On July 16, 1945, the United States carried out the Trinity test, the world’s first nuclear detonation. Today, 80 years later, the University of Chicago — the site of the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction — is host to the Nobel Laureate Assembly for the Prevention of Nuclear War, an event that brings Nobel laureates and nuclear experts together to confront the growing global risk of nuclear war. The event features a performance by the award-winning string ensemble Kronos Quartet, who have spearheaded two new renditions of Bob Dylan’s “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” featuring nearly 50 more artists from around the world. Titled “Hard Rain” and “Hard Rain (Drone),” the new pieces aim to raise awareness of the ongoing threat of nuclear war.

As the global political situation becomes increasingly unstable, says professor Daniel Holz, chair of the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and one of the organizers of the assembly, “the likelihood that we’ll sort of stumble into a nuclear war and the end of civilization … has gone way up.” Holz joins Democracy Now! alongside violinist, artistic director and founder of the Kronos Quartet, David Harrington, to share what inspired them to commission and create “Hard Rain,” which debuts today. “We need everyone in the world to know how dangerous and how awful this is for all of us. And if music and musicians can step up and project those kinds of concerns about all of our futures, then music is doing its job,” says Harrington.

This post was originally published on Democracy Now!.