A new classic composition?

Submitted by simon on

This week we had a visit from David Wilson, who I have been doing some online ringing with. He was interested in ringing a peal, and at about the same time we were making the arrangements, I noticed that he had published on CompLib a two-part tenors-together all-the-work composition of the Core Seven, so I suggested that we try it. We rang a good peal, which was satisfying, especially as we haven't rung much spliced this year (or rung as much as usual at all, to be honest).

Here is the composition.

5056 Spliced Surprise Major (7m)
David B Wilson

B  W  M  H          23456
--------------------------
SSSSSSS.            42356       
W.                 (32654)
Y.YCES.            (63425)
C.YEYS.ELLLLL.      54632
LLS.                65432
BC.YYYSSS.BBBBBBB.  24653
YE.B.ECE.W.         62453
CW.B                56423
EWEES.ESYC.W.       64235
WWWWWWW.CCCCCCC.W.  24365
--------------------------
2 part.
960 Superlative; 896 Cambridge; 832 Cornwall (W); 704 Lessness (E); 
640 Bristol; 576 Yorkshire; 448 London; 79 com; atw.

It has the handbell-friendly part-end of 24365, so each pair rings the same pairs of place bells in the second half as in the first half. Several of the methods occur in whole courses, which makes the composition easier to learn and ring. There were some musical treats along the way, mostly in the second half: the block of three leads of Superlative has the coursing order 65432, which produces four-bell runs in each lead, and the musical coursing orders 62453, 24653 and 24536 all appear.

David explained that he produced the composition in response to a discussion in CompLib following a request for a three-part tenors-together all-the-work composition of the Core Seven. That seems unlikely because there aren't enough spare leads in the part: 49 leads are necessary to get all-the-work, but for a 5088 each part would only have 53 leads. So instead David looked for a two-part, initially producing a composition with a lot of singles, then responding to a suggestion of reducing the number of singles, resulting in the composition above. Previously the only tenors-together all-the-work compositions were one-parts, for example this one by Mark Davies and Alan Reading.

When we were organising the peal I had hoped that we might get the first performance, but another band got in ahead of us with Richard Pearce conducting. I would like to ring it again with members of the Albany Quadrant band who didn't ring this week, now I've learned it.

It will be interesting to see whether the composition catches on. I think it deserves to be up there with the well-known two-part of the Standard Eight by Philip Davies. Congratulations to David for composing it.

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