"A forest of small creatures gradually expose their expressive selves through the transformation, juxtaposition and mutual interaction with their surrounding sound-environment. Slowly, sound-fragments lose their acoustic source-bond to leave the bare essence of their expressive content and gradually unfold an abstract musical discourse."
The ability to use any sound material in a musical composition suggests a direct route to the inherent (and in-explicit) relationships between the sound, the person, their subsequent emotions and experi ence of the world. Here the listening process can be two-fold: on one hand the listener is guided by the acoustic content of the sound material - its spectral characteristics, shape, gesture and direction, and on the other hand, the listener is constantly interpret ing the sound meanings, which are constructed externally to the instrinsic content of the work. Use of the computer as a compositional tool to explore these relationships unfolds a compositional technique manipulating time-flows from nature and the physical world, while allowing each listener to uniquely interpret not only the connotation or extra-musical meaning in the sound material, but also explore their own sense of time-flow through the listening experience.The combined interpretation of the immediate characteristics of the material, the memory of a wider musical context and an asso ciation with the articulation and physical activity of events in the world recontextualised in the music, construct an interrelated time-frame where the listener's expected sound time-flow can conflict with the sounding development and result in a paradoxical perception of time.

Natasha Barret (GB) composes acousmatic and live electroacoustic music, works with sound diffusion and installation projects, and has recently achieved significant succes in England through dance collaborations. Her work has been commissioned by the ISMA, Sonic Arts Network and independent film artists and choreographers. She is currently a composer in residence at the Norwegian network for Technology, Acoustics and Music (NoTam) in Oslo, Norway.