On the Day the World Ends (2009)
for mixed SATB choir

Duration: ca. 14'00"
Instrumentation: mixed SATB choir (a cappella with divisis, SSAATTBB)
Commissioned by Volti, Robert Geary, Artistic Director, for its 30th Season

World Premiere: Volti, Robert Geary, director, May 15, 16 and 17, 2009, San Francisco, Berkeley and Palo Alto, CA, USA.

Program Notes (Short Version - For Programs)

On the Day the World Ends consists of settings of the poems Song on the End of the World by Czeslaw Milosz, Life’s Tragedy by Paul Laurence Dunbar and Do not stand at my grave and weep by Mary E. Frye. Milosz is a Nobel Prize-winning Polish-American poet, Paul Laurence Dunbar is America's first prominent African-American poet, and Mary E. Frye was a housewife and florist who became well-known because of her poem.

– Robert Paterson

Reviews and Quotes

"If this is not in your [Volti] 30 year recording project, it must be. It is an incredibly moving piece for young and old alike... It has the makings of a modern Choral Standard, Volti should do what you can to help it along the path. Thank you for the commission and the first performance, but the commercial recording will put the icing on the wonderful cake you made... One would think that three texts on eschatology, tragedy, and death would make for a rather dismal piece of music. But Rob has created one of the most moving and beautiful compositions it has ever been my pleasure to hear. A poignant pleasure to be sure, but aren't those really the best kind?... If you ever get a chance to hear this work, or Volti does record it, let nothing get in your way. Hear it!"