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

I think we are in the process of getting the word out, and we haven't done very well yet. But we are trying.

I always felt that one day I would have to make the change in my own life, bite the bullet and see what it is to be a composer who conducts rather than the other way around.

Of course performing talent, that's clear. Maybe this is not so well-known among young people who are interested in music, who are talented in music, but they're trying to figure out how to go about it.

Classic music somehow changed, and it changed between the first and the second world wars, and somehow what happened was that the hero that had been the composer, the hero now was the performer, and especially the conductor.

I realized that the European dogma is not necessarily the only way to look at things.

There is such a suspicion in today's world of people who do more than one thing, who aren't specialized.