I went to L'Academie de Cuisine in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and I think French cooking is the basis for a lot of classical cuisine, a foundation of a lot of other cuisines. That said, it's not the only way to approach a cooking career.

Casseroles are one-pot-wonders!

I believe that there are no mistakes in the universe, so I think it all happens as it should!

When I first started cooking, I was very much an intuitive cook when it came to taste, but that didn't mean I didn't want to know why some things worked and why others did not. My interest took me to culinary school.

I've been writing way before 'X Factor,' and I've been doing shows before 'X Factor.' And everything I did on this show was me being me. Same way I acted in the show is the same way I act now as an artist.

When I do a film score, I am basically nothing more than a fancy pencil for hire. I don't own any of the music when I am - it belongs to the film company - and likewise, when I am done, even if I come up with something astounding that I may want to revisit... in the world of film composition, you can't do that.

A career in film didn't seem like something I could attain. Whereas I grew up next to New York City, and I spent my life going into New York City seeing plays, and I was a theater actor in school. Acting on the stage felt really natural to me, and I liked it, and I wasn't terrible at it.

Music lives in cycles. One day, one type of music is on top and the next year another genre is on top. Either the fans love you or they jump from one artist to another.