HackerTubewatch
Surprise me
Frame from Alvin Lucier - I Am Sitting In A Room Plays via YouTube's privacy-enhanced embed

Alvin Lucier - I Am Sitting In A Room

TrilobiteJuice
Music
YouTube
1 HN user recommended this music video1 month2016–2023 score 1
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

HN cites it as the canonical work behind repeated re-recording experiments, and a pivotal piece of minimalist music worth listening to patiently.

Alvin Lucier's 1969 minimalist piece in which a spoken text is repeatedly played back and re-recorded in a room until the room's resonances replace the words. This is the 1981 Lovely Music recording.

“It's a pivotal piece of minimalist music.” (HN, 2023)

1 recommendations · 4 citations · Music

5 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@frereubu Apr 2023 Recommends
on HN thread If Philip Glass Were a Film
I love the earlier, even more minimal pieces like Music With Changing Parts: [link] And I love the parallels to things like I Am Sitting In A Room by Alving Lucier: [this video] (If you're not familiar with this piece, it might be worth reading about it first - [link] ) I hesitate to say this because it depends on your tastes, but I'd recommend setting aside the time to listen to these beginning to end if you can. You'll probably feel a bit fidgety for the first 10 / 15 minutes, but in my view it's really worth persevering because I find the payoffs are worth it.
Patient listening pays off in minimalist work

Citations, criticism and jokes

@necubi Oct 2020 Cites it
on HN thread Teageneration (or: why I don’t trust transporters) (2016)
This is like a physical version of "I Am Sitting In A Room" [0], a classic work of experimental music. In that piece, Alvin Lucier speaks the words "I am sitting in a room different from the the one you are in now..." into a recorder, which is then played back into another recorder, on and on until it becomes unintelligible. [0] [this video]
Classic piece of repeated re-recording until speech dissolves
@austinjp Nov 2023 Cites it
on HN thread I Am Sitting in a Room (1969)
A piece of sound art in which Alvin Lucier repeatedly played back and re-recorded his voice in a room, until his words became completely unintelligible, and only resonant frequencies of the room remained. It's a pivotal piece of minimalist music. Edit to add link to YouTube of the recording: [this video]
Recording of the piece, where room resonances replace words

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

Keyboard shortcuts

/
Search
j k
Next / previous video
r
Surprise me
l
Like (video page)
w
Watch later (video page)
?
This help
Esc
Close