Ringing, 13 July 2026

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We rang minor tonight, with Andrew, Jane, and Randy. We decided to ring St. Clements College Bob, and to switch up the positions. Normally, Randy rings the tenors, whether for minor or major, but tonight Randy rang the trebles, Andrew rang 3/4, and Jane rang the tenors. This was not the first time Randy had tried to ring the trebles, but it is the first time it went well.

After a few plain courses, each sounding better than the last, we decided to try a touch. Jane called a short touch (3 bobs at home), and somehow we got some bells mixed up, because it didn’t quite come to rounds. But it was fun, and we are confident that we rang two courses correctly, and somehow messed up on the third.

After that, we decided to try a splice with Plain Bob, and added some bobs to that. We didn’t have a particular method in mind, we were just playing around. When we started, Jane promised to not call any bobs while we rang St. Clements, and then did so almost immediately! We all laughed, realized that was a silly restriction, and went again. Because we didn’t have a particular plan in mind, we didn’t ring a true method, and didn’t even come back to rounds. But we had fun and stretched our brains.

We then decided to try different pairs, and so Randy and Andrew switched. This was the first time Randy had run St. Clements College Bob on 3/4, and it took a few turns to get right. But by the end of the night we were ringing a plain course with Andrew on the trebles, Randy and 3/4, and Jane on the tenors.

We finished the evening with a speed run of a touch of Plain Bob minor. Again, a short touch with Andrew on the trebles, Jane on 3/4, and Randy on the tenors. It went quite well, and afterwards called it a night.

All in all, an enjoyable evening on the bells.

Ringing, 13 July 2026

Ringing, 8 June 2026

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There were four of us tonight, Maggie, Jane, Andrew, Randy. We have been ringing a lot of Kent and St. Clements College Bob lately, and wanted to see if we could find something slightly different. Andrew found something called Very Very Frightening Bob Major, and with a name like that, how could we resist?

This method is very similar to St. Clements College Bob, except that the front work is all places instead of alternating. As such, we didn’t have too much trouble with it.

Maggie rang the trebles, Jane was on 3/4, Andrew rang 5/6, and Randy was on the Tenors. It took us one or two failed attempts before we were able to ring it all the way through. But doing so was quite satisfying!

We finished the night with a quick round of Plain Bob Major, rung as quickly as we could without errors.

All in all, a nice night.

Ringing, 8 June 2026

Ringing, 9 February 2026

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We had 4 people today, Andrew, Jane, Maggie, and Randy. Since three of us have been working on Single Canterbury Pleasure Bob (minor), we thought we would try SCPB Major tonight. Andrew took a look at it, and said, “Oh, this is just Plain Bob with Kent Places.” So we rang it. Maggie on the trebles, Jane on 3/4, Andrew on 5/6, and Randy on the tenors.

Amazingly, we rang a plain course on the first try! We were all very impressed with Andrew, who had never rung this before, and with ourselves, who had only ever rung Minor for this method. And so, Andrew suggested we ring a simple touch of this method. Jane did not want to ring any bells that were affected by a Bob, and so she and Andrew switched bells, and Jane called the touch (three Bobs at home).

The first time we crashed fairly early – before any Bobs had been called. Not sure what happened, but we just started over. The second attempt saw us crash right after the Bob. Even though we knew what we were supposed to do, actually doing it is a different story. (Hey, long fourths can be tricky to think through!) So, because we ring handbells (and so we can), we started midway through the lead before the first Bob. We got through the Bob this time, but then crashed again before the end. I don’t recall where we started that third time, but we were able to ring to the end of the method after that. So, perhaps with a little cheat, we rang a simple touch of Single Canterbury Pleasure Bob Major.

This took most of our hour, and so we finished with a speed run of Plain Bob Major, with Maggie on the trebles, Jane on 3/4, Andrew on 5/6, and Randy on the tenors. We rang larger bells for this, and stood up for the duration. Sadly, we crashed in the second lead, but started over and rang the entire thing very quickly. It sounds glorious on those larger bells!

We are discussing the possibility of doing a “tower tour” in April or May, where we bring our bells to various locations in the city and ring for a while. Then move to another location and ring some more. Being near the beach results in some nice ringing, and we may attract some new ringers if we are very lucky. This is just in the preliminary stages at this time. But we have done this in the past (many years ago), and had a blast doing it. More later.

Ringing, 9 February 2026

Ringing, 26 January 2026

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It has been a while since we have had much news. But tonight we did something different, and I thought I would record it here.

We were three tonight, Jane, Maggie, Randy. Jane decided that we should try something different, and found an interesting method called Single Canterbury Pleasure Bob. It is essentially Plain Bob, but with Kent places. Maggie rang the trebles, Jane was on 3/4, and Randy rang the tenors.

The first time through, we crashed on the very first change. Maggie and Randy weren’t expecting the Kent Places at that first change, and were confused about what Jane had done! She explained it to us, so we gave it another go.

The second time through, we crashed on the first lead end. We have been ringing Kent some (though it has been a while), and so you would think that we understood Kent Places at lead ends. But this one tripped us up. We decided to go step by step for few changes, and got to a point that we could comfortably and reliably ring the first two leads. (We were ringing Minor, so there are only 5 leads.) After a couple more attempts, we decided to take a break.

After 5 minutes or so of chatting, we gave it another try. And this time, with some bobbles, and stepping on each other’s bells once or thrice, we were able to get through the entire method. We rang it a couple more times, getting more and more confident with each attempt. The challenge was successful!

Jane suggested we ring a short touch of SCP B, but as it was getting late we decided instead to ring a short touch of Bob Minor, as fast as we could ring. And even though we occasionally stepped on each other’s bells, we were able to ring a 180 touch of Bob Minor. At that point we called it a night, and went home happy!

Ringing, 26 January 2026

Ringing, 2 June 2025

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It has been too long!

Some news – we recently welcomed a new ringer to our group. She has rung handbells in a church choir for many years (and is talented in many other ways). But this is her introduction to change ringing. Welcome Twyla! So far she has made it to one rehearsal, and that wasn’t tonight.

But tonight we had 4 ringers: Andrew, Becca, Jane, and Randy. Becca has not been ringing with us for long, and is most comfortable ringing the tenors in Plain Bob major and minor. Tonight she decided to branch out and ring the 3/4 position. We started with simple course of Plain Hunt until she was comfortable with that, with Randy on the trebles, Andrew on 5/6, and Jane on the tenors. We then taught about dodges and lead ends for this pair. By the end of the night, we rang a complete course of Bob major with Becca on the 3/4 pair! We collectively decided that this was an accomplishment worth remembering.

Between attempts of Bob major, Jane, Andrew, and Randy decided to ring a touch of Bob minor. Randy on the trebles, Jane on 3/4, Andrew on the tenors and calling. We rang a fairly simple touch (essentially Bob at home 3 times), but rang quite quickly. Quickly enough that it felt much like a tower, needing to anticipate your ring place without the ability to wait for previous bells to ring. It was very exhilarating!

All in all, a very nice evening of ringing.

Ringing, 2 June 2025

Ringing, 24 February, 2025

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There were only three of us tonight, and so we rang a lot of minor. But we decided to switch it up a bit and play around by ringing pairs we don’t normally ring.

We started with Jane on the trebles, Maggie on 3/4, and Randy on the tenors. We rang a touch of Plain Bob, called by Jane (on the trebles!!). There were a couple of false starts, and there might have been a mistake in the calls (causing us to ring a longer touch than we had anticipated). But we got through.

We then passed our bells to the right, so Randy was ringing the trebles, Jane was ringing 3/4, and Maggie on the tenors. Jane was not much happier calling from 3/4 than she was calling from the trebles, but again we got through, after Jane called a few bobs.

Again, we passed the bells to the right, so Maggie was ringing the trebles, Randy was ringing 3/4, and Jane was on the tenors. These are the pairs we most often ring, and so we just took off. This was a longer touch than the previous two, with a single called just as the bells were about to come around (so Randy had to deal with the single). This was the most fun, though the entire evening was a blast and also a bit mind-stretching!

I didn’t count, but each of the touches was probably between 100 and 500 changes, so nowhere near a quarter peal. But that wasn’t the point tonight. The point was to try different things.

And in that spirit, we decided to ring a plain course of Plain Bob doubles, with Maggie on the trebles, Jane on 3/4, and Randy on the tenors. We don’t do this type of thing often, and so when we do it is usually a struggle. But after a false start, we were able to ring an entire plain course.

We decided that the next time we have 4 ringers, we’re going to ring triples!

All in all, we had great fun tonight.

Ringing, 24 February, 2025

Ringing, 9 December, 2024

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After working on this for way too long, we have finally rung a quarter peal on Major!

We were 4 tonight, Maggie, Randy, Jane, and Andrew. After catching up, we jumped right in. Maggie was on the trebles, Randy on 3/4, Jane on 5/6, Andrew on the tenors, conducting. We rang a composition of Plain Bob Major that Andrew and Jane found on complib.org. I can’t say that it was the cleanest quarter peal. But we did it. And this is our record of our accomplishment.

If you want to see the details of the composition, you can view the Bell Board record here.

WE DID IT!!!!

Ringing, 9 December, 2024

Ringing, 2 December 2024

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We were three tonight – Maggie, Randy, and Andrew.

We’ve been working on ringing a quarter peal conducted by Andrew. He has found a composition that will give us 1344 changes (more than the 1260 needed for a quarter peal). I’m not going to get this exactly right, but it is essentially Bob Major with bobs at wrong, 3 home, single, 3 home, wrong, 3 home, single, and 3 home (and I’m not totally sure where those singles go!)

So tonight we attempted to ring that composition. Maggie on the trebles, Randy on 3/4, Andrew on the tenors conducting. We had a couple of false starts, each time getting further into the composition. The final attempt crashed just before a bob (I don’t recall which, but Andrew knew). Amazingly, we were able to reconstruct our positions and start at a bob near the middle of the composition! This is something we do occasionally (and which we find no other bands do). And after that reset we were able to finish the composition.

This was not a quarter peal. First, it was on 6 bells, so there were only 1008 changes (if my calculations are correct). And we didn’t ring the composition start to finish, though we did ring the entire composition over the course of the evening. But I believe those were the only failures. And it gives us hope that we can actually ring this on 8 sometime in the near future.

When that happens, we will brag about Andrew’s accomplishment; about all of our accomplishment. Stay tuned.

Ringing, 2 December 2024

Ringing, 21 October 2024

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For the past season, we have been working on 3 separate tasks.

  1. Ring a quarter peal of Bob Major
  2. Ring a plain course of Kent Major
  3. Continue to teach our new ringer

Our new ringer was not in attendance tonight, and so we started ringing a long course of Bob Major. Maggie on the trebles, Randy on 3/4, Jane on 5/6, Andrew on the tenors calling the course. Andrew has a quarter peal in mind. We didn’t complete the quarter tonight. And in fact, crashed in the middle of the third course. Since we are on handbells, we figured out where we could pick it up, and continued on. We made it through a couple more courses before Randy swapped his bells, and so it came to rounds much too soon. So we decided to change course.

And decided to see if we could ring Kent Major, which we haven’t attempted in a few weeks. Maggie on the trebles, Jane on 3/4, Andrew on 5/6, and Randy on the tenors. We were very happy to get to the end of the plain course without needing to stop and regroup! We call that a result. Yes, the last lead was a bit rough. But we powered through, and it came to rounds. Yay!!

Ringing, 21 October 2024

Ringing, 23 September 2024

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It has been a while since I have posted. And while we have been busy, not a lot has really happened. Except that tonight in our practice, we finally did something we have been working on for quite a while. In particular, we finally got through Kent Major in a single attempt.

So – sometime last year (see my October 2023 post) we started working on Kent Major. We have been ringing with Maggie on the trebles, Jane on 3/4, Andrew on 5/6, and Randy on the tenors. We have previously been able to get through the entire method, but we have needed to stop and restart partway through. Tonight we got through the entire thing, start to finish. More impressively, it was the first thing we rang tonight, and we just did it! It felt like quite the accomplishment. To be fair, we would not have won any awards for our ringing. But that doesn’t matter – we did it! And we are calling that a result.

Other news – we have a new ringer, Becca. She has rung handbells in the past, but we are teaching her change ringing from the basics. She is picking it up fairly quickly (more quickly than I remember getting this stuff!). She can mostly ring Plain Bob Major on the tenors, with only a little help. She was not able to join us tonight, but we are pleased that she has chosen to join us, and pleased that she is learning so quickly.

The final news is that we continue to work on a quarter peal of Bob Major with Andrew calling the bobs. We feel that we could probably do it now, if we just started when we first meet so we could get through the entire thing in a single rehearsal. But that remains to be seen.

Anyway – we continue ringing. If you are in San Diego and would like to join us, please contact us through this blog.

Ringing, 23 September 2024