Bullring (was bells on Sunday)

[Bill Hibbert]

John Ketteringham:
> Is it something to do with the quality of the ringing?

Michael Wilby:
> Don't know where/when the recording was made, but it
> sounds as if it might have been taken in the intermediate
> chamber.

With the kind permission of the ringers, I took some recordings of 
the Bullring bells a few weeks ago. The Bullring tower is very 
difficult to take good recordings in, because the bells are in two 
tiers and the floor area of the tower is small. The ringers have 
made a good job of the acoustics in the ringing room. From either 
outside, or in the intermediate chamber, it is hard to hear all the 
bells distinctly. There is a lot of mechanical noise in the 
intermediate room (where I had my microphone) which can swamp some 
of the more distant bells. A mike above the bells, in the spire, 
might lose some of the smaller ones on the bottom tier.

I am still discussing my recordings with the tower authorities and I 
hope they will forgive me if I give an example here. I took 
individual recordings of the bells and did some processing on them 
to remove the effect of the two tiers, and take out some of the 
mechanical noise. Here is a composite recording of some Bristol made 
from the results: http://www.hibberts.co.uk/bullbrist30s.mp3

I hope it shows something of the quality of the bells. I am still 
debating with myself how loud to make the tenors, it is work in 
progress.

Bill H