I pick up the New York Times or Time and it's talking about the latest rock group, which I'm sure is exciting to some people, but it neglects a huge area of music.

The rhythms of nature - the sounds of wind and water, the sounds of birds and insects - must inevitably find their analogues in music.

The development of new instrumental and vocal idioms has been one of the remarkable phenomena of recent music.

Perhaps two million years ago the creatures of a planet in some remote galaxy faced a musical crisis similar to that which we earthly composers face today.

I believe that music surpasses even language in its power to mirror the innermost recesses of the human soul

The retrospective glance is a relatively easy gesture for us to make.

It is easy to write unthinking music.