The orchestral works 'Salvation Creek with Eagle' and 'Hagoromo' (1974 and 1977 respectively) continue and develop Lumsdaine's personal take on Australian nature. They are not in any sense programmatic works, but as Lumsdaine has pointed out in a 1983 BBC interview, 'the textures contain smells - one's senses run one into the other'. In musical terms, his by now colourful and versatile harmonic style enables him to control orchestral resources with expertise, as areas of vast harmonic resonance and density are contrasted with passages of limpid simplicity. In 'Salvation Creek', the sense of spaciousness is achieved with recourse to increasingly consonant subsets of the serial matrix, which serve as areas of relaxation in contrast to the occasional violent outbursts. 'Hagoromo', composed for Pierre Boulez and the BBC Symphony Orchestra, is in many ways the summation of Lumsdaine's orchestral output: a complex, 3-movement structure replete with internal cross-references, yet for all that clearly put across to the uninitiated listener. The fast-slow-fast plan is framed by a carefully varied refrain of resonant chords in the brass (accompanied by bass drums). Although the work takes its title from a Japanese Noh Play, it is in effect a celebration of the beauties of nature generally - 'an idealised everywhere', as the critic Paul Griffiths admiringly put it. Whether in the long melodic arches of the slow central section, or the joyous dancing of the last part, the orchestral sonorities are acutely judged, and instantly recognisable as Lumsdaine. Again the harmonic style is clearly focussed with contrasting sections focussing on various modal sub-groups, yet the overall impression is of effortless richness and luminosity. At both its Paris premiere, and its eventual London premiere in 1983, the work generated enormous acclaim from both audiences and critics.