First day of Lonsdale Street Greek Music Festival a huge success

All photos: Kostas Deves

Melbourne’s favourite annual Greek event is back, with flying colours offering a magical Saturday night to its faithful, with heaps of uplifting music and delicious food.

The Greek Community of Melbourne, returned to its Greek hub in the heart of the city yesterday making up for a quiet 2020 with an amazing line-up of bands and flavours.

The event was mainly seated with tables and chair, without road closures. Even though there was more social distancing everyone gathered together, eager to enjoy a night of Grecian delights and Hellenic culture.

The pandemic-related changes did not deter anyone wanting to attend the hight awaited Festival, with the spirit of the audience lighting up as the night and performances at the open-air Golden Square Carpark progressed.

Overall, the Festival is hosting nine local bands over two days with “Halkina” from Totally Kicking Brass opening the stage at 5 pm yesterday, featuring folk music from northern Greece and the Balkans.

The Philhellenes and Byron Triandafyllidis with the company of Cüneyt Çakmak on the ‘kanonaki’ and Jacob Papadopoulos on the bouzouki aka Byron & Friends, swept the crowd away with their folk and modern tuned mashups.

An amazing performance closed the super successful Lonsdale Street Greek Music Festival comeback. Cats & the Canary also returned with another member, vocalist and actress Artemis Ioannides who swooned everyone with her voice and talent in a well-curated repertoire spanning from rebetika to traditional Cretan songs, old ‘laika’ and classics.

The Festival will be kicking on today, in spite of the rain, with performances starting at 1:30 pm. First up will be with Pascal Latra’s Paskalia Ensemble  followed by the Epirotiko Ensemble playing rebetika and traditional Northern Greek tunes respectively. Agapi and Friends will be taking on the stage next, to give way to Sifis Tsourdalakis’ band offering authentic Cretan tunes. Anagennisi, will be closing off the two day festivities with popular laika.

Each band will play for an hour with 30 minutes in between each act.

Food trucks, local restaurants, including a bar are part will be operating offering your favourite Greek delicacies and drinks!

For a Covid-safe festival, it is recommended to confirm your attendance in advance here.

S: neoskosmos.com