Wallaga Lake composer and musician Tony King wins International Award for Black Canvas soundtrack

His legs were crossed as he relaxed on the seat of sovereignty - it's his wife Kris's "throne" but she's asleep downstairs preparing for visitors; "the old band of 27 years."

He lifted his right hand up so that it caressed his chin.

"My thinking pose," he said with a laugh, though a bicycle ride to Bermagui everyday is Tony's usual thinking and melody composing time.

In his dining area, three guitars - his workhorse Maton, a custom acoustic, and a dragon fruit red electric Stratocaster - had nestled themselves into a corner.

"I used to tune them to the bellbirds. They used to produce an E," Tony said with a smile.

His Kawai digital piano balances precariously between the ironic 'round' corner table and the dining room table; the part-time studio.

The piano is filled with an orchestra of voices, of colour, of emotion, of heartbreak and triumph, of failed chord progressions or jazz riffs, of violinists and brass players, a zoo of instruments.

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If not for this collaboration of noise and sounds, Tony King of Wallaga Lake may not currently possess a Cannes World Film Festival award nomination, let alone the physical "Luciole d'Or" (Golden Firefly) resting on his coffee table.

The Festival was established in 2020 by Karolina Bomba after the second COVID lockdown as a way of celebrating and providing greater visibility and recognition to a new wave of filmmaking and creative talent.

"The composer works to the film. Film is the master, not the ego of the people making it," Tony, who composed the score for Black Canvas, said.

Directed by Kaye Tuckerman, the short film is inspired by Jean-Michel Basquiat, a Puerto Rican/Haitian American street artist that transitioned to a gallery artist, rising to prominence in New York in the 1980s.

"I really love reaching people in a visceral way, helping people work through emotional knots in their lives, making a difference. Music acts as a catalyst," Tony said.

Though his Wertheim walnut piano sits alongside the creaking stairs and its top is covered with an ARIA and other songwriting trophies, Tony said music was more important than awards.

"I am proudest of the Wine Music album," he said, before listing off a range of unique instruments.

"We used wine related objects" he said, describing the sound as an orchestra out of water.

In the strings section he had a shiraz glass cello, a chardonnay glass viola, and a champagne flute violin though it was also in the winds section as a piccolo. The nebuchadnezzar was his pipe organ, and in percussion Tony had a barrel, corks to provide pops, and a corkscrew against glass for the triangle.

"I have a musical forefinger on my right hand," his wife Kris said with a laugh.

The profits of the album were donated to WellWishers to help assist in building water wells in Ethopia, so that villages were provided clean permanent nearby water, while eliminating water-borne diseases and reducing mortality.

"Turning wine into water, a reverse Jesus miracle," Tony said, "People say music doesn't make a difference - that's made a difference to a whole community."

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