Theatrical times are different from concert times, to put it simply. Taking a figure like [Mahatma] Gandhi and setting him on a stage requires thinki….

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..

What I've noticed is that people who love what they do, regardless of what that might be, tend to live longer..

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….

The hardest thing about traveling is that mostly you get to a point - and it always happens on every tour - where you can choose between eating and s….

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 di….

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..

There's almost no content in terms of language at all. I don't like using language to convey meaning. I'd rather use images and music..

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

Satyagraha is an opera which I wrote for the Netherlands Opera, so it uses an orchestra of around fifty, a chorus of forty, and there are about seven….

Akhnaten is kind of a dark, kind of mysterious character. We don't know a lot about him - a lot of information on him was lost. But he obviously was ….

I consider the first 20 performances just learning the piece. Think about it this way: If you think about a pianist who plays a Schubert sonata throu….

A new language requires a new technique. If what you're saying doesn't require a new language, then what you're saying probably isn't new..

I've been called a minimalist composer for more than 30 years, and while I've never really agreed with the description, I've gotten used to it..

I travel the world, and I'm happy to say that America is still the great melting pot - maybe a chunky stew rather than a melting pot at this point, b….

I don't think I'm capable of making radical changes, but over a period of four or five years you can perceive very big changes, and they seem rather ….

I find that people can’t find you. It’s kind of quiet. When I go to a city, I can almost always get a piano if I need one. So there’s something nice ….

Traditions are imploding and exploding everywhere - everything is coming together, for better or worse, and we can no longer pretend were all living ….

It takes about a year to write an opera for me, but not a really a year of writing. I'm touring at the same time, and I'm playing, sometimes doing sm….

I was a regular kind of academic music student. I was at Juilliard. I had to study all the contemporary music of the time, and changing that language….

Finally, ultimately, you write music for yourself. I mean, I need a public, I need people to play, I need everything else. I'm not working in isolati….