There is this amusing story of the summer visit of Poulenc and Milhaud to Schönberg in the 1920s, when they were having dinner while the children of the dodecaphonic master were playing in the garden. Hardly had the soup tureen been placed on the table than a ball splashed through an open window right into it, generously distributing the contents over the participants, upon which Schönberg with grim humor stated, looking intensely through the vermicelli hanging over his bald scull: “This is what I want to do with musical life.”

—John Borstlap, The Classical Revolution: Thoughts on New Music in the 21^st Century