I found myself recycling ideas and I saw that I had to invent reasons to compose a piece rather than start from some exciting idea.

I wrote a lot of software to do various kinds of special things, and I loved the idea of composing pieces in an electronic studio.

If the music has a logic of its own - as I think my music has - an open-minded listener will apprehend and understand.

I didn't want my music to be seen as examples of an electronic culture; I just wanted them to be thought of as pieces of music.

I think of myself as experimenting with different ways of structuring pieces. A lot of it has to do with the computer, of course.

With repeated listenings, a piece eventually becomes its own being. I very often say to students that this is like meeting a person for the first time. When you first meet someone, you reference that person with others who are similar; but, as you get to know that person better, you begin to understand his unique qualities.

I came up in the '60s; that was a time when there was a revolution going on in music. Stravinsky had become a twelve-tone composer; even Aaron Copland was writing twelve-tone pieces at that time!