Excessive Deviation (2003) Instrumentation: piano Length: 9:00 Premiere:      April 14, 2003      Composers' Concert      Carnegie Mellon University. Pittsburgh, PA      Dan VanHassel, piano Audio: Live Recording 4-14-03      Dan VanHassel, piano Program Note: Excessive Deviation is a theme and variations for solo piano. The theme is a simple two phrase motive based in part on the whole-tone scale. The first variation harmonizes the motive in a more fleshed-out statement of the theme. This leads directly into the second variation which is more active rhythmically and harmonizes the motive polytonally, with several abrupt changes of tonality. The third variation focuses on the perpetual motion of the right hand as the theme is re-arranged into a minimalist motive of four sets of four 16th notes. Each set is played four times before moving on to the next, and once all the sets have been played they start over with the first, only it is offset by one sixteenth note, and the others follow in kind. A melody of sorts is played in the left hand as the right hand plays this pattern until the cycle is complete. The fourth variation places the theme in an avant-garde/aleatoric context. The fifth variation is more quiet and atmospheric. The sixth variation is characterized by its insistent rhythm as the theme becomes a syncopated melody. The seventh variation, like the second, explores the theme in a polytonal context, however in a much calmer, subdued way. In the eighth and final variation the theme becomes the bass-line of a dance-like rhythm which quickly dissolves into a new, more chromatic, motive played in the left hand. This leads into the bombastic final section in which the motive encounters a 12-tone row, swiftly changing meters, and a blues scale before finally degenerating into a primal pounding of octave C’s.