"Silence is very important. One of my first teachers, when he would quiet the orchestra, would say, "My young friends, remember music is a beautiful picture painted on a background of silence." But silence is challenged in our society. The world is getting louder and louder. There's more and more disruption. I sometimes feel that music, which grew through people challenging the frontiers of human thought, may need to become something that soothes human thought. That music may need to create a kind of refuge where people can experience a kind of calm which otherwise may not exist for them in their real lives." - Michael Tilson Thomas
