Kronos Quartet will give the New York premiere of Awakening: A Musical Meditation on the Anniversary of 9/11, for the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM)'s 2011 Next Wave Festival, with four consecutive nights of performances at the BAM Harvey Theatre this Wednesday through Saturday, September 21–24, with special guests the Brooklyn Youth Chorus. Kronos Quartet will give a preview of the show when they perform live on Soundcheck from NPR member station WNYC, 93.9 FM; tune in today at 2 PM ET, online at wnyc.org. Afterward, Kronos cellist Jeffrey Ziegler participates in a live online chat on Q2's New Canon, at 4 PM on wqxr.org, along with his wife, composer Paola Prestini, whose music will be featured in Awakening at BAM.

As a special offer for readers of the Nonesuch Journal, Kronos and Nonesuch Records have partnered with BAM to give away a pair of tickets to the Opening Night performance this Wednesday. For your chance to see the first New York performance, simply leave a comment below or e-mail info@nonesuch.com by Tuesday, September 20, at 6 PM ET, letting us know which album from the quarter century of Kronos Quartet recordings on Nonesuch has meant the most to you. For a look at that remarkable collection, click here. Winners will be chosen at random; no purchase necessary.

Wednesday's Opening Night performance comes one day after the release of Steve Reich's new album, WTC 9/11; the title piece, which reflects on the World Trade Center attacks of September 11, 2001, was commissioned and performed by Kronos Quartet.

Awakening: A Musical Meditation on the Anniversary of 9/11 was created by Kronos for a concert in San Francisco on September 11, 2006, five years after the attacks. Its catalyst was the debut of a specially commissioned work by Michael Gordon titled The Sad Park, which incorporates the sampled voices of young children who witnessed the events at Ground Zero.

Around that nucleus, the group assembled works from Uzbekistan, Iraq, Iran, India, Germany, Argentina, Sweden, Finland, Russia, Canada, and the United States, drawing from composers including Terry Riley, Osvaldo Golijov and Gustavo Santaolalla. Since the premiere, Awakening has been presented in several cities around the US; the Next Wave performances mark its New York debut.

This collection of works reflects upon those instances where traditional language fails, and music steps in to restore what Kronos Quartet artistic director and violinist David Harrington refers to as “equilibrium in the midst of imbalance.”

In addition to the Awakening performances, Harrington will participate in an artist talk titled Artists Respond to 9/11 at the BAM Rose Cinemas on Thursday.

Get a preview of what's to come in this video from BAM: