Written in December of 2009, Daydream (for violin and piano) was the result of participation in the December 2009 CHOPS Competition at St. Olaf College. I was given a prompt according to which the composition must adhere, and 8 hours to write it.
The prompt that I received was “Write a piece in which all players are playing as fast as possible.” Rather than simply stamping presto possibile at the top of the piece, I chose instead to make the piece move at a slow tempo but use aleatoric techniques to keep the players always doing something as fast as possible, be it through tremolos, arpeggiations, vibrato, or other methods.