THE GREAT CARAVAN TO ZANZIBAR
for Orchestra

by W. Brent Sawyer
completed 6/7/2023
approx. length: 10:00 minutes

This piece is dedicated to my new and very kind friend, Dave Patton, who came to my aide during a scary experience.

I have always been fascinated by the Spanish guitar bolero rhythm famously used by Maurice Ravel in 1928 in his new experimental piece, Bolero.) the rhythmic obstinate has a hypnotic quality to it that I enjoy very much. So, I decided to try my hand in the genre. I have often been accused of having "too many" different melodic themes in my pieces. so I confined myself to only using 2 melodies in the entire piece - and each melody never gets dissected or expanded on. The 2 melodies are always played in entirety. the A melody is a simple completely diatonic melody in B minor. The B melody is highly chromatic and reminds me on Middle Eastern scales, yet still is played over the B minor ostinato the A melody is played over. Only once does the ostinato the change - it modulates up a half step while the B melody remains in the original key. Then goes back to the original obstinate key.

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