Venue Spotlight: Phoenix Central Park

Before doors, I stand in the Nest of Judith Neilson’s Phoenix Central Park for sound-check, listening to the warped synthesisers of my favourite Hood track ‘Branches Bare’ reverberate along the cylindrical walls.

Bright, curious event staff filter in and out of the Nest in their crisp evening blacks. Each has a unique job to perform and I feel excited to see so many young people in a space like this. Lighting cues turn on and off as I follow the red beams of light that crawl up the sides of the deep wooden chasm I’ve found myself in. It feels daggy to admit, but watching myself in the reflection of the polished grand piano, I can’t help but feel, in its proximity, incredibly chic.

Founded by philanthropist Judith Neilson AM, Phoenix Central Park officially opened its doors in February of 2020, an arts and performance space just outside the city centre of Gadigal Land/Sydney, in the suburb of Chippendale. Since opening, Phoenix has welcomed over 50,000 audience members and hosted nearly 300 distinct presentations, distributing tickets fairly and always freely via its ballot.

Embarking on its seventeenth season, Season XVII is Phoenix Central Park’s third instalment of 2025. After hosting a slew of international headliners, James K, Nabihah Iqbal and Kelly Lee Owens (to name a few), 2025 was to be focused entirely on local bookings; a project appointed by its founder.

This season, Phoenix Central Park was thrilled to host the return of Nina Buchanan, who performed her live, electronic ‘Solo Works for CS-80’ for the second time since its composition in late July.

Solo Works for CS-80’ was initially written and performed on a Yamaha CS-80, an analogue synth developed in 1977. A credit to its age, Senior Programmer & Creative Producer Josh Milch notes how both “exceedingly rare” and pivotal the synthesiser has been in breakthrough productions used “extensively by trailblazers as varied as Vangelis and Floating Points.” “So rare in fact,” points out Josh; “that we couldn't find one in Sydney.” Instead Phoenix sourced a Deckard's Dream for the performance, a Japanese clone sharing the same electronic architecture as its predecessor.

Solo Works for CS-80 is just one example of the attention to detail and air of intimacy between Phoenix Central Park and its artists, working in tandem to explore the breadth of their performance and specialty niche.

“Programmatically, it’s allowed us to dig even deeper—to further intimate ourselves with the work of our favourite artists,” says Josh. “We’ve taken the opportunity to foster premieres, special collaborations, and facilitate site-specific work. This is where Phoenix truly soars as a platform.”

“Readers of Mixmag ANZ will also know Naarm-based producer and vocalist Nū,” Josh continues “whose Afrofuturist visions will literally clad Phoenix’s interior walls in projected code while her sublime Amharic lyrics hang in space. She’s coming up in Season XVII.”

Alongside Nina Buchanan and Nū, readers can look forward to experimental and electronic works from Wilson Tanner, Dragonfru?t and Maryam Rahmani.

Aptly named the Nest of Phoenix Central Park, its main hall seems to enclose audiences in a tightly wound ball of sound. Hanging in liminal space is an air of anticipation for ticket holders and artists hidden backstage, waiting for their audience to stream down the stairs and perch themselves on the ledges above, accommodating up to 140 people.

“The space was a piece of art in itself, and it demanded an elevated level of respect,” shares Dan, a member of DIY band Garage Sale. His description runs in tandem with my own, evoking a feeling of being “cavernous and intimate at the same time.” “The sounds shot up into the ceiling and I really liked how deep and resonant our clean tones were,” Dan continues.

Hailing from Melbourne, Garage Sale made their Phoenix debut as part of Season XVI in late May, which I, a lucky ballot holder, attended with my partner. Eagerly positioned in the front row, we watched Garage Sale wander into the Nest, facing one another in a circle, as opposed to the audience. They wore forlorn looks, and their hair drooped over their eyes. They followed the tempo of who I was told was the night’s ‘fill-in’ drummer, who attacked the kit with perfect synchronicity; their voices hung above us in the space.

Midway through the performance, they paused to thank the audience; “This is much nicer than the dive bars we usually play,” they admitted, before retreating their gaze back to their instruments.

The name Garage Sale, emblematic of rough and tumble second-hand shopping, doesn’t exactly lend itself to spaces like Phoenix, nor does electronic music really; which is the precise beauty of the project. According to Executive Producer Angus Hunt, “It’s our view that reverent spaces needn’t be solely reserved for classical music and the fine arts, and that engaging with the music from a range of genres just as seriously can be incredibly powerful. “In a room like this,” he continues, “artists can really explore the possibilities of dynamic range—of going very quiet, to producing intense sound pressures, without the sound system breaking a sweat.”

Inviting an openness for new styles of performance has been thrilling for Josh as a curator.

In early 2025, Phoenix welcomed a club-clad legacy to the Nest Plead Morimoto; a partnership between DJ Plead and T.Morimoto, inviting the duo to explore their productions without drums. This may come as a surprise to readers who are familiar with Plead’s work and roots in club culture, where drums are not only the driving force of its essence - movement, but also signature to Plead’s unique style.

As Josh elaborates, “this year gave the master of Lebanese-inspired percussion the opportunity to explore the possibilities of club production without drums, following months of DJ sets for some of the most prestigious festivals in the world. The result was completely hypnotic, and it was wonderful to witness the continuation of a sustained artistic partnership between the two legendary figures of Sydney’s underground electronic culture.”

In May, Phoenix hosted Australian jazz percussionist and academic Simon Barker’s new experimental drone work Tymbal Echoes, performed live in partnership with “one of the most exciting young saxophonists in the country, Hinano Fujisaki,” highlights Josh.

Like most, Hinano is open in her warm appreciation of the venue; “I love playing at Phoenix Central Park - I always have an amazing time playing music there.”

For their performance of Tymbal Echoes, “we played with a prerecorded Lyra 8 track that Simon put together, which filled the room very beautifully and allowed me to interact with the different textures from the track.” Relays Hinano; “The flickering lights which followed Simon’s drumming added to the hypnotic effect like watching a fire flicker. I think this all came together to enhance the performance experience for myself and the audience.”

Tymbal Echoes is an incredible musical achievement, the layer of intricate drum patterns and haunting drone sound like the sonic makings of a campfire - which as we listen, flicker, growl and propel. Entirely enhanced by the venue's exceptional capabilities, lighting and the shapes created within the Nest.

Bells and whistles aside, the support available to local talent, for many who practice without big management, liaisons or specialty sound and AV, this presence enhances performance in and of itself.

“I don’t have to worry about anything else,” acknowledges Hinano. “I remember being in this very meditative state during the performance where I felt like I was being immersed by the sounds we were making.”

The radiant success of this year's seasons, XV, XVI and XVII prove not only the city’s openness to local talent but has propelled me to consider what might be our block in prioritising these bookings? Did we tend to be inadvertently dismissive or lazy towards local art? Or was booking a fresh international face simply too compelling to resist? Perhaps it’s an even-keeled combination of both. Judith Neilson and Phoenix Central Park invite us to consider the potential for great artistry given the right spaces, equipment, care and community support behind our very own talent, who face the challenges of becoming exceedingly more hard done by. In a way, it offers a glimpse into the future of an experimental arts community that is adequately resourced by an enthusiastic state and federal government. A future propelled by the new; a far cry from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's latest nostalgia grab.

“Sydney is a harder place to sustain an artistic practice than it used to be,” notes Josh. “There’s been a healthy volume of public discourse around the way new music is disseminated, and the viability of developing and sustaining an artistic practice in our city.” I find Josh’s openness to the big elephant in the room, the possibility of making money off experimental art, refreshing. So it’s ever more inspiring to watch Phoenix invigorate our arts scene with niche, marginalised and generally unexpected voices. Even more so is watching them ‘make it.’

Phoenix was home to the premiere of Shady Nasty’s album ‘TREK’, hosting their pre-release show in February; “It felt like an important moment for Sydney heads,” says Josh, “and was a stunning display of the band’s sheer musicianship nestled under the brawn.”

A sound clad with a uniquely Sydney, ‘harbour city twang.’ A distinct etymology hanging on affirmations to their city; calls to moments in time “driving down the Hume” or attestations to South Western Sydney “2194 be the home, be the best.” A project so hyperlocal, now endorsed by international electronic music giants Fred Again and Kettama, who teamed up on new single ‘Air Maxes.’

The venue also hosted Luritja singer-songwriter Keanu Nelson’s Sydney debut, in collaboration with producer Yuta Matsumura. Together they presented an astonishing melding of minimal electronics, dub and rich songwriting about country, family and love from Nelson's home in Alice Springs. A melange of astounding raw, acoustic work and electronics, which Nelson seems to represent in his work ‘Places Where I Go,’ mastered by the revered Mikey Young, who continues to offer outstanding contributions to hybrid works, including self-titled a.s.o debuting on Low Lying records in 2023.

Both performances resemble an incredibly exciting broadening of performance and audience interaction in our local community. “It’s a cliché that art can be transformative,” says Angus, “but when we hear from audience members that their worlds are being broadened, listening to things they would otherwise have never encountered, it feels like a small but significant salve.”

“We’re not naïve that an incredibly scarce, free ticket offering through a ballot attracts people to the shows. But it’s also abundantly clear that people come here with a sense of curiosity and openness to the new.”

For anyone attending a Phoenix show, this combination of accessibility and curiosity breeds wonderful results; notably a crowd of interested people of all ages, backgrounds, subcultures: bound by a genuine, collective interest.

Audiences arrive on time, if not early and approach the space with their undivided attention. Of course, these results are not coincidental. A hope for Phoenix is that “the cultural fabric of the city might be enriched” by “cross-pollinating audiences.” An exciting harmonium where “The stereotypes about genres and their corresponding demographics need not apply,” hopes Josh.

A utopia which feels present within the walls of any Phoenix show, and rarely seen anywhere else.

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To read more about Judith Neilson’s Phoenix Central Park, or register for upcoming Season XVII ballots via their website.

Lilly Grainger is a DJ, radio presenter and writer, contributing to Mixmag ANZ. You can find her on Instagram.