Through a discussion of the installation piece, The Trade / Oro por Baratijas, the authors address the theoretical issues behind the development of ecologically based compositional work. They discuss whether ecologically based music can be studied using linguistic tools. A process that describes the relationship between an individual and his specific social context is proposed: the personal environment. Consistency is discussed in relation to environmental sound listening processes and ecological modelling work. The first part of the paper concludes by suggesting that form-creation is dynamically determined by a process of mutual adaptation between listener and environment. The second part focuses on compositional methods and contextual elements as they are used in The Trade.