When Jenny Banks' string quartet disbanded, the talented violinist decided it was ''Berlin or bust''.
''There's a style of orchestral playing here and a tradition that I really wanted to experience ... '' she says in a late-night phone call from Germany.
''So [after going to Berlin], I did a few auditions and ended up in Leipzig, playing in the oldest and largest civic orchestra in the world.''
Tracing its origins to 1743, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra has been associated with many well-known composers and musicians, from Mozart and Beethoven to its former music director Felix Mendelssohn.
Banks says that as well as their concert duties, the 170-plus members perform in productions of the Leipzig Opera and the Leipzig Ballet, and in St Thomas' Church where Bach once conducted the boys' choir.
''Every week we play a Bach cantata [there] and they still have the boys' choir, 800 years later.''
Leipzig is about 150km south of Berlin, in what was once communist East Germany, and a long way from Alexandra where Banks grew up in a musical family.
As a 3-year-old, she heard the theme music from M*A*S*H. and repeated it by ear on the piano.
At 4, she started violin lessons.
After performing in the national youth orchestra and the national youth choir, she completed an honours degree in violin performance at the University of Otago, did her master's in Boston and joined the Tasman String Quartet, which was ''quartet in residence'' at the University of Colorado.
''I wasn't somebody who had a five- or 10-year plan,'' she explains.
''I just loved the violin and had dreams to see the world and play at a really high level.''
Touring internationally at least three times a year, the Gewandhaus Orchestra recently played all Brahms' symphonies in Paris, London and Vienna.
But Banks notes the group's motto, ''true pleasure is a serious affair'', and says it is not always as glamorous as it sounds.
Having several different pieces in her head and playing something new every night took a while to get used to, while playing a Wagner opera for up to five hours can be physically exhausting.
''We work hard. But it's definitely a passion and a pleasure.
"It's a real privilege to be able to do something you love as a profession and there's a real sense of pride in this orchestra, about its history and where it's come from.''
Having recently been made a tenured member, the 30-year-old is eager to make more musical connections outside of the orchestra by joining a chamber group, returning to the viola and taking up jazz singing.
She plans to see more of Europe with her German boyfriend and is keen to put down roots in Leipzig, a ''beautiful and booming'' city where she says it is not uncommon for taxi drivers to debate classical music or comment on a conductor.
''In America, and New Zealand as well, when someone asks you what you do and you say you're a violinist, they'll quite often ask, OK but what's your real job?'
"Here, you never have that. You just say you're a musician and it's something they understand ...
''It's not that it's not a respected profession in New Zealand.
"There's just more of a tradition here of support from the Government and the cities, because it's so valued.
"And that's really a luxury. The arts have to struggle in so many countries, which is a shame.''
