Bells That Ring Patterns, Not Tunes — Epoche A2
Tuesday, 14 October Bell practice, week six. Up the spiral steps to the ringing room. I like the room even more than the ringing so far. A small stone room, eight ropes hanging in a circle from holes in the ceiling. Each rope has a fat striped woolly part, the sally. The bells are above the ceiling; you never see them while you ring. On one wall hangs a painted board from 1911 with strange names in gold: Plain Bob Triples. Grandsire. I thought they were old ringers. They are methods — patterns. Because that was my big discovery: English church bells do not play tunes. The bells ring one after another in a row, then again in a new order, then another, row after row. A method is the pattern of the changing places, and every ringer carries it in their head. No paper, no screen. Tonight Margaret let go of my rope and let me ring rounds with the others: eight bells, highest down to lowest, over and over. The bell above swings full circle, mouth up, and a pull at the wrong moment can lift you off the floor. She said it again: never wrap the rope around your hand. The 1911 board records one ringing of five thousand and forty changes — three hours — and no row came twice. Not one tune in it. All pattern.