More St. Michael's

This is the bell-ringer's room (though I didn't see anyone who was a dead ringer for his brother...) There are 8 bells, ranging in weight from 500 to 1900 lbs. The church is looking for volunteers to help with this amazing tradition. Contact Jon Paul if you are interested!

Behind Jon Paul is a whiteboard with bell-ringer's sheet music! I wish I understood it...Mostly rhythm patterns and such. The bells don't necessarily make music like a piano or guitar (duh) but they ring in specialized sequences (some called "Kings" and "Queens"). These patterns take a while to actually execute. The first step in creating bell music is to "set" the bells.

Here are the bells! Note the long wooden pieces that are mounted onto the bells. These are used to "set" the bells. From below, the setter pulls the bells and lets them rock back and forth, each time the bell swinging further and further until, like the pirate boat rides at amusement parks, it hangs upside down, perfectly balanced (and propped up by the wooden set rod) until it comes time to actually start the music. The setter does this a few hours before the meetings start.
Once the bells are set, music can be created! The ringers (all eight of them) gather in the pulling room and pull each bell in sequence. It doesn't sound like much at first. But slowly they begin to alternate the pulls and the rhythm evolves into a bell song for a "King" or "Queen" movement. Then, they cascade back into disarray until they no longer chime. I want to go and watch sometime (you can go on Thursday Evenings).


If you look closely, you can see some bronze colored rings along the inside of the bell. This is from the tuning the bells received after Hugo. The bells were removed and sent over to England (where they were cast) and retuned.