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.

Of course, if you think of a European or American household in the '50s, so what were the things that when people started climbing up the ladder, what did they buy? A fridge, a TV, I think piano was the number three item in say '53 or '54.

Our industry [classic music] has kind of retarded into this kind of endless cover-producing thing, and it's a pity.

There's so much energy exchange [in conduction], so you get back a lot, of course, but you also have to give a lot. It's kind of high-energy thing.

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.

The Royal Festival Hall in London is nice; people hang out there. I think this inviting, non-exclusive character is very important.

In the range of music that we play - roughly 300 years' worth-there really are more similarities than differences.