CD: Many composers, not least yourself, are very articulate when talking not just about their own works, but music and aesthetic issues in general. However, others are not. I’ve been heavily involved with research degrees at the Conservatoire for many years and we have a large number of composers, so I’ve spent many hours supporting them in articulating, through words, the research that resides within their music. Some find that more difficult than others. What concerns me, though, is that it has almost become an expectation now that a composer has to have a PhD to be taken seriously. Is there a danger of an over-intellectualisation of composition? Or, more accurately, where is the space for somebody who is purely instinctive, or is a Satie-esque composer, or a compositional equivalent of Le Douanier Rousseau?

JA: I do worry about that. In one case, there was a composer who was already getting quite a lot of stuff played and wanted to study a PhD with me. After a certain point I had to say to that composer, ‘I don't think you need this at the moment. Continue doing what you’re doing, and perhaps come back later.’ Since then, they’ve become a very successful opera composer. It depends on who you are. In that particular case, I just didn't think it was going to help that composer then.