A Plastic Ocean Oratorio from Omar Musa and Mariel Roberts Musa, and a new Chapter for Guy Blackman

Omar Musa and Mariel Roberts Musa’s collaborative performance work The Offering is subtitled ‘A Plastic Ocean Oratorio’. For Musa, it is “an offering of borderlessness in an archipelago of humanity”. It confronts the present – climate change, colonisation, personal histories – with an imagined future narrative through Omar’s inimitable spoken word and Mariel’s fearless cello, which we’ll get a sneak preview of from the Riverside Theatres rehearsal room. 

Guy Blackman was a Pink Floyd-obsessed teenager living in Perth when he started a Syd Barrett fanzine which eventually morphed into the beloved indie record label Chapter Music. For 33 years the label has released albums by Australian bands and artists like NO ZU, Twerps, June Jones, Laura Jean, alongside reissues and compilations from international artists like Kath Bloom and Smokey. This year Guy is winding the label back, choosing to focus solely on reissues. He chats to Andrew about three decades of change in the music landscape, and about his new solo album Out Of Sight, which belatedly follows up his 2008 debut Adult Baby. 

And Andy remembers Alfred Brendel, the pianist who has died at the age of 94.