Los Angeles is just a more open place. The way L.A. functions is that people give you a forum. They say, Show us what you can do.

When an artist works today or whenever, it's not about creating immortal masterpieces, because that's the one thing we don't decide ourselves.

I discovered that the people of the North are different and there's no way you can make a person from the North similar to a Southerner. They're two different worlds.

If I were in a position to announce a public competition to coin a new word, I would do so right now.

The Northern idea of form is more of a process. The various units of the form overlap. You can't tell where some things stop and new things start. This is typical of Sibelius.

I'm trying to conduct only five months a year, and the rest will be composing time. I'm trying to spend as much as I can out of those months here in L.A., because for creative work, this is a fantastic place.

The philharmonic became such a journey and adventure in my life, and a deeply satisfying thing.