Steinmetz’s The Illusion of Separateness is a consortium by the Keene Chamber Orchestra and US 20 bassoonists. The piece is about how difficult it is for humans to see that we are connected to everything and everyone. We're now all experiencing a number of simultaneous crises: the Covid pandemic and its awful consequences; a racial pandemic that has surfaced more prominently and divisively; climate crisis, a result of the ignorance of its inhabitants; and political bipartisanism that has divided our country. In these moments of heightened conflict, people who choose to see it have more in common than originally thought—the earth and its inhabitants rely on each other to survive; in a time where we physically cannot be together, more effort is applied to caring for the people/values/causes/ that truly matter. I will perform this concerto along with one other Steinmetz piece, Lament, to evoke the process of grieving and the idea of hope in challenging times.