"You have got to be all in to be a performing musician," she says. "You can't be half-arsed. You've got to put all your effort into being a performer and being a musician at the top standard."

Sponsored by ArtSound FM and participating Fine Music Network stations in association with Friends of the ANU School of Music and the Bungendore Woodworks Restaurant and Gallery, Jones was awarded the Virtuoso Award and $5000 cash at the national finals in Adelaide.

"The other musicians there were so talented and inspiring," Jones says. "It was really great to meet those people. It was quite a high standard set. I was just happy to get in."

The gifted performer, who recently achieved first class Honors in Classical Guitar performance from the ANU School of Music, started playing the piano when she was five or six years old. "That was a great basis for me," she says. "And then I went on to the violin for a few years. And then when I was 11 I started the guitar because there was a program in primary school where you could choose an instrument, and I thought that the guitar sounded really cool. So I chose that instrument and I've been with it ever since."

Jones says she gets a lot of pleasure from the guitar. He practices around four hours a day though she says playing at her level is more than just about how many hours you put in.

"I don't like to think of it as the amount of hours you do a day, that's sort of a given. It's more about the other aspects of your life. You've got to make sure you make decisions in what you do … what you're passionate about and what you go and listen to and what not. It's about lifestyle rather than a hobby or an extra thing," she says. "It's just what I love to do.

"This is what I'm passionate about and what I get joy from. It's hard work. A lot of people assume that it's easy to practice so many hours a day because you love music …It's still very hard work, it requires a lot of dedication, but I can't imagine myself doing anything else."