Dennis is very affable. He likes to joke all the time. He has a very open personality. I thought I would like to write a piece for him.

Right now, he brings offense to the table, but more importantly he brings personality. He's aggressive, and that's what you have to be.

I never thought it was a principled effort. I always thought it was an organization based around a personality.

All of them turned their backs on me at that time because they thought I was a troublemaker.

It makes sense because there's a big demand to increase participation of minority patients. You want your patient population to mirror the population at large.

In this work, I wanted him (the bass clarinet soloist) to sort of cajole the strings into going along with him. He would sort of kindly and smilingly get them to see his way.