He [Alexander Yurasovsky] heard me play my Sonata No. 2 and said that while of course it was very interesting and inventive, it had not a scrap of real melody in it, just a series of 'tigerish leaps'. This annoyed me, and when he said that the movement he liked best was the Scherzo, I retorted, 'Well, I take just the opposite view, that's my least favourite movement . . . '

'Why?'

'Because the other movements are all more subtle; the Scherzo is targeted at a less discriminating taste.'