I have a commission to do a piece in a place in California, Oliver Ranch, which has an eight-storey structure called The Tower designed by the visual artist Ann Hamilton.

My writing has always been a rather non-linear process. I've found if I get something down, I can listen to it and other things start to come.

All the way from the first thing that I can remember, like our Victrola - a wind-up record player - and my grandfather's crystal radio, and my father's shortwave radio.

I used to go into the studio around midnight and stay all night.

I can't really deal with buttons. And that's what I keep saying, "Okay, I can't push buttons, because that means I have to take my hands off the keyboard or the buttons or whatever. Don't you understand!" .

My mother brought home the accordion in 1942. I was fascinated and wanted to learn to play it. Some of my music has a relationship to dance styles - The Well and the Gentle or The Wanderer for example.

I became interested in the delay, having sounds recorded and played back and then come back. I did many different configurations of sending signals from one track back to another track, or to the same track, or crisscrossing them and so forth. I worked on masking the delays so when I played into the machine, I would make long tones and collect sounds in such a way that you didn't hear the delay, although sometimes you did.