The program for the 2012 Brunswick Music Festival has been announced and it promises to deliver a tour of the world’s music styles, including Greece. Established and emerging artists will perform throughout the festival between March 14 and 25.
The festival will kick off at the Sydney Road Street Party on Saturday 4 March. The music program begins on Wednesday 14 March. Fotis Vergopoulos Band with Polyxeni, will deliver the sounds of Greek roots music, and rembetika on Sunday 18 March.
Fotis Vergopoulos was born in Melbourne but grew up in the Greek town of Koroni. He developed a passion for Greek roots music through the encouragement of his father Niko who had been a member of the legendary Greek Australian band Apodimi Compania. Fotis is a virtuoso on the six-string bouzouki and has a huge repertoire from the rembetika styles that developed in the 1920s and 30s. He has been playing regularly in Athens this northern winter, with some of the best current performers of old style rembetika including Marios Papadeas and Dimitris Mitarakis.
Fotis will be returning from Greece to perform at the Brunswick Music Festival with regular collaborators accordion ace George Butrumlis, Con Kalamaras on baglamas and guitarist Wayne Simmons. They will be joined by two other fine Melbourne musicians from the new band Polyxeni, featuring vocalist Jenny Theologidis and Achilles Yiangoulli on bouzouki and vocals. All six musicians are friends who share a passion for exploring acoustic Greek music and can be regularly heard playing together in various combinations in taverns around Melbourne.
For more information and to book visit brunswickmusicfestival.com.au or call the booking office on (03) 9388 1460.