I feel that I belong to the 19th century. Some composers' music is very topical. It almost says, 'This is about what I read in newspapers yesterday.' Not mine.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
It's hard for me to think of others because I'm not particularly in sympathy with the music of this century.
My music is all about an idealistic human personality. I have 19th-century ideals.
As far as what I do, my value as a writer is certainly not to try to recapitulate a 19th century form. Certain styles of narrative don't conform to my style of experiencing the world.
Writing tonal music now, you are not writing into the 19th Century.
I don't look at our society today too much. My focus is still in the past, and part of the reason is because what I do - the wellspring of art, or what I do - l get from the blues. So I listen to the music of a particular period that I'm working on, and I think inside the music is clues to what is happening with the people.
I'm very obsessed with pop culture of the mid-century and it goes hand-in-hand with the music that I studied in school.
My mother was a classical pianist and my stepfather was an industrialist who was passionate about composing contemporary music.
My entire life has really revolved around music that was written about the time that I was born, 1908, to just before the First World War and shortly after it. This music I've always known, and it is that music that's most important to me.
I'm an amalgam of the 19th-century romantics and the beat poets.
I was brought up in the great tradition of the late nineteenth century: that a writer never complains, never explains and never disdains.
No opposing quotes found.