Somewhere in the Middle - the stories I need to tell is Mr D'Ombrain's memoir of family and friends, his musical life in Melbourne, and his thoughts on religion, war and politics, tertiary music education and Geoffrey's close contact with First Nations' Peoples, while Clear is the Water - My Grandfather was Born in Dublin records his musical peregrinations around Ireland.

The musician, composer, librettist and author refuses to slow down in the tenth decade of his life, and is writing another book.

Born in Melbourne in 1931, Mr D'Ombrain was music lecturer at Melbourne University and head of music at Melbourne State College (now also part of Melbourne University). He has written for film, dance companies and the ABC, in both Australia and USA.

His early, pre-war memories of the city remain vivid.

"My earliest memory: for some reason or another I had a natural inclination to the arts," Mr Dombrain says.

"I remember being taken to the Myer theatrette when I was about three years old and saw a pantomime there. I was so overcome with it, I put on a tantrum and didn't ever want to leave. So that was a very early experience already within my being, this love of anything to do with theatre."

Around the time he fell in love with theatre, Mr D'Ombrain also became enamoured of the power of words and music.

"When I was in about grade five, we went to hear the orchestral concert with Sir Bernard Heinze that he so brilliantly ran for children. I remember sitting in the audience and just feeling totally captivated. And I thought, 'What's wrong with these kids? They're all talking.' I couldn't understand that, because it spoke directly to me.

"As a result of that, I'd become captain of the school drum band. Just after the war, there were people who had been involved in various things, and we used to have a Mr Allen, who came out and taught us the bass drum and the snare drum for our little band. He was, of course, an ex-servicemen.

"So we played for the school to march in, and all that sort of thing. After that (Heinze) concert, I thought, 'I think I'd like to sell my drum.' So at the end of grade six, I sold the drum and bought a flute. It was only five shillings at Allen's (Music Store), and it was a very, very primitive effort, but that got me started. That's been my means of expressing myself fully in music for for the last... well, now I'm 91, so it's a very long time. "

Taught by the well-known flautist Stanley Baines, who also designed and made instruments which could be produced cheaply for use in schools, Mr D'Ombrain graduated to the Boehm system and came under the tutelage of Peter Andry.

"He became my teacher. He was still at the (Melbourne) Conservatorium and he conducted an orchestra, which at about the age of 13 I joined. People like George Dreyfus were in that orchestra too. It was a great experience. Peter Andry guided me very, very beautifully through the various exams until eventually I went to the Conservatorium and did my performance and teaching degree in music, and then went on to a master's degree, concentrating on electronic music. So that's pretty much the story."

But Mr D'Ombrain also developed a desire to understand the connection of First Nations people to the country in his childhood, after a visit to Gippsland.

"When my grandfather died, which was just after the beginning of the war actually, I remember inheriting book of Wordsworth's poetry and absorbing myself in it. I found poetry was something that spoke directly to me, even as a child. And then my uncle won some money in the Caulfield Cup and shouted my mother and I a trip to Bairnsdale and Lakes Entrance.

"I remember we went to Lake Tyers, seeing the community of Aboriginal people on the opposite bank, and I thought to myself, 'I want to be closer to these people, I need to know them.'"

That passion led to Mr D'Ombrain collaborating with Kulin Nation people for national reconciliation weeks.

Despite his natural talent for music, Mr D'Ombrain harboured a desire to be a botanist or zoologist, so much so he prepared to take a cadetship at the Melbourne Museum and begin studies at the university.

"I ended up doing music, and it's been great, but I've been able to inform that with my great interest in natural science, which has been an abiding interest all my life. I wrote over 60 music and theatre works for children, which were all the results of schools asking me to write for their particular syllabus topics. I was able to use all my knowledge and love for natural history to inform many of those works. They are in three big volumes going to be launched later this year at Ballarat Grammar."

Mr D'Ombrain wrote his 60 Music Theatre Works for Children operettas for children while co-directing the Rustic Space Theatre arts centre at historic Pirra Homestead in Lara. He then set up a recording and electronic music studio at his son's property and continued writing compositions for electronic music.

His latest work, Sea to Soil, is a fictional/factual work based on a journey Mr D'Ombrain took to New York, among other influences.

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