Animal communication expert Nollman and two artist friends set out for Canada's vast Mackenzie Delta, electric guitar and underwater sound equipment in tow, to make music with belugas - the elusive white whales of the Arctic. They unwittingly find themselves at the centre of a heated controversy over the Beaufort Sea belugas: Why have the whales stopped coming into the Mackenzie Delta, possibly jeopardizing their own calves, who live the first part of their lives in these shallow, warm waters? Nollman goes on to suggest metaphors for our time about animal rights and animal intelligence, the role of science in conservation, the politics of extinction, and the place of art in the epic struggle to save the natural world.