"Most people are satisfied with the junk food being sold as music."

"I am, as I've said, merely competent. But in an age of incompetence, that makes me extraordinary."

"When I was a young musician, the only option available to pursue secondary education in music was to attend a classical conservatory."

"For whatever reason, not all people are born with the particular gift of being able to express ourselves through music. And, believe me, it is a gift."

"It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it."

"It seems almost backwards to me that my music seems the more emotional outlet, and the art stuff seems more about ideas."

"Simplicity and repose are the qualities that measure the true value of any work of art."

"The true art of memory is the art of attention."