The proliferation of new music groups and individual performers focusing on new music today is heartening. On the one hand the culture is very resistant to new things, and yet it continues to change and grow.

As a young composer I had a particular fondness for Liszt's Beethoven Symphony arrangements for the piano, and to this day I enjoy playing non-piano music at the piano.

I do believe young people should be obligated to try different types of music - that is what education is. But once you're in a situation as an adult, it doesn't benefit anybody - at least in my experience - to force music on people that they don't like or do not have an interest in - whether it's three-hundred years old or newly written.

I don't think the role of the critic has changed very much. In the most positive sense, the music critic is one who helps the public navigate what's out there, especially in bringing attention to things they otherwise wouldn't hear about, or to provide a new window into something familiar.

The proliferation of new music groups and individual performers focusing on new music today is heartening. On the one hand the culture is very resistant to new things, and yet it continues to change and grow.

Just as all pop music is not simplistic, not all contemporary concert music is complex. Often what a person connects with goes much deeper than generalized issues of simplicity and complexity.

My interactions with musicians have been simply that: interactions with musicians. Issues of gender, or anything else beyond the music-making, have in my experience played no role in whether or not a musician has been able to articulate my intentions as a composer.