What is Round (music)?
A '''round''' in music is a song which can be sung by two or more groups of people. One group starts off and the next group start to sing the same song a bit later. It should sound nice together. When a group gets to the end of the song they start again. They can go round and round, singing it several times. Usually rounds are in 2, 3 or 4 parts (meaning that they are for 2, 3 or 4 groups of people). When a group of people sing or play a round they usually sing it an agreed number of times. This means that the group which starts last also finishes last. ''[[Frère Jacques]]'' is a famous French round. ''London's Burning'' is an English round. Both those rounds can be sung in 4 parts. The oldest round that we know is ''Sumer is icumen in''. This is a very famous piece of music because it is the oldest piece of music we know that was written down. It was written around 1250 by a [[monk]]. It can be sung in 4 parts with 2 bass [[drone (music)|drones]] (held notes). Writing music by making one part imitate another is called [[canonic]] writing. Rounds are a kind of canon. ==Related pages== *[[Canon (music)]] [[Category:Musical forms]]