Dear Jeremy Soule,
First off, your works sets itself apart from a great many's, for many reasons. Your compositions are so rich and expressive that my own MP3 player is full of it, to the point that when for example I'm feeling down or full of stress because of daily concerns I simply resort to your music and it's it truly capable of changing my mood, and making me feel better and lighter because it transports us to different worlds. For example, that happens a lot with the music score for TES IV: Oblivion! Even now as I regrettably find myself currently unable to play that game because of some hardware problems, all I have to do is listen to the music and I am immediately transported to the mood of the game as if I had been playing it.
Now that I've elaborated on why I think you are my favorite composer for quite some time now, here comes a little intro for my silliest question. I take a passionate interest in music, particularly symphonic. Unfortunately my entire family does not share my interest in proper musical education and learning to play instruments... I almost feel like Salieri from the movie Amadeus, when he expressed his same resentment that his family did not care for music and "how could he explain to them what music meant to him" X_x Though sadly my family at least may have a valid reason behind it, seeing as unfortunately setting aside money to fulfill these dreams are not generally within the possibilities of "the average Joe"...
So my questions are: did you come from a family already connected to music, that therefore cares and recognizes the importance of joining efforts to provide musical education when a member of the family clearly shows signs of potential on that area?
And more importantly, can a 24-year-old such as myself still achieve some considerable measure of proficiency in music if they start their learning later in life? Or would you consider that more difficult, as many believe that perhaps people can only become truly accomplished in any artistic endeavour if they start at a very early age?
I wish you all the best in your career, and look forward to listening to more of your sure-to-be brilliant, outstanding future projects ^_^