Campanology - the art of bell-ringing
Created | Updated Feb 18, 2002
Campanology refers to the practice of ringing church bells. You may well hear bells ring at a local Church on a Sunday morning, and possibly on an evening in the week also - this is probably practise night. Learning to ring bells properly is actually exceedingly hard to do. Step one is to simply ring one bell by itself. Next you learn to ring with others, in ‘rounds’. Ringing in rounds is when the bells follow each other in order from highest to lowest and repeat.
After that has been mastered it all gets very complicated and technical. If you listen hard to a peal of Church bells you will notice that they do not ring rounds all the time. In fact the bells changes places in a complicated pattern that probably requires a degree in applied maths to understand. Listen carefully - if you hear two bells ‘CLANG’ untunefully together then the ringers got it wrong. Whoops!
To take up the challenge of campanology (and boy, is it a challenge) ask around at any church. You don’t have to be religious to join in, and when you are good enough you may get hired for weddings and get paid a modest fee for your troubles.
After that has been mastered it all gets very complicated and technical. If you listen hard to a peal of Church bells you will notice that they do not ring rounds all the time. In fact the bells changes places in a complicated pattern that probably requires a degree in applied maths to understand. Listen carefully - if you hear two bells ‘CLANG’ untunefully together then the ringers got it wrong. Whoops!
To take up the challenge of campanology (and boy, is it a challenge) ask around at any church. You don’t have to be religious to join in, and when you are good enough you may get hired for weddings and get paid a modest fee for your troubles.
