As a composer you want to tell musicians two completely contradictory things. You want to say, "Play exactly what I wrote, but bring your own thing to it." In a lot of ways they feel like opposites, but in a sense, my job is to cajole or encourage decisions that I approve of.

I think my generation is a lost generation in a way.

I didn't entertain the idea that my music would ever become available in any of the ways that I had previously known music to be available.

I'm pretty clear about what I'm capable of doing.

I'm trying to phase out my availability on the phone. People call you when you're walking down the street and say the most random stuff.

My urge, when I go to the store, is to buy everything. And it's the same when I'm composing. My first instinct is basically to bring the whole store home, and not make a decision about how things play out.

Riding a horse is a relationship with a foreign creature, and with musicians it's a similar thing: "OK, I'm going to put something on the page that will spook you into rushing." Little games you can play.