My pieces are never done, at least for me. It’s an open-ended inquiry process driven by curiosity. I might have a sense that a piece “is completed” for a premiere, or for a showcase, but there’s always the possibility of going back and revisiting it, and I think leaving it open-ended is also a way for me to keep my sanity.

I can tell you exactly and this is a really good lesson that I had to learn. The song gets sent in some format or another, and I add to it what I think is mine to add to flesh out what was being sent. At a certain point what I’ve noticed is if I get into this space where I think “Oh and I need to add this and then I need to add that,” which is not really coming from the song, but from my own ego. I don’t mean that in a negative way, but just it’s just coming from me, it’s not the impulse of the music itself, then inevitably it starts sounding terrible to my ears. I’ve lost a couple pieces because of that. My motto is to try to stay very sensitive to when the piece is expressing what it came to express, and that I have augmented to make sure that it can be understood, but that I haven’t taken it off some place that it had no intention of going.

It really comes down to instincts. If I feel good about it and the people that I trust that are listening to it feel good about it, then it’s good to go. But it’s definitely just a feeling you get in your gut that it’s done, and it’s time to either release it or can it and move on.

If I could go back and remake anything I’ve ever made, I would do it. I could tell you at least three things about anything that I would change in a rehearsal today. I sometimes fantasize about where I would start if I went back to that piece. There’s always some problem to be sorted out. Problems are just engines. That’s what kicks the engine into gear. If you don’t have a problem, then you don’t have a reason to make the work.