Stand with Arts and Nature!

More than 250 artists around the world have joined forces. Because the world needs lots of creativity to solve its largest challenge yet.

Watch the event from June 05 or scroll through the page. Welcome to the Beethoven Pastoral Project!

More than 300 artists signed our Artists Declaration - standing with Humanity and Nature!

READ THE FULL DECLARATION AND ARTISTS STATEMENTS

Artists and creatives offer their artistic and musical creativity to be part of the solutions to current planetary challenges. They signed a declaration formally launched on 5 June 2020, which is the UN World Environment Day.

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Patti Smith
Writer, Performer, Musician

"Beethoven has given a body of work reverberating the spectrum human emotions, ideals and visionary possibilities. A body of work that will eternally inspire."

Muhammad Yunus
Nobel Peace Prize Laureate

"This is the most opportune moment to reflect on WHAT we have been doing all these years, HOW we have been doing them, WHY we were doing them?"

Marin Alsop
Conductor

"This is a critical moment to embrace Beethoven's philosophy and 'change the tone' to a united, compassionate, responsible, and respectful attitude towards our environment."

Are you an Artist? Do you support Climate Action?

Then sign our artist declaration. More than 200 artists have already signed: Patti Smith, Muhammad Yunus, John Eliot Gardiner, Igor Levit, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, ...

SIGN NOW

Beethoven Pastoral Day, June 05 2020 from Bonn

Pastoral Day at Futurium, Berlin

On 5 June 2020, the UN Environment Programme's World Environment Day, artists from all over the world made their statement for climate protection in the spirit of Beethoven's Sixth Symphony, the "Pastoral".

Live music and statements by Pastoral Participants from around the world
Live interviews with violinist Daniel Hope, conductor Dirk Kaftan and Patricia Espinosa from UN Climate Change
World premiere of "Sound of Nature", the official movie about the Beethoven Pastoral Project by DW

Watch "The Sound of Nature" – the Official DW documentary about the Beethoven Pastoral Project

Ricky Kej is a composer and music producer from India who is also very active in environmentalism. For the "Beethoven Pastoral Project" he arranged Beethoven’s 6th Symphony, the "Pastoral" for a traditional Indian ensemble. With his compositions he calls upon people of all nations and age groups to protect the environment.

Betty G is an Ethiopian singer and songwriter who uses music to raise awareness of environmental destruction. As an artist who finds inspiration and comfort in nature, Betty G is a kindred spirit to Ludwig van Beethoven, who wrote his Pastoral Symphony as a tribute to the natural world.

Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, the “Pastoral,” is well known. But have you ever heard Brett Deans’s “Pastoral Symphony”? In 2000, composer, viola player and conductor Brett Dean composed his “Pastoral Symphony”. In this Dean celebrates the sound of nature around him.

Celebrating Art and Nature with Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony by Google Arts & Culture

The beauty of nature has inspired painters throughout the centuries to create some of their most marvelled at artworks. In celebration of the United Nations World Environment Day 2020, enjoy a selection of masterpieces dwelling in nature’s beauty, enhanced by the musical jewel that is Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony - the composer’s testament to his deeply felt love for nature.

Artists discussing their role in making change

Climate Action: Music as a Driver for Change

The EFM Online Series will ask how the music sector can act more eco-friendly, how music can help raise awareness for the need of climate action in general, and how the music sector can support activists in their efforts to put environmental issues high on the political agendas.

Driving climate action: the role of musical institutions and leaders

This virtual event brings together representatives from the United Nations, musical conductors, musicians, and thought leaders to share their views on the interaction between the cultural sector, focusing on musical institutions and figures, and the global effort on climate action. What is the role of the musical sector in supporting climate action? What specific actions can musicians and ensembles implement? Listen in to learn more.

Our supporters left a message for you!

Beethoven Pastoral Day is World Environment Day

June 5 is World Environment Day – the day for environmental action! Since 1974, it has been celebrated every year; engaging governments, businesses, celebrities and citizens to focus their efforts on a pressing environmental issue. This year the theme is “Time for Nature” and the focus is biodiversity, very much in sync with Pastoral Project themes!

350.org and Pathway to Paris: A Virtual Festival for Our Planet

Join the Virtual Festival for Our Planet to hear from a host of incredible musicians, frontline activists, thought leaders, artists and political heroes to collectively to envision the road ahead. As humanity faces an unknown future, we must recognize the fact that we simply cannot go back to business as usual.

Beethoven loved Nature.
We love it, too!

On the occasion of Ludwig van Beethoven's 250th birthday we reach out to artists from all over the world! In hist Sixth Symphony, the composer set the relationship between mankind and Nature to music. He couldn't foresee, that this relationships changed profoundly in the coming decades. In the spirit of the "Pastoral Symphony" we send out a strong message for environmental protection and a sustainable way of life.