SAFE IN SOUND FESTIVAL
Presented by JOLT Arts, Make It Up Club and Liquid Architecture
Safe in Sound 2026: Inclusive Experimental Sound Event Returns to Melbourne
Safe in Sound, the celebrated experimental music event, is returning to Melbourne’s public venues for the fourth year, curated by renowned experimental artist and SIS Artistic Director Robbie Avenaim.
Presented in partnership and co-curated with Jolt Arts, Make It Up Club and Liquid Architecture, the festival showcases Melbourne’s thriving experimental music and sound art communities whilst providing a platform for mentored and professional artists with disabilities to perform alongside seasoned professional sound artists from around Australia.
Saturday 31 October 2026 — Drill Hall – 395 Barkly St, Footscray
Tickets
Sunday 1 November 2026 — Jolted Arts Space, 342 High St, Northcote
Tickets
PROGRAM
31st October
Venue: Footscray Drill Hall
Address: 395 Barkly Street, Footscray (corner Barkly & Gordon st)
Doors: 5pm
Tickets $30/$20 here
Alessio Diletosso & Joe Manton
Composer, musician and electronic music innovator Joe Manton presents a composition that becomes the landscape for an encounter with Alessio Diletosso. Using his interactive systems, Alessio responds to the structure, textures and ideas within Manton’s music, exploring and revealing its hidden possibilities through movement, sound and technology.
Manton brings more than two decades of experience in electronic music, composition, software development and instrument building to the work. Alessio’s practice similarly sits at the intersection of music, technology and interaction, using custom-built systems to create an expressive and highly individual musical language.
Rather than simply performing the composition, Alessio enters into it — responding to its rhythms, textures and sonic architecture to uncover what might lie beneath the surface. The result is a live exploration of the inner worlds of Manton’s composition, where written music, interactive technology and human interpretation become inseparable.
SAFE IN SOUND & JOLTED ARTS PRESENTS
Jim Denley, Carolyn Connors, Esther Tuddenham and Steven Hagiliassis
Four distinctive voices from Melbourne’s experimental music community come together in a spontaneous meeting of breath, voice, electronics, poetry and sonic exploration. Jim Denley brings his unique approach to flute and improvisation, creating delicate and unexpected musical pathways. Carolyn Connors explores the extremes of the human voice, moving between song, spoken word and theatrical expression. Esther Tuddenham blends poetry, voice and intermedia practices, while Steven Hagiliassis draws on Greek folk traditions, religious texts and shredding vocal sound worlds.
SAFE IN SOUND AND LIQUID ARCHITECTURE PRESENTS
Khaled Chahine and his Accidental Orchestra – feat Tarquin Manek, Moses Carr, Genevieve Fry and Rohan Rebeiro
Co Curated by Safe in Sound and Liquid Architecture. Over the last few years, Khaled Chahine He has been developing his voice and music through the Dale Gorfinkels Outhere project. His Accidental Orchestra blends Theatre of the Absurd, Pataphysical performance, Surrealist storytelling and Fluxus event-scores into a wonderfully unhinged live broadcast experience. Chahine selects different story genres and launches into them in real time, with characters, narratives and situations emerging through improvisation. An ensemble of artists curated by Liquid Architecture featuring Tarquin Manek, Moses Carr, Genevieve Fry and Rohan Rebeiro, underscores and responds to his unfolding story, creating an improvised soundtrack that shifts with the characters, situations and twists as they emerge. Together, they twist, stretch and reinvent the familiar tropes of radio drama, creating a live broadcast somewhere between comedy, theatre, sound art and complete absurdity.
MAKE IT UP CLUB PRESENTS
Daniel Munnery & Tangerine
Daniel Munnery and Tangerine (Clementine Girard-Foley) come together for a new collaboration merging exploratory electronics, dark metallic textures and emotive melody. Munnery, an avant-garde electronic sound artist known for his work with JOLT Arts, The Amplified Elephants and Noise Scavengers, meets Tangerine’s distinctive world of atmospheric electronics and adventurous DJ culture. Together, they venture into uncharted sonic waters — an improvised collision of texture, electronics and melody.
Robert Seamons Propagation Band. Featuring; Danny Heifetz, Angus Leslie, Phil Day
Guitarist, songwriter and gardener Robert Seamons takes the stage with his all star band.
Robert Seamons writes songs in the great tradition of the ballad, drawing on melodic worlds reminiscent of Gordon Lightfoot, Jad Fair, The Beatles and the Bee Gees, while following his own wonderfully idiosyncratic path. His songs range from heartfelt ballads to curious observations on plants, gardens and the everyday world around him. Over the last few years, Robert has been developing his voice and music through Dale Gorfinkels Outhere project.
For this performance, Seamons is joined by master accompanists Danny Heifetz, original drummer of Mike Patton’s legendary Mr. Bungle, Secret Chiefs 3, Angus Leslie, multi-instrumentalist & founder of Melbourne yacht-rock, soul group Sex on Toast and Phil Day on tuba.
Together, they bring Seamons’ music to life with musicianship, warmth and playful musicality — connecting his intimate, eccentric songwriting with three musicians from very different corners of contemporary music.
DJ 2 (Aka Paul Wain) & Astrid Hullick
DJ 2 (aka Paul Wain), from the legendary duo DJs Antediluvian Rocking Horse, joins forces with Astrid Hullick.
Spinning records and specially prepared records side by side, Paul and Astrid will constantly interrupt, collide with and hijack each other’s mixes—layering beats over noise, sound effects over songs, and records over records.
Part DJ battle, part improvised sound collage, the pair will build an eclectic, unpredictable and increasingly tangled mix, where interruption becomes composition and almost anything might find its way onto the turntables.
Tickets $30/$20 here
SIS & JOLT ARTS PRESENTS
Victor Meertens with the Noise Scavengers featuring: Astrid Meurer, Stuart Flenley and Esther Tuddenham
A meeting of sculpture, sound and invention. Legendary Australian sculptor, sound artist and experimental musician Victor Meertens brings decades of exploration with found materials, discarded objects and unconventional forms into dialogue with The Noise Scavengers’ adventurous approach to sound.
Known for transforming industrial materials into expressive sculptural works, Victor’s practice has always explored the hidden life of objects — their textures, histories and unexpected possibilities. Together with The Noise Scavengers, a collective of sound artists exploring the space between rock, electronics, improvisation and sound art, this collaboration turns objects, machines and materials into a living sonic environment.
Tête-à-tête, Anthony Riddell, Robbie Avenaim, Ernie Althoff, Jim Denley and Robyn McGrath and special guest Lucas Powell
Ah… Good evening , Your table is ready.
It has been reserved exclusively for tonight’s sonic dégustation. Whether the audience has reservations is entirely their affair.
Your waiter this evening, Mr Ernie, waits patiently in the wings. He’s been instructed not to explain anything. Should he accidentally become helpful, please alert management immediately.
Tonight’s menu is à la carte. There are no entrées, no mains and absolutely no dessert. Instead you’ll be served a carefully curated sequence of vibrating metals, amplified objects, reluctant percussion, prepared mechanisms and sounds whose provenance remains delightfully uncertain.
Every course has been tasted for resonance rather than flavour.
Please refrain from feeding the instruments.
The bells are genuine. The whistles are mostly genuine. Everything else is subject to spontaneous revision.
We trust you’ll find the evening both satisfying and impossible to digest.
Bon appétit.
SAFE IN SOUND & JOLTED ARTS PRESENTS
David Shea and Jay Euesden
David Shea and Jay Euesden come together in a deeply immersive meeting of sound, voice and vibration. David Shea’s long exploration of meditation, resonance and acoustic phenomena draws on the rich tones of Tibetan bowls, prepared piano and subtle sonic textures, creating spaces for deep listening and contemplation. Jay Euesden’s trance-like vocals weave through this landscape, creating a hypnotic interplay of voice, breath and sustained sound.
Together, they create a slow-burning sonic journey where ancient resonances meet experimental practice. A performance that invites audiences to listen differently — moving between meditation, improvisation and the transformative power of sound.
SAFE IN SOUND AND JOLT ARTS PRESENTS
Karina Utomo, Steven Hagiliassis & Mat Watson
Karina Utomo, Mat Watson and Stephen Hagiliassis collide in a live encounter where shattering electronics meet the human voice at its most primal.
Melbourne-based vocalist and composer Karina Utomo works across extreme metal, experimental music and avant-garde improvisation, pushing the voice into territories of distortion, noise and extra-normal voicing, with aspects of her practice informed by Javanese mythology and storytelling.
Mat Watson is a Naarm/Melbourne-based artist working across modular synthesis, drums and electronic composition. His practice explores the possibilities of electronic sound through improvisation, texture and process, moving between Kosmische-inspired electronics, noise, drone and large-scale experimental works.
Against and within this comes Stephen Hagiliassis’ extraordinary vocal practice, drawing on Greek folk traditions, prayer and chant, alongside the raw physical force of the scream. His voice moves between the ritualistic and meditative, visceral and confronting, carrying cultural memory alongside an immediate bodily presence.
Together, Hagiliassis, Utomo and Watson create a volatile landscape of voice, fractured electronics, shifting rhythms, distortion and noise—a sound world capable of erupting, collapsing and reassembling without warning.
MASTER OF CEREMONIES
Stuart Flenley with Charlie McCarthy
Taking on the prestigious role of Master of Ceremonies is Stuart Flenley — host, guide, commentator and keeper of festival order (at least in theory).
Joining Stuart is Charlie McCarthy, a charmingly opinionated ventriloquist doll following in the grand tradition of Charlie McCarthy — the legendary wooden wit who became one of the most famous figures in the history of ventriloquism.
Together, Stuart and Charlie will navigate the unpredictable world of Safe in Sound Festival, introducing artists, offering observations and attempting to maintain control over an event where anything can happen.
One has the microphone. One has the moving mouth. Neither can be completely trusted.
Expect charm, chaos and a little wooden wisdom.
Appearing both on the 31st Oct and 1st Nov
Acknowledgement of country: Esther Tuddenham
DJ 2 (Aka Paul Wain) & Astrid Hullick
DJ 2 (aka Paul Wain), from the legendary duo DJs Antediluvian Rocking Horse, joins forces with Astrid Hullick.
Spinning records and specially prepared records side by side, Paul and Astrid will constantly interrupt, collide with and hijack each other’s mixes—layering beats over noise, sound effects over songs, and records over records.
Part DJ battle, part improvised sound collage, the pair will build an eclectic, unpredictable and increasingly tangled mix, where interruption becomes composition and almost anything might find its way onto the turntables.
SUPPORTED BY
This project is supported by Creative Australia, the Australian Government’s principal body for supporting the arts and culture.
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ARTISTS
Steven Hagiliassis
STEVEN HAGILIASSIS Sound Artist / Media Artist Steven Hagiliassis has been involved with JOLT for the last 6 months as part of the Sonic Adventurers Collective, but has been producing grand musical explorations for many years under his performance names,...
Astrid Meurer
ASTRID MEURER SOUND ARTIST / DIGITAL ARTIST Astrid joined Noise Scavengers in April 2022. Astrid works through various sonic mediums with the band including guitar, found sound and electronics. Astrid also works through the medium of digital, exhibiting digital...
Stuart Flenley
STUART FLENLEY MUSICIAN /// VISUAL ARTIST Stuart Flenley is a musician, songwriter, sonic and visual artist. Flenley is a vocalist, guitarist and works with electronic sound. Visually Flenley has focused on drawing mediums and video art. Flenley sings and plays...
Esther Tuddenham
ESTHER TUDDENHAM voice / synthesizers / electronic music / photography / poetry Esther is a sound artist, poet, photographer and intermedia creative mind. Esther explores human emotions and their utterance in her work. In 2021 Esther completed her book of...
Daniel Munnery
DANIEL MUNNERY computer-based sound maker Joining The Amplified Elephants in 2011, Daniel quickly developed an oeuvre as an electronic laptop-based sound artist. Often working in duos with JOLT director James Hullick and sound artist Steve Richards (aka Cleaning...
Jay Euesden
JAY EUESDEN synthesisers / electronics / percussion Along with Robyn McGrath and Kathryn Sutherland, Euesden is a founding member of The Amplified Elephants (2006-). Euesden’s practice is focused on minimalist sonic patterns, usually realising these ideas through...