The work I've done is the work I know, and the work I do is the work I don't know. I don't know what I'm doing.

I don't know that I make a big distinction between the big pieces and the little pieces, because I don't experience them in that way. I mean, by the same token, you're out touring with a band and then you're writing string quartets, and in a funny way, isn't it all the same, in a way? It's all just music.

But the difference between the little pieces and the big pieces - I'm not actually sure which are the little pieces. With some of the big pieces, it's a lot of musical running around, whereas the little pieces, you can say everything you want to say.

What came to me as a revelation was the use of rhythm in developing an overall structure in music.

I shift between mediums very frequently. Instead of taking a break from writing, I just write in a different medium or in a different way or for a different purpose, so that I don't actually stop writing - I just go to something else. Like going from a big symphony to a piano piece is great and very refreshing, I find. And then going from that to a big concerto, and then having to go out and play.

Traditions are imploding and exploding everywhere - everything is coming together, for better or worse, and we can no longer pretend were all living in different worlds because were on different continents.

My biggest problem about writing is whenever I write piano pieces, because I then have to learn to play them, which is sometimes not so easy.