Jeremy Deller's acid brass, Bach's St John Passion, and Victoria Pham's singing mushrooms

Artist Jeremy Deller first made the connection between acid house music and brass bands back in 1995. The project that emerged, ACID BRASS, brings community bands together in raucous live events. Deller says he was “liberated by brass bands” – since then he’s won the Turner Prize, made conceptual, installation and video art across the world, and represented the UK at the Venice Biennale. Now he brings ACID BRASS to Melbourne’s Rising festival, and he talks to Andy about what music has given his art practice, and what his art has given his music.

Bach’s St John Passion is not his most famous Passion oratorio – often eclipsed by the St Matthew Passion, this earlier work is wilder and more extravagant. John O’Donnell is getting ready to conduct Accademia Arcadia, Ensemble Gombert, and a cast of soloists in a period instrument performance of the Passion to mark its 300th anniversary.

Composer, artist, and archaeologist Victoria Pham joins us on The Music Show to talk about her latest bio-installation Listening Gardens ii - soil fields showing at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery. Her work crosses the boundaries of music and sound in order to communicate otherwise-unheard symphonies of nature. She leans on her background as a biological anthropologist to create a mushroom opera, an orchestral Boeing 747, and draught conservation plans told through synthesisers. 

Performance dates:

Jeremy Deller

1 - 16 June, ACID BRASS, Rising Festival Melbourne. Full details of free performance locations here.

Bach's St John Passion 

8 + 9 June, Bach's St John Passion, Woodend Winter Arts Festival. St Ambrose Church Templeton St, Woodend.

Victoria Pham

4 May - 23 June, Listening Gardens ii -- Soil Fields, Season One: Terrestrial. Bathurst Regional Art Gallery.

Technical production by Simon Branthwaite

This episode of the music show was produced on Gadigal Land and on Gundungurra Country