Biography

Curiosity got me into music, rather than any grand plan. At ten, I picked up the clarinet, mostly to see what all the fuss was about. It didn’t take. Something about it never quite fit, and by twelve I was ready to give the whole thing up.

Then my instrumental music teacher, who also ran the school band, made me an offer I couldn’t refuse: there was a bassoon sitting forgotten in the storeroom, and if I could get a single sound out of it, I could switch instruments on the spot. I managed to produce a note. Somehow, that was enough to change the course of my life. I never looked back.

The bassoon is a slightly ridiculous instrument to fall in love with. It is large, complicated, occasionally temperamental, and has the remarkable ability to make you feel both extremely important and completely defeated, sometimes within the same five minutes. But somewhere along the way, this strange collection of wood, metal and questionable noises became my voice.

That early curiosity eventually took me to the Sydney Conservatorium. Sydney gave me the discipline and confidence to begin imagining music not simply as something I loved, but as a life I could build. In 2024, I also co-founded the Orpheus Quintet, a wind quintet born out of long rehearsal-room afternoons and the realisation that five people could, occasionally, make something much more interesting together than any of us could make alone. Building an ensemble from scratch, finding our sound, discovering new music and learning how five very different musicians listen to one another, has been one of the most rewarding parts of my journey.

I then moved to Vienna for my Master’s, drawn to a city where musical history seems to seep out of the pavement. Now I’m preparing for another move, this time to London, and I’m particularly excited to join Sinfonia Smith Square. I’m looking forward to immersing myself in London’s musical life, learning from the musicians around me, and seeing where this next chapter takes me.

Through all these chapters, what keeps me coming back is the same thing that hooked me in school band: playing with other people. There is something almost magical about a group of musicians, all chasing exactly the same moment and somehow arriving there together.

Outside music, I’m usually reading, travelling, exploring somewhere new, or elbow-deep in a kitchen experiment I probably should have researched first. I think I’m drawn to all of these things for the same reason I was drawn to the bassoon in the first place: curiosity, and a willingness to see what happens if I give something a try.