General Progress

It all started several years ago, when Jonathan Frye and Angela Deakin asked if we were interested in forming a handbell band, including teaching Angela to ring handbells.  We had been trying and failing to do just this for many years (for reasons far too boring to go into), so we said ‘YES’.

(Really, it all started when Mike Clay began some regular handbell practices with some of the students in Edinburgh and various other handbell ringers in the area, including Jonathan.  One day our schedules will mesh enough to all ring together – but in handbell ringing, patience is everything.)

Our journey from those first beginnings to where we are now  has been both fun and interesting.  Also, we learned a lot about teaching handbells to people at various levels of ability.  Through it all we have discussed theories of how people learn, best methods of learning (we don’t always agree), and how to transfer some of this expertise into the bell tower.

The blogs below are about that journey, our progress and the progress of other bands by guest authors.  They describe the ups and downs as they happen, as honestly as we can. 

Yesterday Nick dropped in for a quarter, as he was passing through Glasgow and had some time between trains. After a bit of debate and method revision, we agreed to ring spliced Cambridge, Yorkshire and Lincolnshire Royal. It was the first time we had tried spliced royal with an Albany...

This week's online handbell ringing got off to a good start with a quarter of spliced Yorkshire and Kent. Yes, you read that correctly! Apparently the idea came up a while ago when a band couldn't decide whether to ring Kent or Yorkshire for a safe quarter, and someone suggested combining...

We were supposed to go for a Simons' quarter on 14 a few weeks ago, but it was cancelled because I had to drop out. Soon afterwards a Five o'Clock Club band rang the first online 14-bell quarter, of Little Bob, which I also couldn't ring in. But I had my...