Talk about a change of scenery. Paul Miller left behind his familiar world of pulsating, crowded, sweaty urban discos for the silent, frozen expanses of Antarctica.

"I wanted to get out of my comfort zone," reported the renowned New York writer/artist/musician, known to disco denizens and hip-hop fans as DJ Spooky.

But why trade headphones for ear muffs?

"You can't get a sense of perspective about your world until you pull away," he said.

For four weeks at the end of 2007, Miller traveled to the bottom of the planet to photograph the landscape - solo - with hardly a human or penguin in sight. He also brought a portable studio to record the windy world of that forbidding region.

Back home, he assembled his audio-visual record into a 70-minute program titled Terra Nova: The Antarctica Suite, which will premiere Sunday in the Ellie Caulkins Opera House as part of Dialog:City.

College-educated and endlessly curious, Miller viewed the adventure as a way "to get a look at nature, to discover some different flavors" in his world.

He had no trouble linking his life as a club DJ with the work of those who study the planet's frozen regions. "Scientists can sample ice like I sample a record," he said. "They can pull out core samples dating back 400,000 years.

"Everything is connected. The question is, where does nature end, and urbanism start?"

Miller agreed that the change in climate proved quite a jolt. "I'm half-Jamaican," he said with a laugh - then noted that he had attended Bowdoin College in Maine, "so, cold is not foreign to me."

Recording the stark scenery of Antarctica involved pointing and shooting pictures and video. Capturing the sound of that land proved trickier. "When the wind isn't blowing, it's so quiet down there," he said. "I had to use different compositional strategies."

That involved throwing in some sampled rhythm tracks of his own. "There's a combination of the artificial and the natural, just like our world. Again, the question is, where do those two meet?

"I think of composers as poets of sound. The landscape, really, is a form of poetry."

Miller stressed that Terra Nova is not merely another treatise on global warming.

"There is change going on - some good and some bad," he said. "Much of it is just a roll of the dice, and I celebrate that. I won't be pounding (the audience) over the head. I want to leave room for interpretation.

"We all know there is global warming, but it's been worse in the past. A meteorite killed off all the dinosaurs, the Black Plague nearly wiped out Europe.

"As an artist, my task is to show people that another world is possible. You use whatever tools you have, to get people to listen in - and to think."

Shulgoldm@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5296

Say "O"

"The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second; and throughout nature this primary figure is repeated without end. It is the highest emblem in the cipher of the world."

So begins Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay, Circles.

"Ann liked that, and it led her in this direction," said Denver composer John Kuzma, referring to the respected installation artist Ann Hamilton. Inspired by the essay, Hamilton collaborated with Kuzma on Circle of O's.

This brief work, sung by a chorus of 200, each holding one of the artist's colorful "wave boards," will be presented at 5:30 p.m. Monday in the Performing Arts Complex.

Originally to be staged along the 16th Street Mall, O's was moved to the vaulted Galleria - "a less hostile acoustic venue," Kuzma noted.

The piece will be sung live by an ensemble that includes members of Kuzma's choir from Montview Boulevard Presbyterian Church, the Colorado Children's Chorale and Arthur Jones' Spirituals Project.

Per Hamilton's suggestion, the text for this piece consists of the letter O. "The music is laid out in six to eight vocal parts," Kuzma said. "It's in two segments - one in the style of shape-note singing, and the other that is a tender Appalachian ballad."

The work will be sung at the start and conclusion of the performance, with readings and spirituals sandwiched between. "It's a gift to the community," Kuzma said of the admission-free event. "We wanted to do something that would transcend the (Democratic) convention."

Terra Nova

* When and where: 7 p.m. Sunday, Ellie Caulkins Opera House, 14th and Curtis streets

* Cost: Admission is free

* Information: dialogcity.org

* Of note: New York-based artist/musician DJ Spooky offers his multimedia work drawn from a visit to Antarctica.