Every work of art needs a spine – an underlying theme, a motive for coming into existence. It doesn't have to be apparent to the audience. But you need it at the start of the creative process to guide you and keep you going.

Creativity is more about taking the facts, fictions, and feelings we store away and finding new ways to connect them.

Well, Mozart is extraordinary not only in that he became virtuoso along the lines of his father, but that he had that compositional gift, that melodic gift. By the time he was four, he was doing piano concertos with harmony in the background.

In the not-for-profit world, there can be wastefulness because there's not the desperate urgency of when you're on a clock.

The great ones never take fundamentals for granted.

There are so few people who can really take hold of art and sort of eat and chew it up. Somehow it's got to be held special, sacred in a corner, and if you don't do the same thing with it, if you're not equally reverential, serious, and pompous about it, well, then you're not a great artist. Who needs that?

Creativity is a habit, and the best creativity is a result of good work habits.