"Listening in Deep Space" by Dale Trumbore - The 18th Street Singers

"Listening in Deep Space" by Dale Trumbore (b. 1987) Commissioned for the 18th Street Singers in celebration of our 20 anniversary season. I. Mapping the Unknown | Text by Diane Thiel (b. 1967) We've always been out looking for answers, telling stories about ourselves, searching for connection, choosing to send out Stravinsky and whale song, which, in translation, might very well be our undoing instead of a welcome. We launch satellites, probes, telescopes unfolding like origami, navigating geomagnetic storms, major disruptions. Rovers with spirit and perseverance mapping the unknown. We listen through large arrays adjusted eagerly to hear the news that we are not alone. Considering the history at home, in houses, across continents, oceans, even in quests armed with good intentions, what one seeker has done to another— what will we do when we find each other? II. Pantoum for Laika with No Return | Text by Stacy Gnall Little dog, little star, little tooth bared and confused for a grin, you burn through the sky like a bright white lie. They said you felt nothing when you died. How small did our love look from that height? You burn through the sky like a bright white lie, you little vital, you little dash and line. How small did our love look from that height, how blue the truth? The fear in your throat so bright it seared the night. You little vital, you little dash and line. You little groove on a loop gone ‘round the moon – the truth? The fear in your throat so bright we can still read by it at night. You little tiger through a ring of fire. Little groove on a loop gone ‘round the moon, What is Russian for here? What is Russian for home? Little tooth bared and confused for a grin, I cannot dance you, dream you down. Little tiger through our ring of fire, I cannot take you back like their words. III. Elemental Trail | Text by Diane Thiel (b. 1967) Through thousands of light years, travel on, making an album of the stars, each image sent, already gone, through thousands of light years–travel on, recording the ancients, the long elemental trail fused in ours through thousands of light years, travel on, our family album in the stars. ------------------------ 18th Street Singers Spring Concert, "Synthesis" June 13 & 14, 2025 www.18thstreetsingers.com