For the song's slower section, he plays a Minimoog synthesiser and flute sounds on a Mellotron which he said gave the section a "Strawberry Fields mood". Apart from his acoustic guitar, Howe plays a 1961 electric Gibson ES-5 Switchmaster throughout the song. Anderson noted the music has a "Scottish feel" to it and described the solo part as like a reel, a traditional Scottish country dance. Wakeman's Hammond organ solo was recorded in one take. Once the instrumental tracks had been put down, Anderson entered the studio early one morning and recorded his lead vocals. When the rest of the group arrived, they recorded the vocal harmonies. At the end of the song Anderson, Squire and Howe perform three-part harmonies that is repeated eight times, during which they also sing a second harmony part that Anderson said resembles the main melody to the nursery rhyme "Three Blind Mice". He later revealed Wakeman is singing the notes to the rhyme which was placed "against the grain of what we were doing" to make it sound more intriguing. To close, Howe repeated his acoustic guitar introduction but ended on an E major chord. Release "Roundabout" was first released as the opening track on Fragile, in November 1971 on Atlantic Records. In preparation for its release as a single in the US, the song was cut to 3:27 to make it more suitable for radio airplay. Some changes include an abridged instrumental intro, which forgoes the 40 second nylon string passage played by Howe and skips the second hearing of the bass riff. It was released, with "Long Distance Runaround" on the B-side, another group written track on Fragile, on 4 January 1972. The song peaked at number 13 on the US Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, the band's highest charting single on the chart until 1983 with "Owner of a Lonely Heart". Elsewhere, "Roundabout" went to number 23 on the Dutch Top 40 chart. Billboard ranked it at number 91 on its Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1972. The full-length, album version was used as a B-side in 1973 and a live version was released as a bonus single in copies of Classic Yes in 1981. In June 1973, Anderson and Howe won a BMI Award for the top songwriting and publishing awards held by Broadcast Music, Inc. for 1972. Legacy "Roundabout" has become one of the best-known Yes songs; it has