Variations program note

Variations is a short set of free variations inspired by Beethoven's string quartet op. 131: most of the melodic material is drawn from the first two measures of the Beethoven. I was intrigued by the fifth movement of op. 131, in which the cello seems to have impulse–control problems: it disrupts the texture, blurting out its little arpeggio figure in the wrong place, at the wrong dynamic level. In my piece the instruments are often out of synch with each other: playing a different rhythm, with a different articulation—or simply still engrossed in the last variation, although the others have moved on. Variations is dedicated to Kurt Rohde and the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble.

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