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

Theatrical times are different from concert times, to put it simply. Taking a figure like [Mahatma] Gandhi and setting him on a stage requires thinking about what theater is about and what the whole experience is about and what we're trying to communicate in that way, so you get into certain less abstract considerations.

I'd say it's just part of the world that we live in; it's part of the music world.

In order to arrive at a personal style, you have to have a technique to begin with.

I don't know what I'm doing and it's the not knowing that makes it interesting.

I think I'm really part of a whole generational movement in a way. I think a lot of other people since and during this time have gotten interested in writing what we can still call experimental music. It's not commercial music. And it's really a concert music, but a concert music for our time. And wanting to find the audience, because we've discovered the audience is really there. Those became really clear with Einstein on the Beach.

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.