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.

I always had, deep down, a slight aversion toward the purely cerebral in music.

After 30 years I have realized the greatest pleasure I can get is to have learnt.

I'm still disturbed if a chord isn't together, but your priorities change as you get older.

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.

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

I like this idea of identification with the local team. I think it's great. That's what an orchestra should be. It's an orchestra for its hometown, and it serves the people.