I saw his first production in ’89, and that was the Don Giovanni production. And ever since then I started to follow his work, and I think it is very much his concept of opera which made me realize that that’s a really interesting art form also today. I always felt that he was really very sincere, and I never in fact understood all this talk, him trying to be enfant terrible or trying to create scandals. I don’t think he ever tried to do that. I think he just wanted to bring these librettos to today’s peoples to make them important for today’s people. ((Historic Residue)) And I think that was really important for me to realize in his work, also I always felt that he was very respecting music very much, which is not at all the idea that some other people have of him. So, he’s somebody who is socially very conscious. And I think if he had very big influence on me, it’s maybe also in that respect, that I — until having worked with him, I felt that my music was for me a safe place, and I could turn my back to the world in my music, and during the years after having worked with him, I opened myself very much more to the world, and I feel that my music is more and more in connection with the surrounding world.

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