I find ecological sound fascinating. The rhythms, textures and harmonies of nature are impressive. There are endless variations, crystalline structures that branch out in all directions. Man-made sounds on the other hand can be overpowering, full of piercing frequencies and unpleasant, jolting rhythmic patterns. I'm envisioning that many of the sounds for this piece will be man-made. Sounds created through human energy consumption are quite varied. Ultimately I'll be searching for those sounds that have distinctive musical qualities – perhaps even anti-musical qualities! It will be hard to remove altogether the sense of a "cinema for the ears" but I would like, as much as possible, for this to be purely abstract music.

I find it fruitful to limit the soundworld I'm using and then skew source material to a point that it is no longer recognizable. Yesterday I recorded the sound of steam from an espresso maker – steam obviously being an ubiquitous energy that has been utilized well before the invention of electricity. Steam is also produced as a by-product of many sources of energy production and consumption. But does this all matter? Music can not tell us this. The important point here is that it makes a very cool sound! And by focusing in on this particular aspect of energy consumption/production I'm really only creating a scale, or a chord that becomes a part of the language of the work.