[r-t] Compositions of the Decade: Part 7 - Royal

[Mark Davies]

Crikey, I'd forgotten about some of those compositions, Philip. In
particular the JE one had completely slipped my mind, although I do now
remember ringing in the peal of it, and enjoying it immensely. Looking on
compositions.org.uk I see I composed another one in similar vein, a
slightly crazy mash-up 5077. I want to ring that now!

Couple of comments:

> "From a musical perspective, Bristol Royal is better with 8th's place
> bobs..."
> I feel this is too much of a generalisation.

Yes, you are quite right, Philip. I think I meant to restrict my comment to
tenors-together arrangements only, where it is slightly more justifiable.
Even with the restricted linking possibilities of 4th's place calls, there
are some amazingly good tenors-together peals available. I think the best I
found have just one "duffer" course, which is very good going indeed.

BTW, disappointed that my "zero course" Bristol Royal didn't get a mention.
;-)

> Incidentally, whilst I think I first published the figures for double
> method Snow Tiger (Royal), Mark claims an independent earlier discovery,
> and links it with his eponymous delight maximus method.  The method is
> certainly good enough to fight over.

To be fair, I don't remember when I first looked to see whether the Maximus
would contract down, so you might be right. The earliest reference I can
find is in a May 1999 email - Hull had sent me the place notation saying it
looked like the "closest approximation" to the Maximus and asking whether I
had copyright on it; I claimed in reply that it had been in my files for
"some time", with working name "Snow Tigress". It was some years later I
think that Pooley pointed out to me that, as a Surprise method, it could be
called Snow Tiger even though the existing Delight Maximus method isn't a 
direct extension.

Anyway, as long as you're happy with the name, I don't mind who got there
first. ;-)

MBD