The Trinity Ringers - Sunday, Nov. 11, 2007

I direct bells at 2 Bay Area churches - one of which is Holy Trinity Episcopal Church in Menlo Park, CA. Our handbell choir is called "The Trinity Ringers" and we played in church this past Sunday.

This church has 2 morning services. There's an 8:30am "Peace Service" and a 10:30am "Joy Service".

We played for the 10:30 service & played one piece for the Prelude: Procession and Hymn by Andrea Handley. I listed it in the bulletin as "Praise to the Lord, the Almighty". It's a neat arrangement in that the first bit can be used as a processional (and we did that when we played this piece in concert 2 years ago), but also in that the "introduction" is 47 measures long! You don't hear the melody until measure 48, then you hear it once and the song is done. It's very exciting with lots of "rocking" 8th notes (that's like a rocking chair, not like rock music). The excitement build up until the climax of the piece when the text says, "Let the aMEN sound from his people again!" - the "MEN" is the climax of the piece - the first (and only) time the rhythmic motion comes to a stop and everybody plays a dotted half note, then continues. It's a singularly breathtaking moment in the piece.

We also played the Anthem/Offertory: Ring Alleluia by Howard F. Starks. An older piece & an original composition rather than an arrangement, I added a little bit of octave doubling in a few places to fill it out, and we played it at a tempo of about 160 - very vibrant and joyful! It's interesting because the main melody is played mostly by the D5-A5 ringers - a challenge for the upper treble who are used to always having the melody, but now must play harmony & descant.

A few years ago, we were gifted with a box full of handbell music from a church in Arizona. I'm not very clear how we received the music from this particular church, as the gift was given the summer immediately before I started directing there - so when I started, the box was already there. We dutifully sorted & catalogued all the music & I have found it to be a rich source of material for us -- so many jewels that are now POP (Permanently Out of Print) or POD (Print on Demand) - like the Starks piece.

Most of these pieces were written in a time before there were notational standards - such as the C5 always being in the bass clef, or articulation markings as we now know them - so it is sometimes a challenge for my ringers when we start working on a piece, but I think it's good for them to encounter music like this & learn to interpret the markings.

This music also seems to have a quality of excitement - composers were still learning how to use handbells to best effect and that sense of discovery shows through in the music.