'The point of recapitulation in the first movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony unleashes one of the most horrifyingly violent episodes in the history of music....The point is not to hold up Beethoven as exceptionally monstrous. The Ninth Symphony is probably our most compelling articulation in music of the contradictory impulses that have organized patriarchal culture since the Enlightenment. Moreover, within the parameters of his own musical compositions, he may be heard as enacting a critique of narrative obligations that is...devestating.'

'Tonality itself - with its process of instilling expectations and subsequently withholding promised fulfillment until climax - is the principal musical means …

'Rather than protecting music as a sublimely meaningless activity that has managed to escape social signification, I insist on treating it as a medium that par…

'Most people have music in the center of their lives. I believe my work sheds light on how music affects us and why it is so influential.' from http://www.ucla…

Of Beethoven - 'Beethoven's last quartets were written by a deaf man and should only be listened to by a deaf man'

On Beethoven's Seventh Symphony: 'What can you do with it? It's like a lot of yaks jumping about.'

An OBE is what you get if you clean the toilets well at King's Cross station.