Text has been an important resource for Reynolds's work, and since the mid-1970s he has been engaged with the use of language as sound, "the ways in which a vocalist's manner of utterance – whether spoken, declaimed, sung, or indebted to some uncommon mode of production" affect the experience of the ideas that the text carries. Reynolds was stimulated by his UCSD colleagues Kenneth Gaburo and baritone Philip Larson, deploying extended vocal techniques, such as "vocal-fry" in the VOICESPACE works (quadraphonic tape compositions): "Still" (1975), "A Merciful Coincidence" (1976), "Eclipse" (1979), and "The Palace" (1980).