I don't like the word 'career'. When somebody says to me, 'oh, you've had such a wonderful career', I think, 'career - that's after you're dead.' I just don't think that way.

Teaching is a sacred profession. And art is a form of teaching.

On stage, generally speaking, the story is stopped or held back by songs, because that's the convention. Audiences enjoy the song and the singer, that's the point.

I like murder mysteries, the Agatha Christie kinds of things where you know that it's all going to be neatly wound up at the end.

By the time I get through writing a score, I know the book better than the book writer does, because I've examined every word, and questioned the book writer on every word.

Puzzles are like songs - A good puzzle can give you all the pleasure of being duped that a mystery story can. It has surface innocence, surprise, the revelation of a concealed meaning, and the catharsis of solution.

Music is structure out of Chaos