Pam Tanowitz's "Pastoral" opened at the Barbican in London as a UK premiere collaboration between the New York choreographer, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Caroline Shaw and artist Sarah Crowner.
The piece draws inspiration from Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony and the concept of the pastoral in art. Shaw deconstructs the Beethoven score, layering three live musicians playing various reed instruments with excerpts of orchestral recordings that function as echoes or memories, alongside real-world sounds from streets, skies and the city.
Tanowitz's aesthetic stands apart from current trends in dance. The stage itself becomes a tool: bright and clean rather than dark and shadowy, with abundant white space both literal and figurative. The production avoids the theatrical haze and claustrophobic soundscapes common in contemporary work.
The choreography itself reflects precision. Tanowitz's movement can read as eccentric or odd, but each choice is deliberate and thought-through. Every angle and gesture appears planed to an exact degree, with specificity guiding the overall vision. This exactness extends to how the dance interacts with Shaw's score and Crowner's visual contribution, creating a unified artistic statement rather than three separate elements occupying the same space.