The Vegetable Parliament: THE VEGETABLE OPERA

The Vegetable Opera reimagines the milpa as a stage for collective expression, resistance, and imagination. The work celebrates the zenith of the vegetal growth, proposing a sonic ecology in which plants are given a voice.

What happens if we allow vegetables to sing? What if, through artistic speculation, we could listen to their dreams, frustrations, and ancestral memories?

Ancient rituals and oral traditions have long integrated symbolism, narration and festivities into agricultural practice. The sacred K’iche’ Maya text Popol Vuh, for example, reflects on the profound symbiosis between humans and plants, where the Three Sisters—corn, beans, and squash—emerge as ancient siblings in an interspecies alliance. Or the campesinos—keepers of the land—attribute personalities and temperaments to the crops, based on how they behave in the soil and interact with one another. 

These spiritual and folkloric insights serve as the foundation for the operatic structure of The Vegetable Opera. Fiction, here, is not a departure from truth, but a method for deepening our relational understanding of the vegetal world. The milpa becomes an orchestra choreographed by ritual, song, and storytelling.

Each member of the choir embodies a specific vegetable and its unique spirit, giving voice to the personality of that plant. The Corn is wise, reflective, with a deep and hoarse voice. The Bean is majestic, adventurous, and impulsive. The Pumpkin is tender, melancholic, and streetwise…and so on.

The opera unfolds in three acts:

Act 1 - Dawn of the Milpa: A typical milpa awakens after a long sleep. The plants engage in an early morning dialogue, sharing feelings, dreams and fragments of ancestral memory.
Act 2 - The Uprising: The dreams are revealed to be nightmares. The milpa experiences a collective awakening that evolves into a social uprising—a demand for accountability from the humans who have led them into an ecological crisis.
Act 3 - The Hymn of Togetherness: Through confrontation and reflection, the characters arrive at a renewed understanding of interconnectedness. A closing hymn is sung—not as a resolution, but as a shared commitment to coexistence, joy, and collective care.

The Vegetable Opera playfully blurs the boundaries between species, inviting us to listen differently—to see the milpa not only as sustenance, but as a polyphonic assembly, a vegetal choir, a radical Commons. It is an artistic gesture that affirms the intelligence of plants, the memory of the soil, and the possibility of a more reciprocal ecology.

After the live performance on 14 August, the piece of music will be played as a sound installation via 8 channels in the Vegetable Parliament in the garden. 

Programme

13. Sep 2025: part five THE CONQUERING BANQUET

Full Programme: www.thevegetableparliament.com

Thursday, August 14
Garden
Start: 7 pm
Free Admission
 

Team

Musical Director: Nicholas Bussmann
Author: Santiago Elordi
Choir: Cottbusser Chor

Artistic Director The Vegetable Parliament: José Délano
 

“The Vegetable Parliament” is funded by Hauptstadtkulturfonds.