It surely must take a lot of courage to resign from one of the most prestigious (and best remunerated) positions in the musical world to pursue a career as an independent, free-lance composer. But this is precisely what the Australian Brett Dean did a year ago, when he left the Berlin Philharmonic's viola section after 15 years and went back to his native Queensland. And for all that, composing hadn't even been a part of Dean's training at the Conservatory in Brisbane, or had it?