I had all the normal interests - I played basketball and I headed the school paper. But I also developed very early a great love for music and literature and the theater.

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.

If I felt that one of my operas did not come off I would certainly say so.

If something is successful with the audience, it's automatically suspect; the reverse is to say that not to reach audiences is the greatest compliment an artist can receive!

I had all the normal interests - I played basketball and I headed the school paper. But I also developed very early a great love for music and literature and the theater.

Anyone who creates something new or does something different artistically is going to be singled out.

The artist is something of an outsider in America. I have always felt that America does not value its artists, certainly not in the sense that the Europeans do.