Remix of previous Big Marsh tracks for a private temporary installation June 2018.

Norman W. Long has been following the revitalization of Big Marsh since 2015. He has done this by recording Big Marsh at several times during the year (when the City allows the public in to the area) and since it has opened as a Bike Park and Nature area. He believes listening is great tool to determine the health and resilience of this ecology. Composition, listening and improvisation with the soundscape is a way of being part of the soundscape and affirmation of existence.

Culturally we have been conditioned to separate ourselves from our environment. To treat sound in and of itself and be relegated by race gender and class by timbre. Through creative work with synthesis and field recording Norman makes his own timbres, places and paths.

Within the South Deering neighborhood lies a brownfield marsh area called “Big Marsh” at 11400 S Stony Island Ave that the Park District is in process of ecological restoration. Once the site of a waste and slag dumping ground from surrounding industrial operations since the late 1800s, the City of Chicago and the Chicago Park District teamed up in early 2000s to restore this area to a healthy habitat and eco-recreation park. The Chicago Park District acquired the site in 2011 and began the park planning, environmental assessment, and community input process. A Framework Plan for the park was completed in 2014. Design for the bike park feature in the southwest section of the park began in 2014 and the bike park opened in 2016. The northwest section of the park also opened to the public in 2016 with a new walking trail and parking lot. Big Marsh will be the site for the future Ford Calumet Environmental Center, expected to open in 2018. (www.chicagoparkdistrict.com/parks-facilities/big-marsh-park-no-564#locmap)