Comments

  • The future of peal ringing
    I suspect the problem with 3000s is that established ringers are happy ringing peals and still see it as the gold standard. If I've been ringing for 2 hours I may as well continue for a third hour, knowing that what I am doing is the same thing that the ringing legends of 50, 100 and 200 years ago were doing the same. 3000s don't have the same historic significance, though I do understand the advantages.

    I think it depends on the peal bands. I was lucky to have been involved in a local 'pensioners' peal band who I was able to ring with when it was the school holidays. I was driven to and from peal attempts by one of the band who was willing to give me a lift. If peal bands don't do this then they're doomed to die, and that would be a real shame, for the reasons I outlined above.
  • The future of peal ringing
    In defence of peal ringing
    A few observations myself:
    Peal ringing has, and always will be the only time where good ringing is achieved with a non-12-bell standard band, barring some well-run local band practices and some practices in urban centres which attract commuters, many of these places being inaccessible to younger ringers. Peal ringing for may ‘learners’, if they are lucky, provides them with three hours of ringing with people who are better than them. Uninterrupted
    Anecdotal pub conversations with ringers of my own generation regularly include phrases such as ‘it takes me an hour to properly work out what I need to do to my bell’. ‘Properly’ in this context meaning more than just whether one’s bell is oddstruck; it means working out what pace the ringing is, what the tenor ringer is trying to achieve, what the middle and front bells are/are not doing to accommodate this, how the tower acoustics are affecting what I need to do to my own bell, who I am having particular problems with and whether or not that is a me problem or a them problem. Peal ringing is the only place that promotes this line of thought. So does the decline in peal ringing, or perhaps the reticence of some to push younger people into peal ringing, matter? Absolutely. How many ringers have won the 12-bell having rung fewer than 100 peals? If people stop providing proper opportunities to people through peal attempts, the decline in the quality of striking in the ringing community is inevitable.
    I am travelling to Birmingham to ring in someone’s 22nd birthday peal on Saturday. The ringer in question has rung 344 peals to date. By that age, Alan Regin had rung 79 peals, Colin Turner had rung 21. My brother had rung 336 peals by the time he went to university, though he also comes from what is ostensibly a ringing family, though not to the same depth as Chris Kippin. People in Chris’ position certainly do exist.
    Genuine question – how often has the number of people going to university with 100+ peals under their belt in a single year exceeded single figures? I suspect hardly ever as these people need to be in regular peal bands and these have not really existed (or existed to the extent that someone can ring 50+ peals a year) until the 1970s.
    Perhaps the OP simply isn’t ringing with the younger generation of peal ringers any more. I can assure him younger peal ringers do exist. Many of them are taking it upon themselves to organise their own peal attempts and they are well-supported by those in the more experienced generation who want to see them progress in their striking abilities. High quality peals are still being rung by both those who have rung 5000+ and those who may get there one day. Maybe the OP can refer the concerned young ringer to the current prolific younger peal ringers if he is concerned that they are missing out on peal ringing opportunities.
    What is the future of peal ringing? I suspect it is much like the rest of ringing – increasingly nucleated around clusters of ringers, instead of local bands bringing in a few peal ringers to get them through 42 extents of Grandsire Doubles. Whether this is something the ringing community needs to be worried about risks expanding the query beyond the parameters of the original question. However, I have every confidence that ringers will continue to do what they have always done and get new people involved at every opportunity. Peals are an essential part of that.