There's a world of difference between a strong ego, which is essential, and a large ego-which can be destructive.
I think a composer is always interested in his last work.
Now there is no taboo; everything is allowed. But one cannot simply go back to tonality, it’s not the way. We must find a way of neither going back nor continuing the avant-garde. I am in a prison: one wall is the avant-garde, the other wall is the past, and I want to escape.
Stravinsky used Mother Goose. He was influenced by Mother Goose, indirectly, but very beautifully
Then, after the war it was impossible to travel, after so many years of Hitler and Stalin.
I continued to study Math and Physics on my own, but one and a half years later I realized that I did want to be a composer, and after that I never changed my mind.
But if you go from Moscow to Budapest you think you are in Paris.
If you care for the quality of life in our American democracy, then you have to be for censorship.
Unmitigated seriousness is always out of place in human affairs.
Human rebellion ends in metaphysical revolution. It progresses from appearances to acts, from the dandy to the revolutionary.
Selling more of what you sell has nothing to do with what you sell. It has everything to do with your prospect's wants, needs, fears, goals, values and priorities.