My students frequently ask what their next project should be. My advice: immerse yourself in the music you love and you will find what you want to do; you will discover your next project.

Most people think an artist tries to be original, but originality is the last thing that develops in the artist.

It is obvious that anything a scientist discovers or invents is based on previous discoveries and inventions. The same applies to the arts.

As I sit down and start to work, I often panic. I stare at the empty piece of music paper. How can I say that my piece will be ready for performance next January when I do not have a recipe for making it happen?

Yes, influences are enriching, and they can be found in every work of art, even the most original.

To understand Mozart's contradictory qualities would indeed be to understand genius.

Anybody can put things together that belong together. to put things together that don't go together, and make it work, that takes genius like Mozart's. Yet he is presented in the play Amadeus as a kind of silly boy whom the gods loved.