Canberra's trees have inspired many things - mainly admiration for their bold seasonable displays.
Instagram snaps and photo essays, marriage proposals, picnic destinations, maybe the odd poem or two. But an entire musical score?
One Australian composer has been so moved by one very particular stretch of Canberra trees he has written an award-winning orchestral piece about them.
Alexander Voltz's Dunrossil Elms recently took out a 10,000 Euro (A$16,500) prize at a competition in Bucharest, Romania.
Judges in the Eastern European country were equally moved, it seems, by Voltz's evocation of an avenue of elms, far, far away in the Southern Hemisphere.
Because, as Voltz insists, the elms lining Dunrossil Drive, the stretch of road leading to Government House have things to tell us.
"As the morning sun rises on Canberra's Lake Burley Griffin, those old elms sway gently with the frosty breeze, watching, standing constant alike wooden sentinels as powerful comers and goers pass them by," he wrote in his explanatory notes.
"Princes have sought their shade and governments have sifted through their branches into nothing. Revere these Dunrossil elms, for they have outgrown and outlived many."
Stirring stuff - and did we mention that Voltz is only 25?
The Brisbane native is a spokesperson for the Australian Monarchist League, and is a member of the Queensland Liberal Party.
He writes for conservative journal Quadrant, has written of Australia's colonisation and its benefits for Indigenous peoples, and voted no in the 2023 Australian Indigenous Voice referendum.
He also has more than a slight penchant for the nation's capital, and is working on a series inspired by Canberra's landmarks.
"I'm sort of working on a triptych, an orchestral triptych," he says over the phone, a week after being named the winner in the Symphonic Category of the 2024 George Enescu Composition Competition in Bucharest, Romania.
"The first piece in the cycle, if you like, was called Capital Hill, and that was performed in a chamber orchestra version by the Melbourne Symphony in 2021.
"The third piece in the triptych - I haven't quite decided yet, but I think it will be the Carillon."
And when it comes to those majestic trees lining Dunrossil Drive, Voltz can't help waxing lyrical.
"That's the road that sort of connects the outside world with Government House," he says.
"And I just thought to myself, 'How many people have gone up that road and come back that road and changed our nation one way or the other'?"
Although he hails from warmer climes, he says he's always struck by Canberra's European climate. "A lot of my interests intersect in Canberra," he says.
"So I'm obviously a composer, but I've got an interest in politics, and I've also got an interest in monarchy and the crown, and so it makes sense then, I suppose, that I would be drawn to something like that, but also the surrounding geography of that area."
He's adamant his conservative views aren't in juxtaposition with his artistic sensibilities.
"It isn't juxtaposition - I don't think, personally, that the two parts of my life are mutually exclusive," he says.
"There are a lot of people who are similar in philosophy to me, they're just not as outspoken as I am, in a way."
Meanwhile, he's still basking in the glow of being part of one of the largest music competitions in Eastern Europe.
"It's incredibly exciting ... they've already broadcast this result on Romanian state television, for goodness sake!" he says.
"So it actually goes to show how differently we sort of view the arts [here in Australia].
"It's even more frustrating for me because I'm a person who calls themselves conservative, but I certainly recognise the importance of the arts.
"And a lot of people in that circle of my life, I don't think that they do, and that's terribly unfortunate.
"I mean, we know that the arts are really fundamental to the human condition."
