I'd been collecting different ethnic instruments here and there, and then I started making little bell type stuff, looking for weird little sound toys.

Every once in a while I'll find a new way of playing something, it will suggest itself. But generally speaking, there's a set sonic potential, and that's in concert with a set instrumental technique.

I've always been interested in finding out more about the properties of acoustics.

I started working with synthesizer players, and I had to find new instruments. I needed a more complex sound, so I went to a surplus place and got a bunch of hard plastic stuff and stainless steel stuff, and that stuff worked. So from that point on, from the 70s on, I've made instruments.

A lot of the people that I play with are electronic-based, so there isn't a direct physical analogue between what they're doing and the sound you're hearing.

I don't really need new stuff anyway. I like to make big stuff, and it's too expensive to travel with. So I have my refined set that works well, and I'm pretty much set with that.

I'd been collecting different ethnic instruments here and there, and then I started making little bell type stuff, looking for weird little sound toys.