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Nobody can give a good performance unless the authors and composers have written a good part, a fact which is often overlooked.

Living composers writing for big band are very few and far between. There are not a lot of them, and I have a talent for doing it. I am zeroing in on what I do best.

There are wonderful composers and librettists out there. It's the lack of creative producers that is troubling.

I'm not an intellectual composer.

Composers, like authors, have a lot in common. Our main goal is to connect with the listener emotionally.

I consider myself a composer.

The great composers I worked with along the way, I always felt they were filmmakers more than composers. They would talk about the story rather than the music.

There's a higher place that I have no illusions about reaching. There's a sophistication and aesthetic about composers who only write only for the music's sake.

I've always been a composer dependent on texts.

Composers are not all good conductors.