[r-t] RE: Method Review

[King, Peter R]

Yes, plain bob is dull (double bob is only marginally more interesting
and more prone to mistakes because noboday ever rings it). But why don't
people ring a bigger variety of methods more often? If you want a plain
method (at any stage) why not double coslany? It is the plain version of
bristol with almost as much music and quite an interesting line. How
many peals of it are rung each year? Almost certainly none. My
experience is that even quite good bands find plain methods harder than
you might expect (& I'm sure everyone has experienced mediocre surprise
bands really struggle with double norwich). Some of this is lack of
familiarity but I think it is also that everything happens quite
quickly, you don't have the luxury of 4 blows whilst dodging with the
treble to think about what to do next! Unfortunately I think plain
methods suffer from a bit of an image problem because all that is rung
is plain bob, double norwich (not an intrinsically bad method) and
rarely St clements beyond that the repertoire stops. At least with
surprise there are 8 methods routinely rung. And on odd numbers -
grandsire! This is why I was suggesting a "standard 8" plain methods.
Phil's list is interesting from a structural & compositional point of
view (I had a quick look over the weekend but had very little time) but
they don't offer the variety of interest that one might want.

So what would I have? Sticking to regular methods (conventional
symmetry) I'd include these 4
Plain Bob & Double Norwich (well you've got to really)
Double coslany & double sandringham (both entertaining and musical
methods)

Beyond these 4 I think the rest is fairly subjective & I don't have any
strong views
Drayton (I like the structure and there are some opportunities long
rollups backwards and forwards)
(or possibly dorchester for similar reasons)
Gonville is a bit different for a right place method, opportunities for
8765s, or Eynsham
And some methods which are fairly challenging, but don't have any other
intrinsic merits are Fovant and Kilmeston but there are dozens (well
just over 1000 that have been rung) some of which must have merits.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: ringing-theory-bounces at bellringers.net 
> [mailto:ringing-theory-bounces at bellringers.net] On Behalf Of 
> Chris Poole
> Sent: 19 February 2005 10:14
> To: ringing-theory at bellringers.net
> Subject: Re: [r-t] RE: Method Review
> 
> 
> On Fri, 18 Feb 2005, Philip Earis wrote:
> 
> > All you monkeys talking about flow - blimey, plain bob is a 
> fantastic
> > method.  Ditto double bob, or double norwich. Music = runs 
> = coursing music
> > = flow. Why are there vastly more peals of Cambridge royal 
> then plain bob
> > royal?  There's an order of magnitude difference in the 
> musical potential.
> > Why hasn't there been a peal of double bob royal in 
> decades?  People are
> > inherently conservative, and happy to ring crap because 
> they think it's the
> > done thing.
> 
> Plain bob is so dull though!  Surely that's why it's not rung much on
> higher numbers - methods like Cambridge are more interesting to ring.
> It's all very well coming up with methods to maximise these 4 
> bell runs
> etc., but a method also needs to hold interest for the 
> ringer.  The trick
> is to try to encompass both interest and 'music' in a method, 
> which plain
> bob does not (whereas Bristol does).  Why don't you just ring 
> rounds for 3
> hours Phil?
> 
> Chris
> 
> 
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