Writing a book on a living composer is a double-edged sword: for all the freedom granted by being the first person critically to assess much of the music comes the constant feeling of worry and guilt that you might get some valuable information wrong. Having no vast bibliography of secondary literature is both a blessing and a curse; there is certainly much less to read and absorb, to verify or contradict, but there are far fewer places to turn to for corroborating views or analyses. With the composer in question very much still alive and producing, there is always the possibility of contacting him for another interview, or for that key bit of information that has alluded you – whether he wants to respond or not. In short, writing this book is something of a voyage into the unknown, or the little known, with the ultimate hope being to end up somewhere of value and experience, for both the author and the wider musical world.

I first encountered James MacMillan's name before I had heard any of his music; it was during my undergraduate degree at Durham University in a workshop given by MacMillan's former tutor (and my soon-to-be tutor) John Casken. Casken informed the composition class that there was ‘little money in contemporary composition’ (a typically matter-of-fact statement from the then Head of Composition at Manchester University) and that the ‘only composer who made money from serious composition is James MacMillan’. Who was this James MacMillan who made all this money? How did he do it? I did not take the time to find out, but I remembered his name. I met him for the first time a few years later in Manchester, whilst I was studying with Casken; MacMillan was at the university on one of his visits to work with the BBC Philharmonic as part of his role as composer–conductor. During our brief meeting, I had a nosebleed and spent much of the time hiding behind a piano – an auspicious introduction.

I first encountered his music in any real fashion whilst working in a music shop in Oxford; here we were encouraged to listen to some of the CDs we were trying to sell, and I slowly made my way through all the contemporary music the shop stocked.