[r-t] New spliced major composition

Tue Dec 9 12:39:58 UTC 2014

Over the last couple of years it has become a bit of a tradition that we
attempt an interesting composition of spliced major in early December with
a largely Bristol based band in the Bristol area. This started with the
8-part peal Philip mentioned which we also rang the following day at
Ditcheat http://www.bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=338371. The following
year we went for an improved version of the composition (in terms of method
selection) which we duly scored:
http://www.bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=314309. Having taken the
maximum run 8-parts as far as we could (at least for now) I felt that a new
challenge was in order this year; both a ringing one for the band and a
composing one for myself.

I decided to return to the more familiar fold of the 7-part but attempted
to make the methods as varied and interesting as possible with the clear
goal in mind of hitting the maximum number of runs possible within the
framework. Whilst Rob's 7-part had already achieved these things I hope
this composition will provoke some interest and demonstrate an alternative
approach to Rob's excellent composition.

I would like to pick Philip up on one point though. Whilst Rob's
composition represented a huge step up in method variety, variety of run
within the part and interest I believe that this peal (
http://www.bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=234589) was actually the first
of spliced td major to include all 384 runs.
<http://www.bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=234589>

I've had in mind for some time to use the bob structure HHB to get into
mega tittums and then palindromic inverses thereof to return to the part
end for a cyclic composition of major. Indeed I did produce previous
compositions on this plan (in 16 and 23 methods), which were discussed on
this list, but never rung. The method variety and selection in these
compositions left a little to be desired and so I confined them to the
theoretical interest only pile!

The affect of mega tittums is not particularly pronounced on 8-bells
however it does allow for an interesting bit of variety in terms of runs.
The lead of Mendip (which is rung in mega tittums) has 6 runs off the front
(3 each of two types) and the run type is unique within the part.

In producing this new composition it was originally my intention to have
just 6 bobs per part as described above. However my approach to composing
these things is always a mixture of prior planning and 'on-the-fly
adaptation' as the details of the problem become more apparent.
In this case the last two methods to be added were Coombe Dingle and
Emersons Green. The leads of Coombe Dingle contain two runs at the back and
the leads of Emersons Green contain two runs off the front. I found the
most convenient way to include these runs was to call MHW (for the bell
that becomes the tenor of the next part) near the end of the part. This
pushed the number of calls per part up to 9 but it does mean you get 3
leads of the plain course from a different part and so helps to increase
diversity. In particular the 3 leads of the actual plain course in the 5th
part (including the lead of Bristol with reverse rounds) gave the band a
lift at what was probably a psychologically low point.

The composing process involved producing the methods by hand to achieve the
desired runs and maintain plenty of variety. At each stage I would turn to
my proving program (ringing master) to checkout if things worked as they
stood. Sometimes this meant producing dummy methods just to make the whole
thing join up. Of course most things I tried didn't work so there was a
huge amount of testing things out within the framework and going back to
the drawing board. I maintained a list of the runs required and ticked them
off as I composed them in. Sometimes I decided to remove a method if it was
causing lots of falseness problems with something else that looked more
promising. I guess making these sort of choices is part of the art of the
whole thing and it's sometimes hard to know what the right thing to do is.
With enough time and patience I eventually arrived at a working solution.
More playing around then refined the method selection somewhat.

The composition is a palindrome (pivoting about the lead of Mendip and the
centre of the two leads of Emersons Green). Because some courses use a
mixture of 2nds and 8ths place methods it is necessary to exchange 2nds and
8ths place variants of a method when moving in the other direction. So
really it's 12 methods rather than 15. Each part contains 10 different
types of run off the front and 6 different types at the back making the
music through the peal quite diverse. Ignoring 8ths/2nds place variants the
12 methods have 12 different backworks and 12 different frontworks. No
method is entirely right place. The only (regular) lead head groups that
are missing are D,J&K. Of the others the distribution is as follows A:1 B:2
C:2 E:2 F:1 G:2 H:1 L:2 M:2.

We certainly enjoyed ringing the composition and on such magnificent bells.
The number and complexity (of some) of the new methods does make it a big
challenge though and we lost our first go (the previous evening at Barrow
Gurney) after just under 4-parts.

Cheers,
Alan

On 8 December 2014 at 09:27, Philip Earis <pje24 at cantab.net> wrote:

> Delighted to see a new cyclic 7-part peal of spliced major with the
> "magnificent 96" property (all 24 four-bell runs of each type (excluding
> the treble), forwards and backwards, off the front and back) has been rung,
> and at one of the world's finest rings of 8 to boot: <
> http://bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=360063>. Congratulations.
>
> These musical properties were first generated in a normal length peal by
> Rob Lee in 2010 (http://bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=5785), and then
> Alan himself produced an 8-part with all runs (including the treble) in
> 2012 (http://bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=196167), both breakthrough
> achievements.
>
> Perhaps Alan can say a bit about how he put the new composition together,
> and what motivated it?
>
>
>
> ===
> 5152 Spliced Treble Dodging Major (15 Methods)
> Composed by A G Reading
>
> 448 each Abbots Leigh D, Binegar S, Bristol S, Coombe Dingle D, East
> Pennard S, Emersons Green S, Leigh Woods S, Wakefield S, 224 each Barrow D,
> Clifton Down S, Erythrite S, Gurney D, Hotwells S, Mendip S, Sanvey Gate S,
> 153 com, atw.
>
> 2345678 Bristol S
> -4235678 Wakefield S
> 2547386 Leigh Woods S
> -3425678 Binegar S
> 5748362 Hotwells S
> 8672534 Sanvey Gate S
> 7856423 Abbots Leigh D
> -7862534 Mendip S
> -6782534 Abbots Leigh D
> 7263845 Erythrite S
> 8657423 Clifton Down S
> 2374658 Binegar S
> -3458267 Leigh Woods S
> 2573648 Wakefield S
> -5348267 Bristol S
> 4523786 Barrow D
> 3856472 East Pennard S
> -2453786 Coombe Dingle D
> 8637452 Emersons Green S
> -2438567 Emersons Green S
> 5372648 Coombe Dingle D
> -2486375 East Pennard S
> 3852746 Gurney D
> 8234567
>
> 7 part
>
> 448 each Abbots Leigh D, Binegar S, Bristol S,
> Coombe Dingle D, East Pennard S, Emersons Green S,
> Leigh Woods S, Wakefield S, 224 each Barrow  D,
> Clifton Down S, Erythrite S, Gurney D, Hotwells S,
> Mendip S, Sanvey Gate S, 153 com, atw.
>
> 24 each 2345, 5432, 3456, 6543, 4567, 7654, 5678, 8765
> front and back.
>
> Abbots Leigh Delight Major:
> a 36-34.1-56-36-34-1-2.36.5
>
> Barrow Delight Major:
> b -34.5.6-56-36-2-1-4.36.5
>
> Binegar Surprise Major:
> b 3-5.4.5-5.36-4-5.4-34.1
>
> Clifton Down Surprise Major:
> c 36-56.4.5.2.5.36-4-5.4-4.7
>
> Coombe Dingle Delight Major:
> c 56-5.6-2-1-34-5-34-1
>
> East Pennard Surprise Major:
> e -3-4-2-36.4-2.3.4.56-3
>
> Emersons Green Surprise Major:
> e 34-5.4.5-5.36.4-2.3-56-1
>
> Gurney Delight Major:
> g -34.5.6-56-36-2-1-4.36.5
>
> Hotwells Surprise Major:
> h 36-56.4.5.2.5.36-4-5.4-4.7
>
> Leigh Woods Surprise Major:
> l -3-4-2.5.36.2-4.5.4-4.7
>
> Mendip Surprise Major:
> m -3-4.56.2.5.6.34-2.5-36-1
>
> ===
>
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