Tilly Jones is a young composer and cellist from Lismore, NSW, Australia. The 19-year-old has not let her multiple diagnoses, including Cerebral Palsy, ADHD and Aspergers stop her.
Tilly has been playing music for 9 years and composing for 7 years. She has composed commissioned pieces for the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Cinema Touching Disability Film Festival, Northern Rivers Youth Orchestra and the Evans Head Living Museum. She also plays in numerous ensembles and groups around the Northern Rivers region. She is extremely talented with a very bright future.
After commencing her studies on piano at the Northern Rivers Conservatorium at 8 years old, she has gone on to achieve great heights in composition, appearing in the internationally acclaimed ‘Tilly’s Symphony’, composing for the Australian Chamber Orchestra, writing for an international film festival, playing under the baton of Richard Gill and Sean O’Boyle, as well as working within the Lismore community.
In 2019, Tilly composed music for the 25th Anniversary of the Lantern Parade, and frequently collaborates with local artists such as Mykaela Jay and RealArtWorks.
Tilly is currently studying music composition at Southern Cross University and undertaking an internship with The Flowers of War, supported by the Australian War Memorial. She composes in a number of styles for a variety of instruments, including jazz, classical, world, and fusion.
Tilly is also a passionate advocate and campaigner for better care of Foster Children and the rights of people with disabilities.
Tilly has been part of the group Care2Change since 2015. Care2Chage is a youth reference group for young people who are in/ have had experience in Out Of Home Care. The aim is to improve the lives of those in care and advocate for those who don’t have a voice.
Tilly is a true inspiration and her teachers are all very proud of what she has achieved and look forward to what she can accomplish in the future.
In 2018, Tilly’s foster carers reached out to Variety to help support Tilly’s love of music. As you can imagine, private music tuition, lessons, upkeep of instruments, purchasing music scores and composing software would be incredibly costly.
I was honoured to receive a Variety Heart Scholarship. It directly allowed me to purchase a 5 string electric viola, a loop pedal, music creating software and hardware. These allowed me to create my compositions for my HSC Music 2, for which I received a mark of 93, and 48/50 for Music extension. It also allowed me to travel to Melbourne in 2019 to attend the launch of the Flowers of War collection as part of my internship with the Australian War Memorial. Since then, I have finished my HSC in 2020 and been accepted into the Bachelor of Contemporary Music at Southern Cross University!
The Scholarship has helped me so so much and I am forever grateful to have received it.
– Tilly Jones
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