Salonen had long intended to write a piece for chorus and orchestra, but delayed its composition due to scheduling conflicts and a lack of appropriate text.
Reviewing the world premiere, Mark Swed of the Los Angeles Times called it "a mischievous, madcap 30-minute work for orchestra" and wrote, "Karawane channels Salonen's inner caveman (who knew?
Written in a double cycle, the second part intensifying the first, the score propels from one entrancing dreamlike state to another, from one extreme (nocturnal quiescence) to another (a wild Javanese monkey chant).
He continued:At one point, a passionate cello solo becomes a duet with an oboe, which then gets a layer of enigmatic percussion before the other strings come in, as gently lyrical as any Mahler slow movement.
Later, ethereal notes in the chorus are punctuated by firm string downbeats, like exhalations, that build to loud grandeur, then immediately recede, before a swirling, swinging climax driven on by an undercurrent of ba-bum heartbeat rhythm.
"[7] Despite calling it "entertaining and grandiose," George Grella of the New York Classical Review similarly observed that the "narrative feel of Karawane loses out to density over a 30-minute duration."