There’s much truth in the saying that you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover.

Hidden inside an unobtrusive, 19th-century, single-fronted cottage at 104 Tynte Street, North Adelaide, you will find something unexpected and remarkable: a new concert venue, Baroque Hall.

North Adelaide’s Baroque Hall. Photo supplied

The street entrance to the house leads to a reception area for an auditorium styled in the manner of an early 18th-century rococo chamber. The auditorium seats 40 people – though quite a few more squeezed in for the inaugural recital by visiting Serbian pianist Ljiljana Vukelja in March this year.

Currently the hall hosts two or three recitals each week, featuring some of the best of Adelaide’s established, emerging and visiting musicians.

Baroque Hall is the visionary creation of composer and pianist Julian Cochran, who was born in the UK, grew up in Adelaide (he studied at the Elder Conservatorium of Music), but who has mostly been working in eastern Europe and Russia in recent years.

“In Europe, recitals are usually centered on an exceptionally beautiful concert hall,” Cochran says. “I often met with people in St. Petersburg asking, ‘shall we go to the Mariinsky Theatre...