I've Been Called A Minimalist Composer For

It Takes About A Year To Write An Opera For Me, But Not A Really A Year Of Writing. I'm Touring At The Same Time, And I'm Playing, Sometimes Doing Smaller Projects.[the Opera] Akhnaten Fits In With Gandhi And Einstein, So That Forms A Trilogy In A Way.i Picked People Who Were These Kind Of Larger Than Life Characters, Who Kind Of Changed The World They Lived In By Almost The Force Of Their Personality And Their Inventiveness. People That I Think Not Only Do I Admire But I Think They're Admirable People.

I Was A Regular Kind Of Academic Music Student. I Was At Juilliard. I Had To Study All The Contemporary Music Of The Time, And Changing That Language Very Radically Was Just A Sign Or A Signal That I Was Going To Try To Do Something Very Different. I Find That That's What I Feel Closest To. I Found No Real Inner Response In Me In A Non-tonal Language.

I'm Interested In What Happens To Music When Other People Use It. Whereas There Are Composers Who Don't Like Anyone To Touch Their Music, I Think People Should Because They Do Things I Can't Think Of.

I Think It's A Great Handicap To Be Discovered At An Early Age. I Didn't Have That Burden Of Early Success. I Had The Much More Livable And Durable Career Where Success Comes Late, And Comes Slowly, And You Ease Into It. So By The Time It Comes, You're Ready To Deal With It.

I Don't Know That I Make A Big Distinction Between The Big Pieces And The Little Pieces, Because I Don't Experience Them In That Way. I Mean, By The Same Token, You're Out Touring With A Band And Then You're Writing String Quartets, And In A Funny Way, Isn't It All The Same, In A Way? It's All Just Music.