The large rehearsal room of the East Gippsland Music Centre hummed with the bizarre sounds of a band of students warming up their instruments. Each person was lost in their own private expression. Some blew solid notes in all seriousness, measuring the pitch and timbre against the ideal note that they had in their minds. Others used the piano to tune. Scattered phrases of contrasting pieces of music competed with scales and exuberant blasts of sound. Flutes fluttered, clarinets warbled, saxophones groaned, drums clashed, and trumpets blasted intermittently – it was the regular Monday afternoon chaos.
Tristram sat straight in his chair with the alto saxophone between his knees, his tongue slapping moisture onto the dry reed. He experimented with an intermediate note, before testing the low
