We've just come back from a short visit to Penrith, where we rang a peal of Cambridge, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Rutland with Julia Cater and Nick Tithecott. That makes six peals from six attempts for me, and five out of five for Tina - surely the longest winning streak in my entire handbell-ringing career. It was the first peal in Julia's new house. We rang on her mother's bells, which are a lovely Whitechapel set with three different rings of eight to choose from. We settled on a size 12 ring, the same as Jonathan's light eight that we often ring. It's a nice comfortable size for an eight-bell peal, and we rang a little more quickly than usual: 2h22 for the peal.
Just like our peal of the Nottingham Eight last Saturday, the ringing was extremely good except for a rough lead or two near the end. One day we'll eliminate those rough spots. I called this composition by Rob Lee, which is a popular choice for handbell bands.
5024 Spliced Surprise Major (4 methods) Robert W Lee 23456 M W H Methods --------------------------- 43652 - YYY.YR 56234 - - R.RRRRR.(R) 23564 - - RY.YYY. 52364 - NNNNCCC. 35264 - CCCCNNN. --------------------------- 5 part, substituting NNN for (R) in one part. Contains 1408 Rutland, 1280 Yorkshire, 1216 Lincolnshire (N), 1120 Cambridge, with 31 changes of method and all the work of each method for every bell.
It's the calling of Middleton's, with the methods arranged in blocks with very few changes of method. This style of spliced requires thinking in a slightly different way from a composition with a change of method every one or two leads. Positioning the bobs within the whole course of Rutland, and getting the changes between Cambridge and Lincolnshire, is much more like calling a single-method composition. I did it by a combination of following the position of the tenors and working out which place bells I would be at the next bob or at the change of method.
For the first time in a while, we don't have any more peals booked, but we have some ideas. We want to ring a peal of Yorkshire with Angela on an inside pair. After all their practice at calling quarters, we want to ring peals with Tina and Jonathan conducting. Julia wants to ring a peal of 8-spliced. After our success yesterday, we would like to ring with Julia and Nick again. Finally, there's a special project that I will write about in due course.