Most of the important composers in our country are clustered in the Northeast.

I found a certain kind of music congenial to me; it never occurred to me to write music that was academically acceptable.

I find it enormously valuable to be sure that that the pacing is what I think it is and that the scenes have the shape I think they have musically and dramatically.

It seems to me opera is just as relevant as an expressive art as anything else.

Our most intimate contact with civilizations long since dust has been through the art which has survived them.

Like any other composer of opera, I choose a subject not for polemical reasons, but because it contains vivid characters in highly charged dramatic situations.

Most of the important composers in our country are clustered in the Northeast.