This sounds horribly pretentious, but I like to think that if music hadn't existed, I could have invented it.

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• Harrison Birtwistle:

  There are rhythmic ideas which sometimes only work up to a point. In writing there are moments when

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  The thing about influence is that any composer worth anything will give you the same names.

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  The theatre only knows what it's doing next week, not like the opera, where they say: What are we g

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  The piece that had a large influence on me was Turangalila.

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  The opera tells the story with all the built-in contradictions and from many different angles.

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  People say my music is English. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's not me writing English music, b

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  One thing I've tried to do in writing music is take on very basic things, very archetypal things.

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  My operas usually come from musical ideas rather than ideas about subject matter.

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  My operas and my theatre works are very formal pieces.

• Harrison Birtwistle:

  My attitude to writing is like when you do wallpapering, you remember where all the little bits are