Well, the reason I’ve survived for this long is because any film composer that has an extended career learns to work within deadlines. The deadline becomes the motivating factor in the same way that a pro athlete can do these incredible things with two seconds left in the game. It forces them into their best mode. For film composers, the clock does get us into a higher gear.

That moving a lot really committed me to stability and committed me to ... being in control of my destiny. That was something that was very important to me. And it also made me very conservative about money.

Yes, that’s right. I saw what I could succeed in. I never considered myself very bright, and I always thought of myself as mathematically mediocre. So I figured that probably, like your college runner who has difficulty breaking a ten-second hundred — well, breaking an 11-second, shall we say, 100-meter — realizes that their best shot is to rely less on strength and speed and more on self-discipline, planning, and long hard work. Yes. That’s the way I do science.

Well, I hate the word, but it’s true that something sometimes visits and other times doesn’t. I wish I felt otherwise, but I feel as though there has to be some catalyst, some inspiration. All of a sudden there’s a phrase in your head. Where does that thing come from? I don’t know, and because I don’t know, I don’t know how to have more of them.

I spent time with Rauschenberg a lot during the combine period. I think just around the combine period. He had a big influence on me because he was very free and not full of philosophy and why I’m doing this and that. Some of the artists had this anchor of having to be — relate sometimes to Hegel and Kant and Nietzsche. It was sort of baggage that they brought to the table that was irrelevant. I mean it was in their head and it was relevant, but it was irrelevant to this moment of truth. So I found the artists that were kind of “dumb smart,” that were really smart but didn’t parade it, that were willing to take the risks and stuff.