Part II of a two-part
article
Continue through the piece, several measures at a time, taking care
to work out those nasty surprises that catch you off guard when you
are looking up at the director (which, of course, you are). Once
you've worked out where you need to weave, switch a bell from one
hand to the other, share or pass bells with your neighbor, or add
shellies or four-in-hand, you can easily mark those passages with a
lot less clutter in your score and play them more smoothly.
I found this method particularly useful in studying parts for this
fall's Youth Festival in Richmond. Kevin McChesney's "The First Noel"
has a lot of successive LVs that look totally different when written
out separately. In addition, the D5 E5 ringer has a particularly
interesting series of ring-hooks and hand switches, as it weaves
through measures 54 and 55. Novice ringers can cheat the note values
(but not in my choir), or we can all try this pattern as an exercise.
Everyone will need this skill for a similar pattern sooner or
later.
Soon you will notice many patterns. I hear, "Hey, these eight
measures look like the eight that started back at measure number...,
well, except for ... ." I'll bet this person will remember the
difference between the two patterns the next time we play them. Once
you are finished with this exercise, you are halfway to memorizing
the piece, but even if that's not your goal, you are 90% of the way
toward understanding it. Of course, don't forget to add markings for
dynamics, mallets, marts, etc., to your new individual score. A
logical observation is, "Why don't we just ring from this new part?"
The answer, of course, is that the other ringers' notes are helpful
as reference points.
As a director, when I write out each ringer's part, I notice many
things that take far too long to figure out during a rehearsal. I
find opportunities to redistribute or share bells that individual
ringers would try to tough out by themselves, such as giving the
D<5 to the B4 C5 ringer in measure 54 of the "First Noel,"
mentioned above. In either version of Hal Hopson's "Fantasy On
Hyfrydol," which is a massed piece for this year's Youth Festival,
reassigning or passing the A=5 to ringer 10 (two-octave version) or
the A6 to ringer 11 (three-octave version) preempts a panic weave by
a gung-ho ringer reluctant to ask for help.
A combined look at individual, written-out parts often reveals that
bell switches occur well before key changes. Many pieces modulate
gradually rather than abruptly at the point where the new key
signature is written. When you observe several ringers changing bells
at the last minute, if you've written out their parts, you know where
they were supposed to change -- usually much earlier. Likewise, you
can spot passages where certain ringers are bored for a long stretch.
I recall how dangerous it was to leave any of us in the high school
percussion section with idle hands for very long. Now you can find a
remedy before your ringers take a mental shopping trip to another
time zone and miss their cues (or start talking).
Of course, comparison of parts will enable you to choose or write
warm-up exercises that pertain to the majority of parts in a piece.
As you get better at this technique, you'll be able to sight-read a
piece and see the rehearsal exercise appropriate for an individual or
the group. But keep writing out individual parts; you'll be amazed at
what turns up.
Now, you may ask if I could send you all the individual written-out
parts for the next adult or youth festival music. Of course I could,
but just like looking up an unfamiliar word in the dictionary,
writing out your own handbell parts is a valuable exercise.
David K. Tiller, Metropolitan Washington, D.C., Chair, directs
three handbell choirs at the United Christian Parish in Reston, Va.
Part I of this article appeared in the February 2000 issue of The
Bell-O-Gram.