That is my way of doing things, and I wouldn't necessarily recommend this to anybody else; if you need to do technical exercises, you do them. The whole point of practicing is to get to know yourself, to know your weaknesses and to zero in on them and target them. It's not really about employing anybody else's formulas, because you really have to find what is best for you and what you need.

I never considered myself more able than anybody because I had problems just like anybody else. When I practiced, I solved problems, like any of my fellow students. I looked at my own work, and looked ahead, with blinders, almost.

I don't listen to recordings very much now, to be perfectly honest. I listened to them a lot when I was younger.

As far as the style, I can't say there is one definite style. I probably feel most comfortable writing in a tonal idiom, with considerable, if not extreme chromaticism.

To be perfectly honest, I was never really aware that I had any special abilities. When you have what you have, you don't really think about what you don't have; you simply work with what you have.

My father ran the gamut: a favorite of his was Josef Hofmann, but there was also Friedman, Rachmaninoff, Godowsky, Lhevinne, Moiseiwitsch, Paderewski, etc.

Very rarely do I work on mechanics now. I tend to solve problems within the music itself.