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Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Bell Choirs: Connected With Ancient Traditions

If you attend a church during Advent (leading up to Christmas), chances are you have heard a bell choir playing a favorite Christmas carol. Many churches use handbells as music in worship throughout the year, not just at Christmas. But did you know that modern handbell choirs are connected to religious traditions (and superstitions) that go back hundreds of years?

It’s true. Back in Medieval times in Europe, Christians would ring bells to announce worship times. Eventually, the bells were made too big to carry around, and were housed permanently near churches. Later still, the structures containing the bells were attached to the church building itself, in the form of belfries and bell towers. Gradually, more and more bells were added to these installations, tuned to different pitches.

Bells were thought to hold special powers over demons and other evil spirits, particularly after they had been “blessed” or even “baptized.” Church bells would be rung during storms or other calamities, in the hope of driving away the evil spirits responsible. Bells were also rung whenever a person died, again to frighten away any evil spirits which might have been attracted to the tragic scene.

Some historians even believe that our modern doorbells derive from this custom. It is said that people would hang a small bell outside the door of their home, because evil spirits lurked outside, hoping to slip in unnoticed whenever anyone went in or out. So a visitor would ring the bell to frighten away the evil spirits, and only after this would he enter the home.

In the 1600’s, church bells in England began to take a different turn from the practices observed on the European continent. Elsewhere in Europe, churchbells, while tuned, were rung at random. In England, however, bell ringers began to play tunes on their bells. By striking only one bell at a time, in sequence, the church bell ringer could play surprisingly complex melodies.

Competitions began to spring up. And bell ringers began to practice indoors, so as not to alarm the neighbors with the constant clangor that practicing on the full-sized church bells would have produced. (Also, indoor practice was a lot more comfortable in January, compared to being up in the cold, drafty bellfry!)

Small practice bells were needed. In 1660, brothers William and Robert Cor of the Wiltshire Foundry (England) produced the first set of practice hand bells. Soon, the small handbells became an interesting musical tradition in their own right – no longer considered just a stand-in for the big bells installed above the church. By the end of the 1700’s, practically every town in England had its own bell choir.

In 1845, showman P.T. Barnum brought handbells to the United States. He had heard a group of bellringers while on a trip to England, and been delighted with this new (to him) art form. While a popular attraction in Barnum’s day, bell choirs didn’t really take off in the U.S. until the early 1900’s.

Today, there is a thriving industry to provide arrangements and original works written for bellchoirs, not to mention the bells themselves and numerous accessories. And to think, it all goes back to scaring away evil spirits in Medieval Europe!