We conclude our 10th season with a landmark event, the world premiere of The Unknown Sea, by renowned composer David Conte. Composed for mezzo soloist, SATB chorus, piano and chamber orchestra, the piece is based on the texts of preeminent American poet Elizabeth Bishop. Bishop is one of the most celebrated poets of the 20th Century. A “poet’s poet,” she was the Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress (a position now known as the nation’s Poet Laureate), a Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winner, and a gifted teacher. Conte will attend the premiere and participate in a pre-concert conversation led by former Poet Laureate of California, Dana Gioia. Gioia was both a student of Bishop and the moderator at the Chorale’s inaugural concert in February 2010. The Unknown Sea will be paired with Ralph Vaughan Williams’s masterful cantata, Dona Nobis Pacem based on Walt Whitman’s poems and texts from the Bible, and re-orchestrated by British composer and conductor Jonathan Rathbone. The pre-concert event will be free and open to the public and will begin at 4:00pm. Photo credit: Library of Congress.