One of several short works which together comprise Unheard Voices, Ancient Spaces, Running — Dawn: Microcosm consists of two distinct sections which both refer to common source materials and geographic spaces, but with very different resulting characteristic evocations. This work takes the listener on a journey through the rapidly moving and often violent world of running water, interrupted by moments of relative calm and percussive ostinati, and arrives in the setting of a still mountain lake environment in the early morning. While recording the materials for this piece, however, it became very apparent, very quickly, that dawn is often the most active time of the day for animals, and I represented this by contrasting very dense choruses of activity with the smooth surface of the water. Percussive instruments were used to texturally relate to the percussive nature of the fast moving water. Gongs and other pitched metallic sounds were used in the Dawn section — these were chosen for their suggestive temple-like meditative qualities, which I found to underlie the surging activity of the time.

All of the naturally occuring sound sources were recorded by the composer in wilderness areas of Southern Alberta. Unheard Voices, Ancient Spaces, and the works which comprise it, is a large scale acousmatic work which was composed for the multi-channel diffusion of an 8-track digital source tape. This diffusion was realised at the Banff Centre for the Arts, in October, 1999, using the Richmond Audio Box, at a residency provided by New Adventures in Sound. A stereo reduction of the diffusion is presented here.