Bellringing

I learnt to ring when I was a young boy at Roche, I learnt quickly being the annoying youngster who picked it up with seemingly no effort. I thoroughly enjoyed ringing and grabbed every opportunity to ring which included going out to St Wenn, where I learnt to rise and fall in peal. At University in Leeds, I learnt method ringing and found the challenge of successfully ringing a new method on strange bells fascinating and rewarding. For several years I found myself attempting to ring at least one peal a week and several quarter peals.

Since finishing University and returning to Cornwall I have found that my interest in method ringing has waned significantly to the point now where I now very rarely ring any methods at all. Most of my ringing now consists of ringing rounds and rising and falling every peal. I occasionally ring call changes, when one of the old boys prompts me to call a few by saying, “Good Key!"

One observation that I would make is that method ringing and ringing rounds and rising and falling are entirely different skills. A good method ringer can not necessarily ring decent rounds or rise and fall and vice versa.