My childhood was a period of waiting for the moment when I could send everyone and everything connected with it to hell.

The performance of performance has developed to such an extent in recent years that it challenges the music itself and will soon threaten it with relegation.

I was born out of due time in the sense that by temperament and talent I should have been more suited for the life of a small Bach, living in anonymity and composing regularly for an established service and for God.

The one true comment on a piece of music is another piece of music.

Too many pieces of music finish too long after the end.

I cannot now evaluate the events that, at the end of those thirty years, made me discover the necessity of religious belief. I was not reasoned into my disposition. Though I admire the structured thought of theology, it is to religion no more than counterpoint exercises are to music.

Composers combine notes, that's all.