With William Trafka conducting choir and string orchestra, this anthem is somber, quiet, and deeply reverent.  It instills  a reflective stillness rather than anger or even beauty.  The promise of renewal is in the words while the music that echoes them has a more haunting sense of profound sadness.  As stanzas progress and repeat one hears, always subtly, first the bustle of people going to work, hints of drama regarding what is to come that day, and then not a crescendo but rather the incredible stillness that followed the catastrophe.  One may experience, via the score, the silence of those who survived that day as well as that of those who perished.

A discussion preceding the service in which the anthem was premiered disclosed the creative process and meaning that Mr. Conte and Mr. Walker experienced.  The acrostic of the Walker poem provides the meaning of its hope: "God dwells in joy in the midst of sorrow."  The 'sun' both bears witness and represents Devine grace, it was explained.  Hence the message and hope in this brilliant work is that of transcendence.