The piece that had a large influence on me was Turangalila.
When I was confronted with official tuition, the academic thing, I could see no relationship whatever between that and the music I'd been writing since I was 11.
There are rhythmic ideas which sometimes only work up to a point. In writing there are moments when it just comes off the page, it's not just a collection of notes.
The theatre only knows what it's doing next week, not like the opera, where they say: What are we going to do in five years' time? A completely different attitude.
The opera tells the story with all the built-in contradictions and from many different angles.
One thing I've tried to do in writing music is take on very basic things, very archetypal things.
It's the irrational things that interest me.
I'm not an architectural composer.