“Pam Tanowitz is quick-witted and rigorous. The New York-based choreographer and collaborator has steadily delineated her own dance language through decades of research and creation. Charmingly cheeky, the 2024 Jacob’s Pillow Dance Awardee redefines tradition through careful examination, subtly questioning those who came before her yet never yielding to perceptions stuck in the past. And now, the world’s most respected companies—The Martha Graham Dance Company, The Royal Ballet, New York City Ballet, among others—are proudly integrating Tanowitz’s poetic universe into their repertories.
Tanowitz’s combination of intentional unpredictability, whimsical complexity and natural drama evoke master dance makers from Merce Cunningham to George Balanchine through the clever weaving of movement, music and space. Her “sublime dance theater of the highest caliber” avoids narrative while audiences are instead “taken, poetically, through planes of existence” (The New York Times).
Tanowitz holds degrees from Ohio State University and Sarah Lawrence College, where she clarified her creative voice under former Cunningham dancer and choreographer Viola Farber. After attaining her MFA, Tanowitz moved to New York City to begin her professional career. She immersed herself in dance by working in administration at the New York City Center, splitting her time off by studying the Center’s archived dance videos or developing her own work in their studios. In 2000, she founded Pam Tanowitz Dance (PTD) to explore dance-making with a consistent community of dancers. She has since been commissioned by The Joyce Theater, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, Vail Dance Festival, and many other leading arts institutions, and has received numerous honors and fellowships from organizations ranging from the Bessie Awards, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Herb Alpert Award, and Doris Duke Charitable Foundation among others.
When awarding Tanowitz the 2017 BAC Cage Cunningham Fellowship, Mikhail Baryshnikov, the center’s artistic director, described her interrogative approach to choreography as “a distinct intellectual journey.” Her dances have been called a “rare achievement” (The New York Times) and her 2018 work for PTD, Four Quartets, inspired by T.S. Eliot’s literary masterpiece and set to music by Kaija Saariaho, was called “the greatest creation of dance theater so far this century” (The New York Times). In 2019, in addition to receiving the Herb Alpert Award, Tanowitz was named the first-ever choreographer in residence at the Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York.
Tanowitz’s meticulous years of study have resulted in a non-nostalgic dance dialogue with her own artistic antecedents. But it is not only dance history that colors her choreographic palate. With the same curiosity and intellectual exchange, Tanowitz engages directly with her dancers in the studio. She asks questions and assigns tasks. Her “no steps are off limits” approach encourages the dancers’ own input, which allows an intimate complicity to take place on stage. Of her “gloriously rich” premiere at the Royal Ballet, The New York Times described the dancers as “dancing for and with one another,” and the audience “lucky to be watching” such a tender rapport.
Tanowitz’s resourceful creativity allows her pieces to develop in real-time. Masked contemporary references peak out among traditional movement turned on its side, creating subtle accessibility in the best way possible. Her reconstruction of deconstructed classical and modern dance renders her work uncannily familiar while being entirely brand-new. With a toolbox filled by the present and past, Tanowitz is making dances for the 21st century.”
Text by Sarah Silverblatt-Buser
Photograph by George Etheredge
The Dancers
Kara Chan is a New York based freelance artist, originally from Vancouver, Canada. She has danced lead roles with Twyla Tharp Dance and has assisted Ms. Tharp in the staging of Deuce Coupe and GHOSTCATCHER on American Ballet Theatre. Other performance credits include Lar Lubovitch Dance Company (Artemis in Athens), Mark Morris Dance Group (The Hard Nut), Merce Cunningham Trust, Janis Brenner & Dancers, Gleich Dances, among many others. A BFA graduate from The Juilliard School, Kara was named one of Dance Magazine’s “25 to Watch” for 2020. For more information visit www.karachandance.com.
See works featuring Kara Chan.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Maggie Cloud grew up in Sarasota, Florida and graduated from Florida State University with a BFA in Dance. As a performer, she has been involved in the work of Moriah Evans, Beth Gill, John Jasperse, Neal Medlyn, Sarah Michelson, Pam Tanowitz, Gillian Walsh, and the Merce Cunningham Trust. Maggie has taught at Chen Dance Center, Brooklyn Arts Exchange, and at the University of the Arts. Maggie is also a licensed acupuncturist practicing in New York City.
See works featuring Maggie Cloud.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Dylan Crossman grew up in France and graduated from The Laban Center, in London. He was a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company during the Legacy Tour (2009- 2011) and is now a stager for the Cunningham Trust. A freelance performer and a two-time Bessie recipient, Dylan works with Kimberly Bartosik, Ryan McNamara, Sally Silvers, Amber Sloan, Pam Tanowitz, and Megan Williams. He loves sharing Merce’s teachings, whenever and however he can. Dylan’s company, Crossman Dans(c)e, looks at humanity in formalism and has been called “compellingly poetic” by the New York Times. Dylan made his curatorial debut with a Works & Process at the Guggenheim and a mixed bill at the Art Gallery of Ontario (Toronto), both celebrating Merce’s life, work and legacy.
Christine Flores is originally from Toronto, Ontario and has been working with Pam Tanowitz since 2016. She graduated from New World School of the Arts (Miami) in 2015 with a BFA in Dance and received additional training at Springboard Danse Montreal, the Contemporary Program at Jacob's Pillow, and Cunningham Fellowship workshops. Named one of Dance Magazine’s 2021 “25 to Watch”, Christine is currently based out of New York City and also performing with Company XIV, Danielle Russo Performance Project, Dance Heginbotham, NVA & Guests, and Shinsa Collective.
See works featuring Christine Flores.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Zachary Gonder was born in Grayslake, IL, a small suburb north of Chicago. At the age of five, he started dancing at The Dance Connection, a local studio. He then trained at the Chicago Academy for the Arts High School under the tutelage of renowned choreographer Randy Duncan. He graduated from Juilliard in 2018, where he performed works by Austin McCormick, José Limón, Aszure Barton, Pam Tanowitz, Richard Alston, Gustavo Ramirez Sansano and Crystal Pite. Zachary has worked for BODYTRAFFIC in Los Angeles as well as the Barton Sisters’ Axis Connect Program. Along with Pam Tanowtiz Dance, he also works with Brian Brooks Moving Company and Zvi Dance.
See works featuring Zachary Gonder.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Lindsey Jones is a Brooklyn-based dance artist and educator. She has been a member of Pam Tanowitz Dance since 2013. Since graduating from SUNY Purchase in 2012, she has performed with Dance Heginbotham, Kimberly Bartosik/daela, Caleb Teicher & Co., Sally Silvers, Bill Young, June Finch, Adriane Lee, Ian Spencer Bell, and GREYZONE among others. Jones has been featured in productions directed by Isaac Mizrahi; The Magic Flute, Peter & The Wolf, Third Bird. She has worked with the Merce Cunningham Trust on numerous projects, including Night of 100 Solos at BAM in 2019 and Alla Kovgan’s 3D film, Cunningham. Jones has taught Cunningham technique at Purchase College, served as adjunct faculty at Marymount Manhattan College, and taught master classes for PTD at Dartmouth College, Case Western University, Montclair University, and The Taylor School. Jones grew up in St. Louis, MO.
See works featuring Lindsey Jones.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Brian Lawson is a dance performer and educator who began dancing in Toronto, Canada. He earned his BFA in Dance at SUNY Purchase, and while studying performed with Douglas Dunn and Dancers and the Mark Morris Dance Group. He graduated summa cum laude in 2010 and went on to work with Pam Tanowitz Dance and Dance Heginbotham before joining the Mark Morris Dance Group from 2011-18. Brian left MMDG to earn his M.F.A. from the University of Washington, where he graduated in 2020. He has been on faculty at Cornish College of the Arts and has given masterclasses at Purchase College, NYU Tisch, and the American Dance Festival among others. Recently he partook in the Merce Cunningham Trust's event Night of 100 Solos. He continues to perform with MMDG and is very glad to be rejoining Pam Tanowitz Dance.
Victor Lozano has been a member of Pam Tanowitz Dance since 2016. He holds an M.A. in Performance Studies from New York University and a B.F.A. in Dance from Juilliard. He is originally from Houston, Texas.
Maile Okamura studied with Lynda Yourth in San Diego, CA, and at the San Francisco Ballet School. She was a member of Boston Ballet II and Ballet Arizona. From 2001-2015, Okamura was a member of the Mark Morris Dance Group.
Melissa Toogood is a Bessie Award winning performer who began dancing with Pam 15 years ago. She has assisted Tanowitz on numerous creations including works for the Australian Ballet, Ballet Austin, Martha Graham Dance Company, The Juilliard School, Paul Taylor American Modern Dance, Vail Dance Festival and others. Melissa was a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. She has taught Cunningham Technique internationally since 2007, and is a 2013 and 2015 Merce Cunningham Fellow. Melissa is an official Stager for the Merce Cunningham Trust. She has performed with Kyle Abraham/Abraham.In.Motion, Kimberly Bartosik, Wally Cardona, Rosie Herrera Dance Theater, Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener, Miro Dance Theater, Stephen Petronio Company, Sally Silvers, Christopher Williams, Michael Uthoff Dance Theater, The Bang Group:Tap Lab, and more. Her own work has been commissioned by the Boston Ballet and New York Theater Ballet. Melissa is a native of Sydney, Australia and earned a BFA in Dance Performance from New World School of the Arts, Miami, FL.
See works featuring Melissa Toogood.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
The Collaborators
Reid Bartelme is a freelance fashion and costume designer who lives and works in New York. Prior to designing he spent many years working as a dancer for companies throughout North America. Reid Bartelme and Harriet Jung are the founders of Reid & Harriet Design. For more information visit www.reidandharriet.com.
See work created in collaboration with Reid Bartelme.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Kathleen Ann Chalfant is an American actress. BROADWAY: Angels in America (Tony and Drama Desk nom.), Racing Demon, Dance With Me. OFF-BROADWAY: A Woman of the World, Wit (Drama Desk, Lucille Lortel, Outer Critics Circle, Drama League, Connecticut Critics Circle, Obie Awards), For Peter Pan on Her 70th Birthday, A Walk in the Woods (Drama Desk nom.), Tales from Red Vienna, Miss Ovington & Dr. Dubois, Talking Heads (Obie Award), Dead Man’s Cell Phone, Nine Armenians (Drama Desk nomination), Henry V (Callaway Award). OTHER NY CREDITS: The Vagina Monologues, Iphigenia and Other Daughters, Endgame, Sister Mary Ignatius..., The Investigation of the Murder in El Salvador. FILM: Old, Isn’t it Delicious?, R.I.P.D., The Bath, In Bed With Ulysses, Lillian, Duplicity, The People Speak, Lackawanna Blues, Perfect Stranger, Dark Water, Kinsey, Laramie Project, Random Hearts, A Price Below Rubies, Murder and Murder. SELECT TELEVISION: Recurring on “The Affair,” “The Strain,” “The Americans,” “House of Cards,” “Rescue Me,” “The Book of Daniel,” “The Guardian,” “Law and Order” “One Life to Live”; “Madam Secretary,” “High Maintenance,” “Elementary,” “Muhammad Ali’s Greatest Fight” (HBO), “Georgia O’Keeffe” (Lifetime), “Voices from the White House” (PBS). AWARDS: 1996 OBIE Award for Sustained Excellence, 2004 Lortel Award for Sustained Excellence of Performance, 2015 Lifetime Achievement Award from the League of Professional Women. 2018 OBIE Award for Lifetime Achievement. She has received the Drama League and Sidney Kingsley Awards for her body of work and hold an honorary doctorate in Humane Letters from Cooper Union.
See work created in collaboration with Kathleen Chalfant.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Simone Dinnerstein is an American pianist with a distinctive musical voice. The Washington Post has called her “an artist of strikingly original ideas and irrefutable integrity.” She first came to wider public attention in 2007 through her recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, reflecting an aesthetic that was both deeply rooted in the score and profoundly idiosyncratic. She is, wrote The New York Times, “a unique voice in the forest of Bach interpretation.”
Since that recording, she has had a busy performing career. She has played with orchestras ranging from the New York Philharmonic to the Melbourne Symphony and has performed in venues from Carnegie Hall to the Seoul Arts Center. Her 13 albums have all topped the Billboard classical charts, with her 2021 album, Richard Danielpour’s An American Mosaic, receiving a Grammy nomination in the category of Best Classical Instrumental Solo.
The Washington Post writes that “ultimately, it is Dinnerstein’s unreserved identification with every note she plays that makes her performance so spellbinding.” In a world where music is everywhere, Simone hopes that it can still be transformative. For more information visit www.simonedinnerstein.com.
See work created in collaboration with Simone Dinnerstein.
Photo by Lisa-Marie Mazzucco
FLUX Quartet, "one of the most fearless and important new-music ensembles around" (San Francisco Chronicle), has performed to rave reviews in venues worldwide, including the Tate Modern with BBC Radio3, Park Avenue Armory, Kennedy Center, Mount Tremper Arts, EMPAC, Walker Art Center, Carnegie's Zankel Hall, as well as international festivals in Australia, Europe and Asia. It has also premiered new works on numerous experimental incubators, including Roulette, The Music Gallery, and Mount Tremper Arts. FLUX’s radio appearances include NPR’s All Things Considered, WNYC’s New Sounds and Soundcheck, and WFMU’s Stochastic Hit Parade. The group’s discography includes recordings on the Cantaloupe, Innova, New World, Passin Thru, and Tzadik labels, in addition to two acclaimed releases on Mode encompassing the full catalogue of Morton Feldman’s output for string quartet.
Strongly influenced by the "anything-goes" philosophy of the fluxus art movement, violinist Tom Chiu founded FLUX in the late 90's. The quartet has since cultivated an uncompromising repertoire that combines late twentieth-century iconoclasts such as Cage, Nancarrow, Scelsi, and Ligeti with today's visionaries, including Oliver Lake, Michael Hersch, David First, Alvin Lucier, Michael Schumacher, Sean Shepard, Wadada Leo Smith, Julia Wolfe, Matthew Welch, and others. Having premiered over 100 new works, FLUX has been awarded grants from the American Composers Forum, Aaron Copland Fund, Meet-The-Composer, New Music USA, and Chamber Music America. FLUX also discovers emerging composers from its many college residencies, including Wesleyan, Dartmouth, Williams, Princeton, Bard, and the College of William and Mary.
The spirit to expand stylistic boundaries is a trademark of the FLUX Quartet, and to that end the quartet avidly pursues interdisciplinary projects, resulting in acclaimed new works with choreographers Pam Tanowitz and Christopher Wheeldon, avant balloonist Judy Dunaway, digital collective The OpenEnded Group, and visual artist Matthew Barney. In the upcoming season, FLUX will perform and record the full string quartet output of Toshi Ichiyanagi, widely acknowledged as an influential pioneer of the Japanese avant-garde. For more information visit www.fluxquartet.com.
Ted Hearne (b.1982, Chicago) is a composer, singer, bandleader and recording artist. Inspired by the overlay of different viewpoints and their sonic possibilities, he creates multi-dimensional works that often explore unconventional interactions of text and music, and are rooted in a spirit of inquiry.
Pitchfork called Hearne's work "some of the most expressive socially engaged music in recent memory -- from any genre," and Alex Ross wrote in The New Yorker that Hearne's music "holds up as a complex mirror image of an information-saturated, mass-surveillance world, and remains staggering in its impact."
Hearne's Sound From the Bench, a work for choir, electric guitars and drums about corporate personhood setting texts from U.S. Supreme Court oral arguments, was a finalist for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize. Place, Hearne’s work written with poet Saul Williams and director Patricia McGregor, was nominated for two 2021 GRAMMY Awards and named a finalist for the 2021 Pulitzer Prize.
Ted’s ongoing collaboration with legendary musician Erykah Badu pairs new music with arrangements of Badu’s works for orchestra, most recently presented with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. His album The Source sets the words of former U.S. Army Private Chelsea Manning alongside classified documents from U.S. Dept of Defense cables that she was responsible for leaking to Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. The New York Times called The Source "a 21st Century masterpiece.”
Upcoming collaborations include a new work with poet Dorothea Lasky to be presented at Carnegie Hall, a new theatrical piece with Daniel Fish for Komische Oper Berlin and and a new orchestral project with performance artist and singer-songwriter Taylor Mac. For more information visit www.tedhearne.com.
See work created in collaboration with Ted Hearne.
Photo by Jen Rosenstein
Jeremy Jacob is a critically acclaimed and award-winning visual artist and filmmaker currently based in Brooklyn, New York. Jacob was born in rural Minnesota, 40 mi (64 km) west of St. Cloud, in 1985, into a rural farming community and spent their childhood working on industrial chicken and dairy farms. At the age of 9, Jacob had emergency surgery, performed without anesthesia, after having been severely injured in a farming accident. Sent immediately back to work, the injury would never have a chance to heal properly. In the further isolation caused by the injury, Jacob became obsessed with American cinema. After initially considering joining Saint John's School of Theology and Seminary, Jacob studied for his B.A. in visual arts and cinematography at the Savannah College of Art and Design and Parsons The New School for Design from 2003 to 2008.
Jacob’s work has been presented internationally by such institutions as The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, The Zuckerman Museum of Art, Cindy Rucker Gallery, New York Live Arts, ALL ARTS, The New York Public Library, Projekt 722, Wexner Center for the Arts, Montserrat College Of Art, Kaatsbaan Cultural Park, Fisher Center at Bard College and Princeton University among others. In 2017, Jacob created the podcast Dance and Stuff with Reid Bartleme and Jack Ferver and in 2022 became a co-host of the weekly podcast in addition to producing it. Jacob’s work also includes on-going collaborations with performance-makers including Jack Ferver, Pam Tanowitz, Netta Yerushalmy, and Abby Z and The New Utility among others. For more information visit www.jeremyjacob.com.
See work created in collaboration with Jeremy Jacob.
Photo by Daniel Rampulla
Harriet Jung is a New York-based artist with experience in costume design, womenswear design, and illustration. She studied visual arts at a young age and attended Orange County School of the Arts in Southern California. She earned a degree in molecular and cell biology from the University of California, Berkeley, before studying fashion design at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Upon graduating, she joined the womenswear design team at Jill Stuart. Jung founded Reid & Harriet with Reid Bartelme in 2011. Through this collaboration, she has designed productions at companies domestically and internationally, including New York City Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève, American Ballet Theatre, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Pennsylvania Ballet, Malpaso Dance Company, Miami City Ballet, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Ballet Austin, and Semper Oper Dresden. For more information visit www.reidandharriet.com.
The Knights are a collective of adventurous musicians dedicated to transforming the orchestral experience and eliminating barriers between audiences and music. Driven by an open-minded spirit of camaraderie and exploration, they inspire listeners with vibrant programs rooted in the classical tradition and passion for artistic discovery. The Knights evolved from late-night chamber music reading parties with friends at the home of violinist Colin Jacobsen and cellist Eric Jacobsen. The Jacobsen brothers together serve as artistic directors of The Knights, with Eric Jacobsen as conductor.
Proud to be known as “one of Brooklyn's sterling cultural products... known far beyond the borough for their relaxed virtuosity and expansive repertory” (The New Yorker), the orchestra has toured extensively across the United States and Europe since their founding in 2007. The Knights are celebrated globally, appearing across the world’s most prestigious stages, including those at Tanglewood Music Center, Ravinia Music Festival, the Kennedy Center, the Vienna Musikverein, and Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie. The orchestra has collaborated with many renowned soloists including Yo-Yo Ma, Dawn Upshaw, Béla Fleck, and Gil Shaham.
The 2021-2022 season is in full swing, featuring collaborations with virtuoso pianist and composer Aaron Diehl and dancer/choreographer Twyla Tharp; a new residency partnership with storied New York City venue the 92nd Street Y; and the release of a long-anticipated holiday album, The Knights Before Christmas. For more information visit www.theknightsnyc.com.
See work created in collaboration with The Knights.
Photo by Shervin Lainez
David Lang is one of the most highly esteemed and performed American composers writing today. His works have been performed around the world in most of the great concert halls. Lang’s simple song #3, written as part of his score for Paolo Sorrentino’s acclaimed film YOUTH, received many awards nominations in 2016, including the Academy Award and Golden Globe. His opera prisoner of the state (with libretto by Lang) was co-commissioned by the New York Philharmonic, Rotterdam’s de Doelen Concert Hall, London’s Barbican Centre, Barcelona’s l’Auditori, Bochum Symphony Orchestra, and Bruges’s Concertgebouw, and premiered June 2019 in New York, conducted by Jaap van Zweden. prisoner of the state received its UK premiere in January 2020 with the BBC Symphony, European premieres are rescheduled for 2022-2023. New works for 2021-2022 include sun-centered for the Tallis Scholars — to be interwoven with Antoine Brumel’s monumental Renaissance mass for 12 voices Missa Et ecce terræ motus (“and the Earth moved”); a new evening-length work for Pam Tanowitz Dance, created as part of the dance work Song of Songs; and an evening-length work for the chamber ensemble Eighth Blackbird, composition as explanation. Lang is a Professor of Music Composition at the Yale School of Music and is Artist in Residence at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He is co-founder and co-artistic director of New York’s legendary music collective Bang on a Can.His music is published by Red Poppy Music and G. Ricordi & Co., New York (ASCAP) and is is distributed worldwide by the Universal Music Publishing Group.
See work created in collaboration with David Lang.
Photo by Peter Serling
Brice Marden was born in 1938 in Bronxville, New York, and currently lives and works in New York. He received his BFA in 1961 from Boston University School of Fine and Applied Arts, and his MFA in 1963 from Yale University School of Art and Architecture. Collections include the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; Philadelphia Museum of Art; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Museum of Fine Arts Houston; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC; Saint Louis Art Museum; Tate, London; Kunstmuseum Basel; Museum Wiesbaden, Germany; Musée des beaux-arts du Canada, Ottawa; and Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art. Exhibitions include Cold Mountain, Dia Center for the Arts, New York (1991, traveled to Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Menil Collection, Houston; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid; and Städtisches Kunstmuseum, Bonn, Germany); Work of the 1990s; Paintings, Drawings, and Prints, Dallas Museum of Art (2006, traveled to Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC; Miami Art Museum; and Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh); A Retrospective of Paintings and Drawings, Museum of Modern Art, New York (traveled to San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin); Works on Paper, Kunstmuseum Basel (2007); Jawlensky-Preisträger: Retrospektive der Druckgraphik, Museum Wiesbaden, Germany (2008); and Morocco, Musée Yves Saint Laurent, Marrakech, Morocco (2019). Marden is represented by Gagosian. For more information visit www.gagosian.com.
See work created in collaboration with Brice Marden.
Photo by Alexis Dahan
Jessie Montgomery is an acclaimed composer, violinist, and educator. She is the recipient of the LeonardBernstein Award from the ASCAP Foundation, the Sphinx Medal of Excellence, and her works are performed frequently around the world by leading musicians and ensembles. Her music interweaves classical music with elements of vernacular music, improvisation, poetry, and social consciousness, making her an acute interpreter of 21st century American sound and experience. Her profoundly felt works have been described as “turbulent, wildly colorful and exploding with life”(The Washington Post).Her growing body of work includes solo, chamber, vocal, and orchestral works.Some recent highlights include Shift, Change, Turn(2019) commissioned by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and the Saint PaulChamber Orchestra,Coincident Dances(2018) for the Chicago Sinfonietta, andBanner(2014)—written to mark the 200th anniversary of “The Star-Spangled Banner”—for The Sphinx Organization and theJoyce Foundation, which was presented in its UK premiere at the BBC Proms on 7 August 2021.Summer 2021 brought a varied slate of premiere performances, includingFive Freedom Songs, a song cycle conceived with and written for Soprano Julia Bullock, for Sun Valley and Grand Teton MusicFestivals, San Francisco and Kansas City Symphonies, Boston and New Haven SymphonyOrchestras, and the Virginia Arts Festival (7 August); a site-specific collaboration with BardSummerScape Festival and Pam Tanowitz Dance,I was waiting for the echo of a better day(8 July);and Passacaglia, a flute quartet for The National Flute Association’s 49th annual convention(13 August).Since 1999, Jessie has been affiliated with The Sphinx Organization, which supports young AfricanAmerican and Latinx string players and has served as composer-in-residence for the Sphinx Virtuosi, theOrganization’s flagship professional touring ensemble.A founding member of PUBLIQuartet and a former member of the Catalyst Quartet, Jessie holds degrees from the Juilliard School and New York University and is currently aPhD Candidate in Music Composition at Princeton University. She is Professor of violin and composition at The New School. In May 2021, she began her three-year appointment as the Mead Composer-in-Residence with the Chicago SymphonyOrchestra. For more information visit www.jessiemontgomery.com.
See work created in collaboration with Jessie Montgomery.
Brooklyn Rider has carved a singular space in the world of string quartets over their fifteen-year history with their gripping performance style and unquenchable appetite for musical adventure. Defining the string quartet as a medium with deep historic roots and endless possibility for invention, they find equal inspiration in musical languages ranging from late Beethoven to Persian classical music to American roots music to the endlessly varied voices of living composers. Claiming no allegiance to either end of the historical spectrum, Brooklyn Rider most comfortably operates within the long arc of the tradition, seeking to illuminate works of the past with fresh insight while coaxing the malleable genre into the future through an inclusive programming vision, deep-rooted collaborations with a wide range of global tradition bearers, and the creation of thoughtful and relevant frames for commissioning projects.
Brooklyn Rider has remained steadfast in their commitment to generate new music for string quartet at nearly every phase of their history. Shared during the global pandemic at the height of the US lockdown, the Grammy®-nominated recording Healing Modes (In A Circle Records) presented Beethoven’s towering Opus 132 — the composer’s late testament on healing and the restorative power of new creation — interwoven with five new commissions powerfully exploring topics as wide-ranging as the US-Mexico border conflict, the Syrian refugee crisis, the mental health epidemic, and physical well-being. Described by The New Yorker as a project which "...could not possibly be more relevant or necessary than it is currently," the composers include Reena Esmail, Gabriela Lena Frank, Matana Roberts, Caroline Shaw, and Du Yun.
That same season also saw the release of two projects from vastly different musical spheres—one with the master Irish fiddler Martin Hayes (In A Circle Records) and the other, Sun On Sand (Nonesuch Records), featuring the saxophone great Joshua Redman. In fall 2018, Brooklyn Rider released Dreamers on Sony Music Masterworks with Mexican jazz vocalist Magos Herrera, and 2017’s Spontaneous Symbols (In a Circle Records) featured new commissions by Tyondai Braxton, Evan Ziporyn, Paula Matthusen, Kyle Sanna, and Colin Jacobsen. These records, along with the rest of Brooklyn Rider’s 18-album discography have helped give rise to NPR Music’s observation that Brooklyn Rider is “recreating the 300-year-old form of string quartet as a vital and creative 21st-century ensemble.” For more information visit: www.brooklynrider.com.
Liz Sargent is a director and producer with extensive background in dance, theater and film informs a unique style to stories with complex subject matter. The NY Times describes her work as “imaginative... both lovely and disturbing”. Her films have received awards and distinctions at multiple film festivals including Best Director at Diversity in Cannes 2020, Best Screenplay at Brand Film Festival London, Best World Film & Best Actress at SoHo International Film Festival and a NY EMMY from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. Her short film STRANGERS’ REUNION was 1 of 5 winning scripts to be fully produced by Ritz-Carlton & Hearst. Created with RSA Hong Kong, Final Cut NY, Jungle Sound, Glassworks, and mentoring by Academy Award Nominee Mike Figgis (Leaving Las Vegas), it was released internationally in 6 languages. Informed by a multifaceted career as a choreographer, performer, producer Liz understands the boundaries, freedoms and unexpected surprises in live art. She has collaborated with Pam Tanowitz & Fisher Center @ BARD; Eiko Otake at Jacob’s Pillow, CAP UCLA & UCROSS; curator Lili Chopra at Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and more. These films have been broadcast on PBS/ALL ARTS, screened at Venice Biennale Danza and Lincoln Center Dance on Camera among others. Liz has served as a judge of the IDA Documentary Awards, is a member of NYWIFT, and is an Asian Women Giving Foundation grant recipient. Her work is continually expanding stories about community, family and disability with a bold and true-to-life style of expression. For more information visit: www.sargentliz.com.
Davison Scandrett is a Bessie award-winning lighting designer and production manager based in Brooklyn, NY. In addition to 10 designs for Pam Tanowitz, he has created lighting for works by Merce Cunningham, Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener, Charles Atlas, Sonya Tayeh, , Sarah Michelson, Netta Yerushalmy, Moriah Evans, Mina Nishimura, Dylan Crossman, Andrew Ondrejcak, Rebecca Lazier, Mike Birbiglia, and Neal Brennan. Production management credits include projects with Wendy Whelan, Marina Abramovic, Bill T. Jones, Benjamin Millepied, Kyle Abraham, BalletBoyz, Jennifer Monson, Brian Brooks, Silk Road Ensemble, Steve Reich, The Knights, Lincoln Center Festival, Park Avenue Armory, Lyon Opera Ballet, and Paris Opera Ballet. He served as Director of Production for the Merce Cunningham Dance Company from 2008-2012 and is currently the Design & Production Consultant for the Merce Cunningham Trust.
See work created in collaboration with Davison Scandrett.
Photo by Marina Levitskaya
Caroline Shaw is a musician who moves among roles, genres, and mediums, trying to imagine a world of sound that has never been heard before but has always existed. She is the youngest recipient of the Pulitzer Prize in Music for Partita for 8 Voices (Roomful of Teeth), and she works often in collaboration with others, as producer, composer, violinist, and vocalist. 2022 will see the release of work with Rosalía (on upcoming album MOTOMAMI), the score to Josephine Decker’s film The Sky Is Everywhere (A24/Apple), the premiere of Justin Peck’s Partita with NY City Ballet, the premiere of the new stage work LIFE with Gandini Juggling and the Merce Cunningham Trust, a premiere for NY Philharmonic and Roomful of Teeth, the premiere Wu Tsang’s silent film Moby Dick with live score for Zurich Chamber Orchestra co-composed with Andrew Yee, a second album with Attacca Quartet called The Evergreen (Nonesuch), the premiere of Helen Simoneau’s Delicate Power, tours of Graveyards & Gardens (immersive dance theater work co-created with Vanessa Goodman), and tours with So Percussion featuring songs from Let The Soil Play Its Simple Part (Nonesuch), amid occasional chamber music appearances (Chamber Music Society of Minnesota, Caramoor Festival, La Jolla Music Society). Caroline has written over 100 works in the last decade, for Anne Sofie von Otter, Davóne Tines, Yo Yo Ma, Renée Fleming, Dawn Upshaw, LA Phil, Philharmonia Baroque, Seattle Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, Aizuri Quartet, The Crossing, Dover Quartet, Calidore Quartet, Brooklyn Rider, Miro Quartet, I Giardini, Ars Nova Copenhagen, Ariadne Greif, Brooklyn Youth Chorus, Britt Festival, Vail Dance Festival, and many others. She has produced for Kanye West, Rosalía, Woodkid, and Nas. Her work as vocalist or composer has appeared in several films, tv series, and podcasts including The Humans, Bombshell, Yellowjackets, Maid, Dark, Beyonce’s Homecoming, jeen-yuhs: a Kanye Trilogy, Dolly Parton’s America, and More Perfect. For more information visit www.carolineshaw.com.
Dan Siegler is a Composer and Sound Artist from New York City. His work combines electronic and organic elements, incorporating references to jazz, blues and folk. Strongly influenced by musique concrète, these compositions employ a mixture of analog synthesizers, orchestration for concert instruments, glitch sound material and field recordings. His music has been described as "luxuriously mercurial" by Artforum and “frequently haunting” by The New Yorker. Siegler studied with Bill Dixon and Milford Graves. He came of age immersed in a boundary-pushing New York scene, absorbing the abrasive hip-hop of Public Enemy and the experimental sounds of No Wave.
Siegler received a Bessie Award for his work with Pam Tanowitz. Their collaborations have been performed at The Joyce Theater, Danspace Project, Central Park Summerstage, Lincoln Center Out of Doors, and many other venues from Brooklyn to Buenos Aires. Siegler has composed music for String Noise, Crossman Dans(c)e and Yanira Castro. Other awards and residencies include a WPA Virtual Commission from Works & Process at The Guggenheim Museum, a Composer’s Fellowship to Art Omi, a CAP/UCLA Artist Residency, The Abe Olman Scholarship from The National Academy of Popular Music, a Composer’s Residency at Wildacres and with Tanowitz, an EtM Choreographer + Composer residency at JCAL. Siegler is a Part-time Lecturer at Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University. For more information visit www.dansieglermusic.com.
Clifton Taylor has created designs for Broadway, London’s West End as well as opera, theater, and dance companies around the world. In 2019, he was made a Knight of Illumination in the U.K. for his designs on this production of Four Quartets at the Barbican. His designs for dance have been seen at in the repertoires of the Royal Ballet and Rambert (London), Mikhailovsky (St. Petersburg), Scottish National Ballet, American Ballet Theater, San Francisco, Houston, Lorraine (France), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) and Florence (Italy) ballet companies, among many others. Opera designs have included the New York City Opera, several works for the Haydn Orchestra (Italy), Brooklyn Academy of Music (notably: Watermill, Hagaromo, Itutu, Journey Beyond the West and Passage through the Gong), New York Philharmonic, Tanglewood Music Center and many other companies in the US and around the world. He is a prolific fine art painter and recently had a show in New York at 2 Rivington. Mr. Taylor is also on the design faculty of the UNC School of the Arts in North Carolina. For more information visit www.designcurve.com.
See work created in collaboration with Clifton Taylor.
Photo by Maria Baranova
“An artistic home is very personal to me. It's where I can make my dances; a place where I can fail and struggle and be able to keep working. It’s where I can work in a way with my collaborators that is holistic.” - Pam Tanowitz
The Fisher Center at Bard develops, produces, and presents performing arts across disciplines through new productions and context-rich programs that challenge and inspire. The Center’s relationship with Tanowitz began with the presentation of three works for Bard SummerScape Festival 2015 and continued with the 2018 commission, premiere, and touring of Four Quartets, which has been lauded as “the greatest creation of dance theater so far this century” (The New York Times). Following the success of Four Quartets, Tanowitz became the Center’s first choreographer-in-residence. This three-year fellowship supported by Jay Franke and David Herro included four film commissions, comprehensive administrative and touring support, creation residencies and rehearsal space, professional development, and three large-scale proscenium commissions- the last of which, Song of Songs, premiered in summer 2022.
With the success of Tanowitz’s fellowship, and connected to a 20-year record of developing ambitious productions, the Fisher Center is making its unique brand of long-term, personalized, and holistic support of artists the guiding force of its organizational development into the future. This commitment to American artists like Tanowitz is central to the Center’s mission as a premier professional performing arts center and a hub for research and education that develops, produces, and presents productions and context-rich offerings that challenge and inspire. It is a priority to nurture artists at all stages of their careers. As such, the Fisher Center serves as Tanowitz’s ongoing artistic home. For more information visit fishercenter.bard.edu
