In the language of the Chinikee Indians, Em-bith-kâ means “the eagle calls”. For all Indians, the voice of the eagle is equated to the voice of their God. The composer was permitted to gain insight into the way of life and mythology of North American Indian tribes and shaped his impressions into the single movement string quartet entitled Em-bith-kâ while residing at the Canadian artist colony of Banff in the fall of 1998. He developed a tonal scale model whose modal character allowed him to create harmonies that closely correspond to his own pictoral images of coming into being, passing away, the changing of the seasons and the transpiring of life. Using no steady meter for long passages, the music evolves out of the rhythm of the joint inhalations and exhalations of the four players. “Hear the drum speak”, says the Indian poet Sky Blue Mary Morrin. The passages marked with Drumming originated through experiencing and interacting with Indian drums and demand an intense and powerful style of playing from the quartet.