‘It’s a hobby you can take anywhere’: ringing at St Augustine’s Church, Penarth
TAKING a winter walk along Penarth prom can be wet, windy and chilly but a peal of bells drifting down from the tower of St Augustine’s can still bring cheer.
Bellringing is a distinctly British soundscape. We associate it with weddings, Sunday morning strolls, and Christmases past. Full-circle towers, in which bells swing in a wide arc rather than hanging still, exist nowhere else in Europe, and in only a handful of Commonwealth countries.
If being born within earshot of the bells of Bow that makes you a true Cockney perhaps in Penarth to be a true local is to be woken by St Augustine’s bells on a Sunday morning.
But what is bellringing? What is the music that we hear ringing out across our landscapes?
Meet the St Augustine’s tower captain
Among those keeping the tradition alive is Alex Saunders, a chemical engineer and St Augustine’s tower captain. Mr Saunders was taught to ring by his father in Pembrokeshire when he was 12 and has been a keen ringer ever since.
Now, Mr Saunders’ daughter is the tower’s latest recruit.
“She’s 12, so the same age I was when my father first taught me,” said Mr Saunders. “She’s fighting against it a bit, but doing a good job of learning the basics.”
Mr Saunders, 46, joined St. Augustine’s tower in 2008 and became the Tower Captain nine months ago. He has started a new learners’ practice to attract the latest generation of campanologists.
“After COVID, we saw a lot of ringers drop out across the country. The average age is probably over 60, but in Penarth, we’ve been lucky.
“Things have kept working, but we need fresh blood to keep this happening.”
When asked what keeps him coming back to ringing, Mr Saunders said: “I think it’s the fact that you can keep progressing with it every step of the way.
“It helps you focus. You forget about what else is going on around you and understand where you are within a method.
“Cardiff is a great city for ringing—you can ring every night of the week if you choose.”
Over the past year, the ringers at St. Augustine’s have received noise complaints during practice nights in Penarth.
“We make sure to have practice sessions at a time that is mindful of people,” said Mr Saunders. “We’ve got a ringing simulator that we can use when we need to be quiet.”
But generally, the feedback is only positive. “People love to hear the bells ring,” said Mr Saunders.
“Last week, we had a request from the family of someone who died locally. They weren’t involved in the church but loved hearing the bells every week and wanted them rung in their memory.”
A quintessentially British tradition
The sound of church bells—the Anglican call to prayer—is medieval, and grew in popularity during the Reformation, where a move was made away from complicated polyphonic music to simple, one-line melodies. St Augustine’s Church is perched on Pen Arth— Bear’s Head—and has a ring of eight bells, cast in 1935.
During World War II, the tower was almost razed to deny German bombers a landmark for Cardiff docks, but it endured, and to this day, St. Augustine’s is the only ecclesiastical building shown on Admiralty charts.
A strong team of ringers meets weekly, and methods of change ringing are practised. Naturally, no rendition of methods with names like “Bob Doubles” would be complete without a round of whiskey doubles at the Bear’s Head pub, and a detailed discussion of all things, from ringing to football.
The method in the music
I was drawn to ringing at the age of 15 when I walked past a church in mid-Wales and became curious about the music coming from its tower. A keen musician, I decided to join the weekly practice.
I was at first surprised at how bellringing is not treated by ringers as a form of musical expression. Instead, it is mathematical, requiring memory, precision, and physical stamina.
You first learn how to control your bell, to exert exactly the right amount of pressure on the patterned “sally” rope to pull the bell into action.
The rope flies into the air and tips the awaiting bell from its balance point to spin a full circle. When you check the rope at the top of its arc, the sally drops back down, to be caught by the expectant ringer.
Once you have mastered this, and can vary the speed of the bell between fast and slow, you are able to ring with others in rounds. This is when the bells sound in their tonal order, from highest pitch to lowest pitch: 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8.
Methods are ways of altering the order of the bells in a certain pattern—there are currently over 23,000 recognised change ringing methods catalogued in the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers’ Method Library.
Some of these are fiendishly difficult, and studying them can be a lifetime’s work.
A community in decline?
Bellringing is not just for worshippers; many ringers are drawn to the challenge and community rather than the church.
Yet the practice faces challenges. There are thought to be around 40,000 ringers active in the UK. Bellringing made the news in 2023 at the time of the King’s coronation, as there were worries that the towers of the UK would struggle to muster enough ringers to ring every bell.
Ever since, towers across the country have been trying to involve new ringers.
Learning to ring opens a community across the breadth of the country. A ringer visiting can walk into any tower, and is always welcomed and invited to join practice sessions.
Ringers from local guilds go on tour and compete at striking competitions, with marks given to accuracy and uniform placement of the bells.
Becoming a bell-ringer – how to get involved
If you’re looking for a hobby that you can take anywhere, bellringing is for you,” said tower captain Mr Saunders.
“It’s a stimulating challenge and something that stays with you for the rest of your life.”
It typically takes around 20 hours from first handling a bell to ringing with others in rounds.
“We encourage ringers to turn up and see what that practice session is like,” said Mr Saunders.
Learner practices are held on Wednesday evenings at St. Augustine’s church, Penarth, and on Thursday evenings at St. John the Baptist, Sully.
- For more information, contact Alex Saunders and the Penarth ringers via email at: Penarth@llanmon.org.uk
