Castlemaine Piano Guerrillas

Duration: 2025

The Maine Piano Guerrillas are coming to Castlemaine Fringe 2025 and now beyond!
During Castlemaine Fringe 2025 and now beyond, The Coolroom at the Northern Arts Hotel are joining forces with an underground piano movement to put donated upright pianos in prominent locations around town to encourage a new movement targeting the spontaneous mellifluous, mesmerising and melodious machinations of music in public places. The Program see: bit.ly/pianoguerrillas

PIANOS AT LARGE
During the Festival and now beyond we will perpetuate piano mayhem at eight locations around Castlemaine.

Stay tuned for regular concerts and sometime milk crate seat popups.

MAINE PIANO GUERRILLAS PIANOS AT LARGE LOCATION

Market Building Front Portico 44 Mostyn St Castlemaine,
24 Hour access outside
Piano: Hapsburg, Hugo Wertheim Melbourne made – nice instrument # 3396. Tuned to 320hz
Castlemaine Senior Citizens Centre next to Castlemaine Library
Open only for specific events.
Piano: Ronaldi, Berlin Piano [20s-60s] Beale Agents. Tuned to concert pitch 440hz.
Castlemaine Community House through foyer 30 Templeton St Castlemaine,
Open 9-3pm Monday to Friday but not Tuesday morn cooking classes.
Piano: Klingmann, Berlin [Honky Tonk] Not being tuned.
The Tap Room, The Mill 9 Walker St Castlemaine,
Open from 12 noon 7 days.
Piano: Hans Rose Berlin, #12271, Tuned to 320 Hz.
The Mill Castlemaine Bazaar 9 Walker St Castlemaine
Open 9-5pm 7 days.
Piano: Thürmer #35689 Existing in-situ: was workers piano for the Mill when a carpet factory. Tuned.
To Be Advised
Piano: Thalberg Player Piano #8750. Historic Piano purchased in 1974 from Carriage Arms Hotel Castlemaine (Original XXXX Brewery)
Northern Arts Hotel 359 Barker St Castlemaine.
Accessible on request. Wertheim Piano tuned to concert pitch.
The Albion Hotel, 152 Duke St Chewton
Inside accessible during open hours unless gig on. Thur & Fri 5pm-10pm, Sat 12pm-10pm, Sun 2pm – 6pm
Piano: Yamaha Upright. Tuned to 440 hz.
Maldon Bakery, 51 Main St Maldon Contact: Rebecca Barnett.
24 hour access.
Piano: Gors & Kallmann Piano Tuned to 312hz
Rail Underpass: Corner of Forest & Kennedy St on way to Camp Reserve, 24-hour access
Piano: F Bauer, Hamburg #18812 total honky tony untuned, possibly untunable, but great echo!

MAINE PIANO GUERRILLAS LAUNCH CONCERT
Friday 21 March at 7.30pm, with a launch of a piano music fundraising concert at The Coolroom Northern Arts Hotel.

PIANOS AT LARGE GRAND FINALE CONCERT
Sunday 6 April at 6pm, end with a public perfectly played grand piano Concert at The Coolroom Northern Arts Hotel.

MUSIC GROUP OR CHOIR – JOIN IN!
Are you a community musician, choir, or small group that would love to be part of our planned and or spontaneous program? Get in touch as we want to program some weekend and mid week gatherings.

Contact Helen 0431 747 504 or mainepianoguerrillas@gmail.com
https://bit.ly/pianoguerrillas

ABOUT THE PIANO PALS

PIANISTS AT LARGE [PIANO PALS] first appointed for Castlemaine Fringe 2025.

Maggie Jackson:
Our patron and well known local jazz pianist who can be seen playing piano and many local events including with her NY Jazz Trio, At Arcare for the residents and families, for the IWD Concert, at the Castlemaine Secondary College where she plays for students., Castlemaine Jazz Festival and more. Maggie enthusiastically joined us on this journey as great lover of the piano. Her baby grand Steinway and Maggie have had a 30 year love affair.

Jem Challender:
Jem plays with a variety of other musicians around Castlemaine and is a passionate Jazz pianist. He is the leader pianist and songwriter and inspiration behind the Jazz group The Anticlinal Fold, He has presented many concerts at The Coolroom , raised money for Asylum Seekers Resource Centre, presented our 2024 Christmas Concert involving his three children, Thomasina, violinist and Castlemaine Secondary College Musician of the Year, Mary another talented violinist, and his youngest is Albertine, who recently commenced her piano journey and is already showing promise.

Paul Ryan:
Paul started this journey for our group leading conversation about the need to save pianos been given away and put them to good use and proposed project to put them on our street and so The Maine Piano Guerrillas was born and now we have the Fringe project. Paul is also pianist who is presenting a unique show during Fringe with a colleague Victor O Circumstance where they use digital piano, and recorded sounds and projections to explore original poems and musical landscapes based on a range of related themes, traversing fanciful, poignant and sometimes surreal spaces of imagination.

Jude Russell:
Jude says ‘I would dearly love to take advantage of using these pianos in the street. I’m wondering if you could give me more info on their locations so that I may consider my accessibility to them beforehand. I’m highly qualified as a classical pianist, have had a major career in jazz but these days I prefer to freely improvise from the heart and I can imagine in this situation taking inspiration from surrounding environment and people. I’m an Australian Art Orchestra Alumni and these days am mostly involved with their events and their affiliation with Castlemaine-based Punctum.’

John Meir:
John is well known local jazz musician both on guitar and piano and leads the local group John and The Meircats. [more to come!]

The Coolroom supported by Music Victoria

Duration: 2024-2025

10,000 Gigs: The Victorian Gig Fund

We are very pleased to announce that The Coolroom has received a grant under the 10,000 Gigs: The Victorian Gig Fund which will support 20 gigs over the next nine months in the The Coolroom. s over the next few months we have already announced that will recieve this support includes Jesse Lawrance Music, Sally Ford and the Idiomatics, Hetty Kate Trio, Peter and the Wolves, and lots more to come.

The first round of 10,000 Gigs: The Victorian Gig Fund will fund 144 venues to stage paid gigs by local artists. Venues awarded grants include iconic Melbourne venues such as The Tote, The Jazzlab, Mamma Chen’s and Laundry, regional venues like Ballarat’s Volta, Barwon Heads Hotel and Theatre Royal, Taproom and The Coolroom in Castlemaine, along with suburban venues including Narre Warren’s District 14.

____________________________________________________________________

Best Regional Venue/ Presenter (Over 50 Gigs).

We are also very pleased to announce we have been short listed for Music Victoria 2024 Awards Nominee: Best Regional Venue/ Presenter (Over 50 Gigs). This nomination is recognition, we believe, for the tireless work our venue has done to create a program that connects our regional audience with the best in small venue acts possible in our active listening venue.

We have embraced music from a range of genres from jazz to experimental, from country to blues, world music and singer songwriter, nurturing both local talent and some of the best of Melbourne and touring acts from elsewhere, whilst providing a venue for new work, album launches and regular income for musicians.

To Thank The Room

Duration: January 2025

Saturday 18 January 2.30pm, 7.30pm and Sunday 19 January 6pm.

Bookings: events.humanitix.com/thanktheroom-25

TO THANK THE ROOM
Winner Best Melbourne Documentary at the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival 2024.

‘So few films try to capture everyday life… I enjoyed it so much. Just beautiful‘ – John Flaus – Australian screen and broadcasting legend.

Before there was the Northern Arts Hotel there was the Brooklyn Arts Hotel. A film about transition and change.
Maggie Fooke set up the 10 room Brooklyn Arts Hotel in downtown Fitzroy as a guest accommodation for ‘artists and lovers of the arts of all kinds – including conversation, activism and philosophy’ to stay, when visiting Melbourne.It was rather a well-kept secret, but Maggie and Brooklyn clocked up 25,000 guests stays over 13 years of operation – many of those return visits. In late 2019, Maggie emailed her regulars that she had reached the decision to sell the building and close the hotel. And that there would be a film. Join in and help me document Brooklyn’s last 100 days, she wrote. TO THANK THE ROOM is that film:

Documenting the courageous and compelling Maggie Fooke, along with her soft-voiced housekeeper Helen MacKay and Maggie’s feisty also-arts-focussed daughter Aphrodite through the final days of this beloved and ‘quirky’ institution. Maggie joins others in filming ad hoc, engages guests in conversation and the filmmaking process and we the audience are alongside her intimately as she, in her original wild way, is determined – at any cost – to enjoy and share her creation to the last drop.

Length: 77 minutes. 20m Q&A post-film.

Feature Documentary
Directed By Belinda Lloyd.
Featuring: Maggie Fooke, Helen Mackay, Aphrodite Feros-Fooke, and Bajjah [the dog]
Executive Producer: Maggie Fooke, Editor: Larry Lawson Original Score By Emily-Rose Sarkov
A KIND WORLD FILMS PRODUCTION

Saturday 18 January 2.30pm, 7.30pm and Sunday 19 January 6pm.

World Music at The Coolroom

Duration: August-November 2024

FRIDAY, SATURDAY SHOWS AT 7.30PM | SUNDAY AT 6PM

Sat 3 August	Italian Songs: Kavisha Mazzella Trio Kavisha Mazzella, celebrates her Italian heritage with heartfelt songs and beautifully engaging stories.
Sat 17 August	Bossa Nova: Anticlinal Fold & Jo Huf Celebrating Brazil with Jo Huf’s beautiful voice and deep understanding of the bossa nova
Sat 24 August	Langue de Chat: French Musette French Musette with chanteuse voice, cajoling guitar, earthy double bass and of course, piano accordion
Fri 6 September	Indigenous Music: Yirrmal Yirrmal Marika is a young dynamic singer from Yirrkala in Eastern Arnhem Land,
Sat 7 September	Ms Onur Kurt & DJ Laqman Transport yourself to a night filled with a mix of classical and Anatolian Psychedelic remixes
Fri 13 September	Namrock House: Solomon Islander Reggae Jimi’s Solomon Islander band Namrock House is based in Bacchus Marsh makes its way to Castlemaine.
Sat 21 September	Trudy Fatnowna Edgeley With a rich Yidinji ancestry, Trudy Fatnowna Edgeley blends soul, gospel, work-song and tribal rhythms
Fri 11 October	Raziel Gutiérrez Soto Duo with Julian Harrison Mexican Australian Now a local, Raziel Soto brings to us his unique Aztec sounds and guitar styling
Sun 20 October	Miguel Rios \| 6pm Rooted in Australia, Miguel Rios has strong connections to his Mexican and Native American heritage.
Fri 15 November	Thieving Magpies: Balkan Gypsy Thieving Magpies bring us fiery folk music from the Balkans, Scandinavia, Ireland, Scotland & England
Sat 16 November	Kavisha Mazzella & Charles Maimarosia Solomon Islander, Charles Maimarosia collaborating with multicultural musician, Kavisha Mazzella

THE COOLROOM AT NORTHERN ARTS HOTEL | 359 BARKER ST CASTLEMAINE | NORTHERNARTSHOTEL@GMAIL.COM TICKETS: HUMANITIX

Castlemaine Jazz Festival – Live at The Coolroom

Duration: 8-9 June 2024

Castlemaine Jazz Festival once again comes to The Coolroom at the Northern Arts Hotel. We are just one venue with 38 bands performing in the 6 venues – Theatre Royal, Castlemaine Bowling Club, Phee Broadway Theatre, Coolroom at the Northern Arts Hotel and this year two nights at the Boomtown Winery.

You can wander from venue to venue at your leisure and enjoy some beautiful Jazz this Kings birthday weekend (June), or you can stay at just one! The Program at The Coolroom at the Northern Arts Hotel includes some current favourites and some new to the venue.

Saturday 8 June | 12-10pm
12.00noon Steamboat Whistlers [T]
1.20 pm The Django Fretts [T]
2.40pm Rebecca Barnard [T]
4.00pm TMT (Tamara Murphy Trio) [C]
5.20pm Meg Corson & Cam Scott [M]
6.40pm Nigel Maclean [C]
8.00pm Hargreaves Jazz Quartet [M]
9.20pm Stat [C]

Sunday 9 June | 12-8pm
12noon Ben Nieuwkerk’s Strange Awakening [C]
1.20pm The Anticlinal Fold [C]
2.40pm The Bird Conference [C]
4.00pm Kind Of Blue Trio [M]
5.20pm. The Clunk Orchestra [F] [cancelled]
6.40pm Maggie Jackson NYJazz Trio [M]

[T] TRADITIONAL [C] CONTEMPORARY [M] MAINSTREAM [F] FUSION

Tickets for the weekend are available from castlemainejazzfestival.com.au

What’s On in The Coolroom

Duration: 2024

SHORT CUT TO TICKETS

The Sentimental Bloke with Live Music

Duration: 16-17 March, 2024

THE SENTIMENTAL BLOKE With live music by Jen Anderson and The Larrikins

Saturday 16 March 7.30pm-10pm
Sunday 17 March Matinee 2.30 pm-5pm

BOOK TICKETS HERE> GET SPECIAL DISCOUNT VIA THE WEB

The Sentimental Bloke [1919] will be presented in-cinema with a music score by Jen Anderson, which is performed live by Jen Anderson & The Larrikins [Dave Evans and Dan Warner]. The film, an icon of Australian silent film, is based upon the best-selling verses of C.J. Dennis. It humorously tells the heart-warming story of Bill – the Sentimental Bloke – and his sweetheart Doreen

“The pièce de résistance of Australian feature film-making from the silent era” The Guardian

About the Film

The film is the digitally restored version which incorporates new footage found in the vaults of the George Eastman House (Rochester, New York), and restored with the vibrant colours of the original tinting and toning. Director. Raymond Longford was one of the Australian silent era’s most prolific and successful film directors.

An adaptation of C.J. Dennis’ verse narrative of life set on the backstreets of inner Melbourne in the 1910s, The Sentimental Bloke is a tale of redemption, depicting the social rehabilitation, courtship and marriage of the titular ‘Bloke’, Bill (Arthur Tauchert) to his sweetheart, Doreen (Lottie Lyell). Lyell, an international star of the Australian silent era and a filmmaker in her own right, co-wrote and edited the film with Longford, her partner and key creative collaborator until her premature death in 1925, from tuberculosis. Lyell was 35.

For the film, Longford and Lyell relocated the setting from Melbourne to Sydney, shooting on location in Woolloomooloo, which then enjoyed a well-earned reputation as a tough inner-city neighbourhood, as well as at Manly Beach and the Hornsby Valley (the orchard scene). Longford’s direction – Longford was himself an actor before becoming a director – elicited a remarkable naturalness from his talented cast, which also featured Gilbert Emery in the role of Ginger Mick.

A hit when it opened at Melbourne Town Hall on the 4th of October 1919, The Sentimental Bloke broke domestic box office records and screened to packed houses for some years. It subsequently disappeared without trace once ‘the talkies’ took over until the 1950s when it was rediscovered in a film library in NewYork!.

Saturday 16 March 7.30pm
Sunday 17 March 2.30pm

BOOK TICKETS HERE> GET SPECIAL DISCOUNT VIA THE WEB

*The Digitally remastered versions is presented courtesy of the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia.

About The Band
Jen Anderson
Jen has earned an international reputation as a composer and improvising violinist. With a strong classical training background and many years of professional performance improvising with numerous bands, she has also composed music for film, television, theatre and dance.

Jen has enjoyed national success with her score and live performance of string quartet music to the silent film ‘Pandora’s Box’, and further national and international success with her score for the silent film ‘The Sentimental Bloke’. Jen and her band the Larrikins accompanied the screening of the film at several prestigious screen events including the London International Film Festival (UK), Pordenone Silent Film Festival (Italy), Telluride Film Festival (Colorado USA), Tokyo Film Festival (Japan) and Chungmuro Film Festival (Seoul, Korea).

As a composer for film and television her many credits include Ablaze (documentary feature film, 2021) The Show Must Go On (documentary 2019), Hunt Angels (documentary feature film) The Goddess of 1967, Simone de Beauvoir’s Babies (ABC television mini-series), and the silent movies Pandora’s Box and The Sentimental Bloke.

The Larrikins
Dave Evans
Dave Evans is one of Melbourne’s most acclaimed musicians, widely recognised for his mastery of all musical genres. He performs regularly in Northern Europe and has performed and recorded with The Band Who Knew Too Much, Bric-a-brac, and Jen Anderson & The Larrikins. Dave Evans has performed across Australia in mainstream theatre shows and avant-garde works. He played the featured accordionist in the stage musical Warhorse. His interpretations of tango on the accordion bring his jazz improvisation skills to the fore as well as showing an authentic understanding rarely heard outside native Argentina.

Dan Warner
Dan Warner is a songwriter from Melbourne, Australia. In the 80s and 90s, Dan sang and played rhythm guitar in several local bands including The Warner Brothers, Overnight Jones, Dan & Al and The Largest Living Things. Dan now plays with his band The Night Parrots featuring Marcel Borrack, Clio Renner, Nathan Farrelly, Adam Simmons and Ash Davies. Dan has contributed to The Sentimental Bloke project as one half of The Larrikans with Dave Evans.

https://danwarner.com.au

BOOK TICKETS HERE> GET SPECIAL DISCOUNT VIA THE WEB

Magic Lantern Music Show

Duration: 10-11, February 2024

A biunial magic lantern built from mahogany and brass in the nineteenth century by Newton & Co.

Article from Castlemaine Mail Feb 2024
Some of the most intense experiences to be had at the turn of the last century were produced by the magic lantern apparatus as people sat together, shoulder to shoulder, in the dark. Head to the Coolroom at the Northern Arts Hotel this February as Crank Williams, Patsy Decline and Martyn Jolly work their magic, reconjuring the same sensations and emotions felt by Australian audiences over a hundred years ago.

Colours will swirl and twist in the dark, stories of heartache, despair and desire will be vividly rendered on the screen. They will be performing a series of authentic, original chro- matropes — optical devices where a handle and a cog spin concentrically patterned discs of glass in opposite directions to generate psychedelic pulses of pure colour sensation.

They will also be performing a series of ‘dissolving views’, where hand-coloured squares of glass made from ‘life models’ photographed against painted backdrops, are dissolved one into another to illustrate a story or a song.

Crank Williams will be performing vocals; reel-to-reel tape recorder from the 1960’s with its original magnetic heads, a heavily used RCA 1/4 inch tape recorder from the late 1960’s; 1951 National Chicagoan six string lap steel guitar; Hagstrom six string hollow body electric guitar; and a1965 fender tube reverb tank. Patsy Decline will be performing vocals; and playing a Moog theremin (a modern-day model of a classic instrument de- signed by Leon Theremin in the 1920’s).

Martyn Jolly uses slides from the 1800s and early 1900s including; the Lights of London Town, and hand-tinted life models magic lantern slides, to recreate the magic experienced by audiences more than 100 years ago.

7.30pm, Saturday, February 10 and 2.30pm Sunday, Febru- ary 11 at the Coolroom- Northern Arts Hotel 359 Barker Street Castlemaine.

Tickets: $20/$15 or $55/$45 for a share package (two tickets plus bottle wine).

Seating is limited so bookings are essential – events.humanitix.com/magic-lantern-show.

Castlemaine Safe Space Raffle

Duration: 26 November 2023

Big shout out to over 60 amazing businesses who have donated goods and vouchers to our three big raffle baskets. Over $1600 in value! Fundraising is part of the It’s Almost Christmas Spectacular Fundraising Concert on Sunday 26 November from 5pm-7pm. All money raised goes to Castlemaine Safe Space. Two will be drawn at the event and one will be drawn on 17th December at our final event for 2023. @followers

you can buy tickets online: https://events.humanitix.com/css-raffle

And here is the list!
Aolita, Art Supplies Castlemaine, Bakers Delight, Beehave, Blackbird Cafe, BMS Mower Service, Boomtown, Bubble & Squeak Pet store, Castlemaine Floristry, Castlemaine FRESH, Castlemaine Noodle, Castlemaine Office Supplies, Central Wine Store, Chapmans Picture Framing, Clifford’s Quality Cuts, Computers Sales & repairs, Desa Shoes, Extremity, Fasom Plumbing, Green Green Goes the Grocer, Hip Pocket workwear, Home Timber & Hardware, Hot Variety, IGA Supermarket, Ivy & Grace, JM Leech Jewellers, Little General Kids, Love Shack, Lyall Eales Store McShanags Pie Shop, Maine Second-hand, Maine Shoes & Accessories, MAXI Supermarket, McKenzie Davey Amcal Chemist , Mensland, Merchants of Mostyn, Midland Pet Supplies, Miss Maisie, Moxie Café, Mulberrys, Nem Viet, News Lotto, ONI Streetwear, Origini Cafe, Pet Stock, Pyrenees Premium Meats, Ritchies, Saint Florian Café, Shoestring Market, Stocks Gifts & Gallery, Stoneman’s Book Room, Taste Of the Orient, Terry White Pharmacy, The Corner Store, The Cumberland Hotel, The Moon-Massage, The Tea Dispensary, Theatre Royal, Togs Place, Travellers Choice,Tribe, WILD Food & Wine.

Thanks to staff member Claire Perry [left in photo with Safe Space member Rose] for her hard work in getting such an amazing groups of donations together.

TimeOut Melbourne Magazine Feature

Duration: May 2023

The best natural wonders to find in Bendigo, Castlemaine and surrounds

Less than two hours from Melbourne, Victoria’s beautiful goldfields region has stunning landscapes as well as a wealth of history, culture and great eats.

By Matthew Kennedy in association with Visit Victoria and Bendigo Regional Tourism Friday 5 May 2023 Northern Arts Hotel | Photographs: Carmen Zammit

STAY

Experience high art on the hilltop at Northern Arts Hotel

Castlemaine has long been celebrated for its commitment to the arts, and the Northern Arts Hotel is no exception. While rooms here are warm, charming and steeped in history, it’s the atmosphere that made us fall in love with this hotel – owned and operated by Maggie Fooke, whose now-closed Brooklyn Arts Hotel was a Fitzroy institution. Arriving on a Saturday afternoon, we catch the tail end of a poetry reading & workshop (sorry for the interruption, guys!). After ducking out for dinner, we join the locals in the main room for some slow jazz and wine by the fire. It’s great to see Maggie’s dedication to the arts is as strong as ever with such a diverse roster of salons, screenings, talks & performances.

Download a copy of the story here

NORTHERN ARTS HOTEL | 359 BARKER ST CASTLEMAINE | northernartshotel.com.au

Bookings: 0491 074 340 | enquiries@northernartshotel.com.au