Mary Mihelakos is an Australian music promoter and journalist. In 2020, she was inducted into the Music Victoria hall of fame. [1]
Mihelakos began working as a volunteer for Melbourne radio station 3RRR when she was 14, helping with administration, compiling gig guides, and meeting band managers. [2] [3] Through these connections she began booking bands for the Punters Club at 17, before moving to the nearby Evelyn Hotel. [4] [5] [6] She studied media and journalism at Swinburne University of Technology and during her first year became manager for The Earthmen. [2]
Beginning in 1995, Mihelakos was editor of Melbourne's music street press title Beat Magazine , after previously contributing writing to them as a student. [2]
In 2003, Mihelakos and Glenn Dickie started the Aussie BBQ showcase of Australian music at South by Southwest (SXSW) in Austin, Texas. [3] Their initiative paved the way for Sounds Australia who have continued promoting Australian music at events such as SXSW. [7] Mihelakos licensing the Aussie BBQ brand to Sounds Australia, and handed the event to them in 2013. [8] [5]
After leaving Beat in 2005, between 2009 and 2016 she wrote 'Sticky Carpet', a music column in The Age newspaper, focusing on Melbourne's live music scene. [9]
Beginning in 2013, Mihelakos founded and produced the annual music festival Leaps and Bounds for City of Yarra. [10] [2]
In 2020, she was inducted into the Music Victoria's hall of fame alongside blues singer Chris Wilson for the 15th Annual Music Victoria Awards. [1]
Between 2021 and 2024, she was music booker for the Brunswick Ballroom. [11] The venue was reopened in 2021 with the Ballroom Blitz, a three-day music festival created by Mihelakos and venue director Will Ewing. [12]
The Music Victoria Awards are an annual awards night celebrating Victorian music. They commenced in 2005.
Year | Nominee / work | Award | Result |
---|---|---|---|
Music Victoria Awards of 2020 [1] | Mary Mihelakos | Hall of Fame | inductee |
3RRR is an Australian community radio station, based in Melbourne.
Christine Joy Amphlett was an Australian singer, songwriter and actress, best known as the frontwoman of the rock band Divinyls. She was notable for her brash, overtly sexual persona and subversive humour in lyrics, performances and media interviews.
The Little Band scene was an experimental post-punk scene which flourished in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia from late 1978 until early 1981. Instigated by groups Primitive Calculators and Whirlywhirld, this scene was concentrated in the inner suburbs of Fitzroy and St Kilda, and involved many short-lived bands that played live only once or twice before changing names and swapping members.
Since 1988 the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) has inducted artists into its annual ARIA Hall of Fame. While most have been recognised at the annual ARIA Music Awards, in 2005 ARIA sought to create a separate standalone ceremony ARIA Icons: Hall of Fame event as only one or two acts could be inducted under the old format due to time restrictions. Since 2005 VH1 obtained the rights to broadcast the show live on Foxtel, Austar and Optus networks; and each year five or six acts were inducted into the Hall of Fame with an additional act inducted at the following ARIA Music Awards.
Christopher John Wilson was an Australian blues musician who sang and played harmonica, saxophone and guitar. He performed as part of the Sole Twisters, Harem Scarem and Paul Kelly and the Coloured Girls, and fronted his band Crown of Thorns. Wilson's solo albums are Landlocked, The Long Weekend, Spiderman (2000), King for a Day, Flying Fish (2012) and the self titled Chris Wilson (2018).
Greg Champion is an Australian songwriter, guitarist, and radio personality.
Graeme Emerson Bell, AO, MBE was an Australian Dixieland and classical jazz pianist, composer and band leader. According to The Age, his "band's music was hailed for its distinctive Australian edge, which he describes as 'nice larrikinism' and 'a happy Aussie outdoor feel'".
Gary Young is an American-born Australian musician who was a founding member of Australian rock band Daddy Cool in which he played the drums and sang backing vocals. He also played drums with Jo Jo Zep & The Falcons amongst other bands. Young was twice inducted into the Aria Hall of Fame as a member of both Daddy Cool and Jo Jo Zep & The Falcons which were inducted into the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) Hall of Fame in 2006 and 2007 respectively.
Daddy Cool is an Australian rock band formed in Melbourne, Victoria, in 1970 with the original line-up of Wayne Duncan, Ross Hannaford, Ross Wilson and Gary Young. Their debut single "Eagle Rock" was released in May 1971 and stayed at number 1 on the Australian singles chart for ten weeks. Their debut, July 1971's LP Daddy Who? Daddy Cool, also reached number 1 and became the first Australian album to sell more than 100,000 copies. The group's name came from the 1957 song "Daddy Cool" by US rock group The Rays. Daddy Cool included their version of this song on Daddy Who? Daddy Cool.
A Music Victoria study finds Melbourne hosts 62,000 live concerts annually, making it one of the live music capitals of the world. Victoria is host to more than three times the live performance national average, making it the live music capital of the country. Melbourne is host to more music venues per capita than Austin, Texas.
Blackchords are an alternative rock band from Melbourne, Australia, consisting of Nick Milwright, Damian Cazaly, Tristan Courtney (bass)and Guy Kable (guitar)
Teeth & Tongue were an Australian indie rock band formed in 2007 by Jessica Claire Cornelius, a New Zealand-born singer-songwriter and musician. The project has included other members, such as James Harvey on drums, Marc Regueiro-McKelvie on guitar and Damian Sullivan on bass guitar and synthesiser. Teeth & Tongue released four albums, Monobasic, Tambourine, Grids and Give Up on Your Health, before disbanding early in 2017. The stage name had also been used for Cornelius' solo performances, but since 2017 she has performed and released material under her own name and relocated to Los Angeles late that year.
Geoff Achison is an independent Australian Melbourne-based singer/songwriter guitarist, whose artistic focus is of the blues, blues rock and soul genres. He performs in two modes – as a solo artist performing and singing with acoustic guitar, and bandleader as a singer/electric guitarist.
Julia Jacklin is an Australian singer-songwriter from the Blue Mountains region of New South Wales. Jacklin's musical style has been described as indie pop, indie folk, and alternative country. She has released three studio albums, Don't Let the Kids Win (2016), Crushing (2019) and Pre Pleasure (2022). Jacklin has also performed with the band Phantastic Ferniture, with whom she released the debut single "Fuckin 'n' Rollin" and a self-titled album in 2018, followed by subsequent singles.
The Music Victoria Awards are an annual awards night celebrating music from the Australian state of Victoria. They commenced in 2006 and are awarded in Melbourne Music Week between October and December. The awards were initially an exclusively online public voted awards, changing in 2013.
The Music Victoria Awards of 2020 are the 15th Annual Music Victoria Awards and consist of a series of awards, presented on 8 December 2020. For the first time, an Outstanding Woman in Music Award and Best Producer Award will be awarded.
Mia Isobel Wray-McCann, known professionally as Mia Wray, is an Australian pop singer, songwriter and musician from Noosa, Queensland.
Dobe Newton OAM is an Australian musician and member of folk and country music group the Bushwackers from 1973. He co-wrote the patriotic song "I Am Australian" in 1987 with Bruce Woodley. For his service to the performing arts as an entertainer and advocate he was appointed to the Order of Australia in 2013.
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Bruce Milne is a prominent figure in the Australian music industry, a long-standing member of the grass-roots Melbourne music community who, after getting his start publishing a punk fanzine in the late 1970s, has done practically everything since – been a writer, radio presenter, DJ, run record shops, book shops and record labels, run bars and venues, and worked in A&R and as a tour promoter.