In 1944, while the Second World War ground on in Europe and Asia, David Diamond’s “Rounds for String Orchestra” received its premiere performance by the Minneapolis Symphony and its then conductor, Dimitri Mitropoulos. 

“Write me a happy work,” Mitropoulos had asked Diamond. “These are distressing times, most of the difficult music I play is distressing. Make me happy.”

To some in 1944, “Rounds” sounded as if Diamond had turned to traditional American folk music, but, as the composer put it, “the tunes are original. They sound like folk tunes, but they are really the essence of a style that must have been absorbed by osmosis.”

Even the stodgy conservative music critic of the St. Paul Pioneer Press expressed her grudging admiration: “it reveals a good deal of talent and resourcefulness” was her verdict. Reviewing a subsequent Boston Symphony performance under Koussevitzky, New York Times critic Olin Downes was much more enthusiastic. He wrote: “It is admirably fashioned, joyous and vernal. There is laughter in the music.”

“Rounds” has gone on to become one of Diamond’s most frequently performed works. Perhaps joy and laughter in music remains as rare and precious a commodity now as it was back in those distressed days of 1944.

David Diamond (1915-2005) — Rounds (Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra; Gerard Schwarz, cond.) Nonesuch 79002