Before they performed my ballet Vanina Vanini in 1961, the renowned Bolshoi Theatre orchestra had never played any music that had been written in the 12-note system.

There was a lot of tension at the first rehearsal. The musicians neither understood or accepted the music. Their heads turned in bewilderment every time a phrase was taken up by a different instrument to the one that had begun it. It gradually dawned on me, and the musicians themselves, that they were simply incapable of playing the piece.