In June of 2003, my good friend Randy Atkinson asked if I might be willing to conduct and compose a piece for the 2005 All-Iowa Middle School Honor Band. Randy and I have known each other for many years, and the opportunity to write a piece for him and also return to the state of Iowa was too tempting to bypass. I wanted to write a piece that would be exciting and challenging for the students, but attainable in the limited rehearsal time of only three and a half hours, so my concept was to use a rather difficult melody, but repeat the melody throughout the work so that I only had to teach it once to the whole ensemble. The melodic line is based on the octatonic scale and the piece uses other techniques such as singing and buzzing on mouthpieces. The work is intended to become progressively faster, with a sense of increasing momentum and intensity. In a sense, the piece "unravels" in front of the listener. The title has a dual meaning, though, as the concept of a repeating melodic line that gradually grows in intensity owes a great deal to Maurice Ravel's famous orchestral work Bolero (hence un-"Ravel"-ing)

Unraveling was commissioned by the Iowa Bandmasters Association for the 2005 All-Iowa Middle School Honor Band and premiered by that ensemble with the composer conducting on May 12, 2005.