My favorite music is when the sound is supplementing the message. I don't think it's dramatic; it's cinematic.
Music is the literature of the heart; it commences where speech ends.
The thing I don't want to do as a film composer is reiterate. I prefer to subtextualize or to underline rather than to say, 'This is what you should be feeling.'
I always thought songs are movies for the ears and films are like songs for the eyes.
I don't read newspapers, and I've said I don't watch the news. I love books, but I don't read much. What I do is I get people to read to me, and I put the stories in my head.
My novels and poems are meant to be read aloud. That's why jazz musicians have been able to adapt my stuff.
There was an era when people would turn on their radio and hear a radio drama. Now, you could be as scared by that as seeing it filmed. In those days, people used to sit by the fire and imagine what they were hearing. Everything is its own art form.
Music or sound in a film is a character as important as another character.
