Portrait of Alvin Lucier

Birthday profile

Alvin Lucier

Alvin Lucier, American composer and academic (died 2021)

Born
May 14, 1931
Died
December 1, 2021
Zodiac sign
Taurus
Birth year
1931

About Alvin Lucier

Alvin Augustus Lucier Jr. was an American experimental composer and sound artist. A long-time music professor at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut, Lucier was a member of the influential Sonic Arts Union, which also included Robert Ashley, David Behrman, and Gordon Mumma. Much of Lucier's work explores psychoacoustic phenomena and the physical properties of sound. Though Lucier had composed chamber and orchestral works since 1952, the composer and his critics count his 1965 composition Music for Solo Performer as his first mature work. In 1972, Lucier became a musical director of the Viola Farber Dance Company, a position he held until 1979. One of Lucier's most important and best-known works is I Am Sitting in a Room (1969), in which Lucier records himself narrating a text, and then plays the recording back into the room, re-recording it.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Alvin Lucier timeline

  1. Though Lucier had composed chamber and orchestral works since 1952, the composer and his critics count his 1965 composition Music for Solo Performer as his first mature work.
  2. One of Lucier's most important and best-known works is I Am Sitting in a Room (1969), in which Lucier records himself narrating a text, and then plays the recording back into the room, re-recording it.
  3. In 1972, Lucier became a musical director of the Viola Farber Dance Company, a position he held until 1979.

The world when Alvin Lucier was born

Alvin Lucier was born in 1931. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1931

  • #1 song"Stardust" – Artie Shaw
  • Top movieFrankenstein
  • Best-selling bookThe Good Earth – Pearl S. Buck

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentKnute Rockne dies in plane crash
  • Top headlineAl Capone convicted of tax evasion
  • Technology milestoneEmpire State Building completed
  • Defining fadJigsaw puzzles
  • Notable inventionElectric razor
  • World population2.10 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderHerbert Hoover
  • Sports championSt. Louis Cardinals (World Series)
  • U.S. population124.0M

1931 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Alvin Lucier's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19312026
Gas$0.17$3.45/gal
Average home$5,500$435,000
Average income$3,000$67,500
Movie ticket$0.25$11.95
Postage stamp$0.02$0.73
Population124.0M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, MusicBrainz, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.