“I was an accomplished junior tennis player up to around fourteen years old. At fourteen or fifteen I made the decision to venture off to make my life 100% music.”

I have a huge record and cd collection of all kinds of great classical, jazz and all music but I find the internet very accessible and quick.

When you play competitive tennis you are competing against someone else and you have to win. Playing music I didn’t have to win I had to become better within myself.

The thing I learned from playing tennis is that I know what competition is. I can handle rejection.

When I lost a tennis match that made me upset or hurt emotionally I would find myself going to the piano and playing for hours. It was my place of refuge and solace.

There is competition. It’s almost like I’m back in tennis competing in a way. There are usually about twenty composers vying for the number one spot for a big or medium film.

Sometimes it’s very hard to turn off my brain especially when I have an eighteen hour day. I try to stop working by 10 or 11pm but you know sometimes there is nothing I can do about it.

Composers can do things that weren’t allowed in the 17th century. Until we had composers like Igor Stravinsky and Sergei Rachmaninoff to break the rules.

You cannot do what I do for a living without having a thick skin.