On Approach
• Music is about discovering things hitherto unheard.
• By all means be experimental, but let the listener be part of the experiment.
• Compose about obscure things but don’t compose obscurely.
On Description
• You need to set things very thoroughly in time and place unless you have good reasons [not to].
• A sense of place distinguishes a piece of music. It may be a distillation of different places. There must be a very good reason for not describing place.
• You sometimes need to magnify something, describe it amply in a roundabout way. And in the process you discover something.
On Detail
• Oddities are interesting.
• Songs need details that will anchor themselves in your mind.
On Style
• Every song taken by itself should mean something.
• Making music should not create the impression that the composer is trying to be ‘poetic’
On Revision
• Don’t revise too much or it turns into patchwork.
• Lots of things resolve themselves just by being in the drawer a while.
• Don’t listen to anyone. Not us, either. It’s fatal.