And it was free too!

Years ago when I worked part time, I used to attend the free lunchtime concerts in the Brisbane City Hall. A little while ago, I realised that I have been retired for 3 years and although I have had time to go to these concerts, I had not been to one!
So I have been checking the program online and have been to 3 in the last month or so...
To celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Beatles tour of Australia there was a concert by a local Beatles' tribute band, the Beatlegs.
( Excuse the poor quality of the photos...used my phone)

 The MC introduced the concert...

No photos till after the concert...that's the rule!

Here's a photo from the Beatlegs website. A friend told me that her cousin Paul (real name) , plays Paul in the group...he is right handed but plays the bass guitar left handed just like the 'real' Paul.

Another concert I went to, featured a terrific percussion group called Percussimo.

 Then there was the Elton John tribute concert featuring local entertainer, Greg Andrew...another enjoyable concert!

 Greg really did sound like Sir Elton...both in voice and piano playing

Brisbane City Council also sponsors author talks at local libraries...and these talks are also entertaining and free! DH has read and enjoyed 2 books by local author Matthew Condon, so we went along to Ashgrove library one evening to attend his talk. Matthew has been writing books about the 'corruption in high places' involving police and politicians...and he also focusses on the fact that many honest police officers and their families had their careers and lives ruined by the 'bad apples'...his books are allowing them to have a voice.

Matthew's book Jacks and Jokers which is a sequel to Three Crooked Kings

The hour and half went too quickly...he is an extremely interesting man.

So that's just a small part of the free entertainment provided by the Brisbane City Council...now I have a friend who loves the council's GOLD Program...(Growing Old and Living Dangerously)...but would I have time? lol

The City Hall Light Show...

I've been hearing comments about the light show which is being projected on the Brisbane City Hall during the run up to Christmas, so DH and I decided to go and have a look for ourselves. (The Lord Mayor discusses the show with a Channel 7 TV reporter here. He explains that the company responsible for the show have done shows all around the world.)

We stopped in the Myer Centre for something to eat first and I loved this vertical garden near our table...

Then it was a brisk walk through to the King George Square to join the hundreds of Brisbanites waiting for the light show, which starts at 7.30pm and continues being repeated every 15 minutes, until midnight.

 As well as fascinating changes of colour, the lightshow also presents a story...similar to The Nutcracker

The Christmas tree was also in the square...

There are some better photos than ours of the light show here.
It was well worth the trip to the city :-)

Our walk down the hill continued...

The Saturday before last, DH and I visited Brisbane City Hall. This rather beautiful building has been part of our lives growing up in Brisbane. When I was a child I can remember going with my mother to pay rates and utilities' bills there. There were also free  immunisation clinics there when I was a child. I can also remember being left in the City Hall Creche  when my parents went to a daytime movie on my dad's Wednesday day off.

And also when I was a child, no 'trip to town' for the day,was complete without taking some lunch to the Red Cross room in  the basement off Adelaide St. Here, mum and I would find a table and my mother would purchase a pot of tea for her and a glass of milk for me.

The quite stylish furniture of the Red Cross room during the 1950s

Another special childhood memory of City Hall for me was the wonderful Christmas in Storyland Play that was put on there each December. For many years, the Queensland Symphony Orchestra played concerts there. My dad was a subscriber to these concerts and sometimes he would take me along, although I found the symphony after interval a bit long when I was 12!! lol
As a schoolgirl, our classes would travel into city hall for school concerts put on by the orchestra...these were fun. Years later, I would also take my classes in to enjoy similar concerts of the school programme.

When I was 12 years old I finally got to go up into the clock tower and look down on the other buildings...but it wasn't long before City Hall lost the title of tallest building in Brisbane...it is certainly dwarfed nowadays!

One extra special shared memory that DH and I have of our City Hall is the Brisbane Eisteddfod. We were both in school choirs and our dear mothers would sit through an evening of hearing many choirs sing the same song...over and over! lol It was so exciting being led by our music teacher through the curved corridor to the large door near the stage...he would tell us to be very quiet. Then he would get the signal that it was our turn to go on stage. the door would open and we would file on. Oh how I loved those nights in that beautiful auditorium!!!

As I wrote in my previous post, the hall has been closed for 3 years while it was repaired/restored/refurbished.

The photo below shows the auditorium during the work... (photo from the BCC website)

Now here are my photos from the other week...

The dome ceiling: lighting can change the colour of this dome. 'They' must have known I would be visiting so the lighting was in my favourite colour :-) The mouldings around the ceiling are gorgeous...

 DH and I went upstairs and entered the auditorium there so we could look down on all its grandeur.

Look at that beautiful floor...many balls have been held over the years in this place too! Seating is brought out for events of course.

Looking to the left of the stage area

DH sitting and just watching me try to take a panorama photo...not too successfully either!

The door where choir members would file through to come on stage...

The magnificent organ. For my Year 12 Speech Night, one of our teachers, Mr Marks, was given permission to play this organ. Mind you, he already was one of the organists at St John's Cathedral so he was pretty experienced.

Now back in the downstairs foyer of City Hall are 2 marble staircases which fascinated me as a child. I was sure they were just like the ones in the castles of Disney cartoons such as 'Sleeping Beauty'. lol
Here's the one on the right...

Here is that same staircase in 1962...and that is me!

ha ha! And here I am again!

As well as those childhood memories, the association with City Hall has continued through my adulthood and I'm sure this will continue. Before I went back to working full time when my children were older, I used to go to the free weekly lunchtime variety concerts in City Hall. A City Hall staffer reminded me the other Saturday that these concerts are still on ...every Tuesday to be precise. Maybe I might see you there!

One more photo, taken as we walked from the main entry and turned towards Adelaide St...I suspect that I've walked past this plaque for many years without seeing it!

I have one more post to write about our visit to City Hall...and that's to show you some of the photos that I took in the Museum of Brisbane (upstairs in City Hall) Exhibition. 

A walk down the hill...

On the Saturday of the week before last, DH and I took a trip into the city. We drove in and were lucky enough to get a parking space on Wickham terrace, just around the corner from Edward St. So come with me as we walked down the hill...
Here, we walk past some unusual sculptures...

This 'piece' blocks my view of Edward St as it continues down the hill towards the Ann St intersection...the street off to the right is Turbot St and we will follow it for a while...

This staircase is known as Jacob's Ladder and it starts up the hill on Wickham Terrace and comes all the way down to Turbot St

To the right of Jacob's Ladder was the old Trades Hall but it was demolished in the mid 1980s when the Trades and Labour Council moved to a site in Peel St, South Brisbane. You can just catch a glimpse of the building which took its place on Turbot St.

Here's a photo of the old Trades Hall from the John Oxley Library collection ...

And if you look closely, you can see Jacob's Ladder on the left hand side of the lovely old building...

Now walking on just a few metres past Jacob's Ladder, there is a lovely park...because we had our car parked in a '2 hour space', I just took a quick photo and didn't read that sign...reckon I need to come back some time to read it as I suspect there is some history there.

 Striding briskly along Turbot St, we came to this impressive looking building; a building that DH and his brothers got to know well when they were young children...the dental hospital! This was, and is still, a public facility providing dental care, and providing training for UQ dentistry students.  (My dad went to a dentist in private practice so I used to visit Dr Rappaport too :-(  )

Quite a lovely old building , although many of my childhood friends hated the place! lol 

 Our walk now continues to a triangular area of city block, bounded by Turbot, Albert and Roma Streets and I stopped when I saw this plaque which I had never ever seen before...

I had heard people talk about the old Roma St Police station...before the Transport Dept took over issuing of drivers' licences, people used to do their driving test at certain police stations. Many friends who were older than me, did their driving test at this old police station...I don't remember ever seeing it so I went looking for an old photo...again the State Library Collection came up trumps...

The old Roma St Police Station, looking across Albert St...

DH continued our walk along Albert Street and there is actually an old building that has not been demolished! When I was a girl it was called the Albert St Methodist Church...in latter times it is the Albert St Uniting Church and it is beautiful.

We're still walking down Albert Street and we're nearly at our destination...yep! Brisbane City Hall.

 Our City Hall was closed for 3 years while extensive and expensive ($215 million) restoration work was done. It reopened in April this year.
We are just about to cross Ann St which will bring us to the rather desolate King George Square which is in front of city Hall.

Now as part of the restoration and renovation of City Hall, an iconic Brisbane cafe that used to be in Edward Street before the building it was in was demolished to make way for the rather grand Queens Plaza, was rebuilt in the lower level of City Hall. The Webster family, who owned The Shingle Inn, had it dismantled and then carefully stored until a new location could be found for it to be rebuilt.

 Now in recent years, a Shingle Inn franchise has resulted in a plethora of 'fake' Shingle Inns in various shopping centres. Those of us who went with our mums or grandmas to the original, know they are not like the original. However, I suspect this one in City Hall won't be like 'the good old days' either. DH and I didn't have a booking so there was no chance I could try the place out that Saturday. maybe next time???
But we still spent an hour in City hall but I'll tell you all about that in another post!