People are really suffering these days. There's a lot of corporate triumph and a lot of personal despair as they wonder what are they working for.

There are plenty of ways you can play the game of fighting and really seem to be fighting without going for the jugular.

It's good to take a longer view and think, what would I really like to do if I had no limitations whatsoever?

. . . I wrote a letter to Thomas Pynchon asking, Can I have your permission to try to make an [adaptation] of your book? And I had no idea that he would answer me, because he's pretty elusive. But he did send a letter back that said, Yes, you can do that - as long as the only instrument in the opera is a banjo. I thought, That's an interesting way of saying No.

We want to dedicate our music tonight to the great opportunity that we all have to begin to truly understand the events of the past few days and to act upon them with courage and with compassion as we make our plans to live in a completely new world.

History is an angel being blown backwards into the future

Long live the beauty that comes down and through and onto all of us.