The theatre in all its aspects has always been one of my main loves and has, in one way or another, been present in much of my music. It formed part of a number if works I wrote around the time of this piece, composed in 1972.

The title, 'Round', then, does not refer to the structure of the music, in the sense of being a canon, but rather to describe physical movement. The eight violins, performing in a standing circle, are required to move round at a given pace, to music, from position to position, and on arrival they play different variations on a given set of notes. The three violas, two celli and double bass are positioned in the foreground and play complementary music, as 'soloists', though not by having more difficult parts, but in the sense of providing a visual representation of what is heard.