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.

When you have performers, there's the uniqueness of live performance and what performers do in concerts.

It's always a thrill for me to see new versions of my pieces on YouTube.

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 to what I think of as the critical problem: the aging process of a piece of music. I noticed in the '70s that pieces I wrote would sound great the first time I listened to them and then on repeated hearings they sounded older and older until what seemed exciting and vibrant on first listening became stale.

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

The experimentation that I do has a lot to do with tunes and pitches and ways that melodies are put together.