Rose is one of seven ‘birthday candles’ commissioned by the Mobius Ensemble to celebrate their tenth anniversary. Each ‘candle’ features a member of the Ensemble as soloist, the others accompanying. My soloist is the wonderful violinist Philippe Honoré, who told me that a formative book during his childhood was Le Petit Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. The Little Prince lives all alone on a planet with the sinister Boabab trees until one day a beautiful single rose grows and completely entran...