The program featured the Pittsburgh premieres of four contemporary works inspired by past traditions from around the world. Double bass soloist Jeffrey Turner headlines the program in Missy Mazzoli’s Dark with Excessive Bright (2018), a work that synthesizes musical traditions from the Renaissance and Baroque eras with modern techniques. The piece’s title is borrowed from a phrase in Milton’s Paradise Lost and is a surreal and evocative description of God, written by a blind man. Gabriela Lena Frank’s Leyendas: An Andean Walkabout (2003) is an evocative musical soundscape that juxtaposes western classical and Andean folk music traditions. Chen Yi’s Shuo (1995) opens the program with a “shimmering, sparkling amalgam of folk singing from [the composer’s] native China.” Finally, Jessie Montgomery’s Source Code (2013) is based on syntax derived from black spirituals and reflects the gestures, movements, and speech patters of Civil Rights arts leaders in America.