The Brunswick Ballroom presents “A month of Sundays” starring The Pearly Shells big band and very special guests!

Playing swingin’ jazz and blues for dancing and drinking every Sunday afternoon in June .

The Winter ball and Summer balls at the Brunswick Ballroom were fabulous events!

Now get you tickets and get ready to do it all again at the Pearly Shells “Month of Sundays” with special guests:

Yvette Johansson (Sunday 4 June)

Julie O’Hara (Sunday 11 June)

Kerri Simpson ( Sunday 18 June)

and Ben Peters (Sunday 25 June)

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KILLING THE ANGEL with Clementine Ford

First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in the baby carriage. So goes a rhyme popular in our childhoods. For women, marriage and motherhood is framed as the most important thing we can aspire to. Without either or both of these things, we’ll be left to gather dust on the shelf. Alone and unloved, pointless and sad. What a misery! 

But what happens when the secret gets out? That a woman left alone to her own devices can discover that she is powerful and brilliant?

KILLING THE ANGEL brings together five performers to speak about what it means to reject the burden of marriage and live purposefully alone, moderated by writer, broadcaster and feminist community builder CLEMENTINE FORD

A celebration of the untethered life, this is an event not to be missed. Suitable for ages 13+, with parental supervision for 13-16 year olds.

Featuring special guests:

JACINTA PARSONS Jacinta Parsons is a broadcaster, writer and public speaker who currently hosts the Afternoon program on ABC  Radio Melbourne.  She released her debut memoir, ‘Unseen – the secret life of Chronic Illness’ in 2020 and in 2022 released her second book ‘A Question of Age: Women, ageing and the forever self’. She began her radio-life at community radio station 3RRR over a decade ago and is a board member for Melbourne disability theatre company, Rollercoaster. Jacinta has lived with Crohn’s Disease for over 20 years and is an ambassador for the Crohn’s and Colitis Association.

JILL STARK is a best-selling author, award-winning journalist, mental health advocate, speech writer and content creator, who was once described by a Murdoch columnist as a “social justice warrior straight out of central casting” – a badge she wears with pride. Her first book, High Sobriety: My Year Without Booze, was a Walkley Book of the Year finalist and was this year re-released as a ten-year anniversary edition, Higher Sobriety, documenting what happened next, for Jill and the drinking culture.  Her other books, Happy Never After and When You're Not OK, document Jill’s hard-won lessons from a life-long struggle with anxiety, and offer hope and connection to anyone doing it tough. Jill is Scottish-born and Brunswick-based, and a proud child-free, single, cat lady.

LIBBY O'DONOVAN is a 'powerful and sassy performer' (SMH), renowned for her nuanced interpretations and extraordinary voice. She is a critically acclaimed Jazz and Cabaret performer and an award-winning Musical Director. Libby has entertained audiences world-over with her unique talents, performing in New York, Tokyo and Toronto as well as Australia-wide. Equally at home in small ensemble acts as well as solo performances, she has been a proud member of ARIA nominated Coco's Lunch, Flat on Your Bacharach, and Women With Standards, for which she won a Green Room Award for Musical Direction.

Libby has performed seasons for the Adelaide Festival of Arts, Edinburgh Fringe, Sydney Spring Festival, Perth International Arts Festival, the International Jazz Educators Convention, Adelaide Cabaret Festival (including working with Broadway composers Jason Robert-Brown and Andrew Lippa), Melbourne Fringe, Adelaide Fringe, Feast Festival, and this year performed across India as part of the Hindu Festival.

KAREN PICKERING is an Australian writer, speaker and organiser working for women’s rights and feminist approaches to social change. Her writing has been published widely in print and online, and she’s appeared on television, radio and at festivals across the country. She was the cofounder and director of the first Girls On Film Festival, and the creator and host of long-running salon, and now podcast, Cherchez La Femme.

Dr YVES REES (they/them) is a writer and historian based on unceded Wurundjeri land. They are a Lecturer in History at La Trobe University, the co-host of Archive Fever history podcast, and the author of All About Yves: Notes from a Transition (Allen & Unwin, 2021). They are also co-editor of Nothing to Hide: Voices of Trans and Gender Diverse Australia (Allen & Unwin, 2022). Rees was awarded the 2020 ABR Calibre Essay Prize and a 2021 Varuna Residential Fellowship. Their writing has featured in the Guardian, The Age, Sydney Review of Books, Australian Book Review, Meanjin, the Griffith Review and Overland, among other publications.