Season V

new album out now!

With Season V, the Vegetable Orchestra presents its new album and opens a fresh chapter in an artistic practice that has been unlike any other worldwide since 1998. The “V” in the title stands for several things at once: Vegetable, the Roman numeral for the orchestra’s fifth album, and an imaginary fifth season – a space beyond familiar categories in which sounds, genres and expectations can be rearranged. The instrumentarium itself also enters a special fifth season in this new cycle.

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released October 16, 2026

For more than 25 years, the Vegetable Orchestra has explored the musical possibilities of an extraordinary set of instruments. The ensemble builds its instruments from fresh vegetables such as carrots, leeks, pumpkins and aubergines, continually developing and refining their design and signature sound. Over time, this has evolved into a distinctive musical language moving between contemporary music, sound research, rhythmic structures, techno, ambient, improvisation and noise.

Season V makes this ongoing development audible once again. The pieces are focused yet open. Organic textures meet rhythmic structures, fragile sounds encounter powerful layers of sound. Established musical patterns are extended and reimagined without losing their familiar roots or the characteristic sound of the Vegetable Orchestra. The album brings together more than a quarter-century of experience with an undiminished curiosity about new sonic territory.

The new pieces draw on reggaeton in “Aubertone” and cumbia in “Cucumbia”, while “Modulette” playfully explores minimal music and loose forms of aleatoric composition. The album also features a cover version of “Moondog’s Theme”, revealing the striking affinity between the sonic world of the US composer and musician Moondog and that of the Vegetable Orchestra.

“Pulsar” sets a monotonous pulse against the organic chaos of carrot flutes and leek leaves. “Ferment” translates the image of an magnified onion skin into microscopic layers of sound. “Celeriac Drive” generates tones by using motor-driven wooden balls on carrot xylophones. “Bosporus Breeze” was inspired by impressions from a concert in Istanbul. Inspired by Bach’s The Art of Fugue, "Refugio” explores the idea of places of refuge, with the forest as its central image. “Decomposition” sonically accompanies the final journey and disintegration of discarded vegetable instruments as they make their way through the compost. “Mosquito's Lament” then follows the hectic life of a mosquito for several minutes.

To experience The Vegetable Orchestra live is to enter the very fifth season that Season V captures in the studio: a sonic space that reveals its full impact on the stages where the ensemble performs around the world.

The Vegetable Orchestra is exploring the sonic and musical potential of vegetables since 1998. All sounds on this album are played on fresh or dried vegetable instruments.

All instruments built and played by The Vegetable Orchestra

Composed, arranged and produced by The Vegetable Orchestra: Jürgen Berlakovich, Verena Fuchs, Susanna Gartmayer, Barbara Kaiser, Matthias Meinharter, Jörg Piringer, Ingrid Schlögl, Ulrich Troyer, Stefan Voglsinger, Martina Winkler

Except "Moondog's Theme" composed by Louis Thomas Hardin

Recorded and mixed
by Ulrich Troyer at 4Bit Studio, Vienna

Mastered by Kassian Troyer at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin

Track 1/3/5/10/12 additional recordings and pre-mixes by Jürgen Berlakovich

Photo credits: Apollonia Theresa Bitzan

Cover design: Matthias Meinharter