He made a score that in some ways is very spare, which fits with the period that is represented in the film, which is actually a unique period in Japanese history because it was a...

Our (nation’s) cultural strength has always been derived from our diversity of understanding and experience.

I’m not likely to forget where I’ve been and what I’ve done and learned. I think it’s just as important to play new instruments as to play new pieces. The old ones are getting scarcer...

When you learn something from people, or from a culture, you accept it as a gift, and it is your lifelong commitment to preserve it and build on it.

I think I actually enjoy practicing now more than seven years ago because you’re really doing something totally specific.

Music has always been transnational; people pick up whatever interests them, and certainly a lot of classical music has absorbed influences from all over the world.

It took me way beyond what I knew, into places of which I was totally scared, but as I became less frightened, I welcomed new ways of thinking and approaching something. It made me an...

The tango is really a combination of many cultures, though it eventually became the national music of Argentina.

When we enlarge our view of the world, we deepen our understanding of our own lives. The Silk Road project hopes to plant the seed of new cultural growth and to celebrate traditions and musical...

From the sight-reading abilities of the students who came to the [reading sessions], 95% of whom were not music majors, to the great questions and comments we got from students in the classes, to the...

Early on he was thinking somehow in the recesses of his mind that ‘Hey, maybe we should do that,’ and I know he was interested in the possibility of setting the book to music.

One is that you have to take time, lots of time, to let an idea grow from within. The second is that when you sign on to something, there will be issues of trust, deep...

He’s just so much a master of the material, and that’s also based on the deep knowledge of the jazz world, of the American musical theater. By having had such a wide and deep history...

Things can fall apart, or threaten to, for many reasons, and then there’s got to be a leap of faith. Ultimately, when you’re at the edge, you have to go forward or backward; if you...

But an innovation, to grow organically from within, has to be based on an intact tradition, so our idea is to bring together musicians who represent all these traditions, in workshops, festivals, and concerts, to...

It was just so sweet. It was personally sweet but what he did was actually emotionally right, for the score.

I’ve been traveling all over the world for 25 years, performing, talking to people, studying their cultures and musical instruments, and I always come away with more questions in my head than can be answered.

The Silk Road is far more than a historic trading route that connected the people and traditions of Asia with Europe.

Many of the Central Asians know Russian, and Ted Levin speaks it fluently. I speak Chinese, but Mongolian is completely different, so we had to have translators.

Good things happen when you meet strangers.

One of the most interesting aspects of the film project was collaborating with so many people – directors, filmmakers, and writers – over a five-year period. I learned that there are two components to this.

After reaching 50, I began to wonder what the root of life is.

We may be coming to a new golden age of instrument making.

I think it’s pretty rare to have the opportunity to work with so many people that I admire in one project.

There is no culture in the world that we have not benefited from.