The J. Paul Getty heir Gordon Getty always goes big—whether it’s economic ideas, his classical music, or a ‘perfect’ Napa cabernet. Brendan Coffey interviewed him for the May issue of Bloomberg Markets magazine.

Q: You’ve been composing since 1980. Are you a businessman or artist?

A: Business I have to do, but it’s fun, too. Even if I agreed with some of the socialists that the free market is iniquitous, I would still be for it because it’s so much fun.

Q: You have a buy-side company.

A: ReFlow, which provides liquidity to mutual funds seeing redemptions. It hasn’t conquered the world like I hoped 10 years ago. But it’s been cash flow positive for the past five years. It’s alive and kicking.

Q: What’s your approach to investing?

A: I’ve always been a risk taker. There’s a logic to that: If you are born to wealth, you can afford to lose a fair bit and still be fine.

Q: If you had to invest new money right now, would you choose funds, gold, bonds, or stocks?

A: If I had to choose one thing, I’d say SPDRs.

Q: You spend a lot of time on economics.

A: Money and banking theory. The banking system to me has failed. There have been once-a-generation failures since its founding in Venice in 1200. We keep blaming the incidents that spark them, like subprime, but not blaming the big leverage that’s the root of the problem.

Q: Is wine a vanity business?

A: I don’t want to lose money in it. You lose morale, and nobody takes you seriously. The more you make, the more confident the people working for you are.

Q: Malcolm Forbes crowned you America’s wealthiest person in 1983. Do you miss being the richest?

A: Hell no.

Q: Today, Bloomberg has you at $3.5 billion.

A: Honest to God, it hasn’t been on my mind in so long. I have much more dough than I need. It’s always fun to make more, but it’s just a game!