Living Water - Dissertations - Bass Ringer's Notebook - Assignments

Assignments

Determining who plays which bells often is a rather mundane task with standard assignments, but sometimes the high and low fringes of the scale have interesting challenges. On the top end, the usual solution is to assign bells by parallel octaves ("doubles"), and to have your four-in-hand wizardettes (yes, usually the ladies, because the guys are usually handling the buckets) work out their parts. The lower bass bells - B3 and lower - sometimes require a bit of skill to assign. Here are some guidelines with respect to doing this well:

• Note speed must be managable. The general idea is to keep the parts within the players' capabilities.
• Legato lines should be playable, preferably without table damps.
• High-speed weaves should be minimized. This should be done in the context of just how much layout chaos your ringers can manage.

Of course, just what you do will depend on just what your ringers are able to do. If you have more novice bass ringers, you might need three of them to cover what a seasoned bell hog can handle.

Here are several of the more commonly-seen bass assignment types:

• "Block": Block assignments simply allocate the bells by chunks of keyboard. In may five-octave pieces, this takes the approximate form C3-F#3 / G3-B3, but the actual split point between players depends on the bells used and the general activity of that region of the scale. The middle bells tend to be shared, especially in large chordal sections.

• "Sequence Two": Passages with rapid scale runs are not generally easy with block assignments unless the ringers are good at weaving or reengineering their layout. Regardless, splitting the bottom octave into two large pieces could mean that both ringers will be responsible for playing four notes at a time. "Sequence two" assignments alleviate this problem by ensuring that neither ringer plays more than two consecutive scale tones. There are two possibilities: CDGA3 / EFB3 and CFG3 / DEAB3. When you use a "sequence two" assignment pattern, it's important to check it against any chordal passages in the piece. This is even more important in six-octave music, because the basic options are GA2 DEAB3 / B2 CFG3 and G2 CDGA3 / AB2 EFB3 - now you might also have issues with handling passages with octaves on G and B. Using this assignment can be of moderate difficulty because of the skips and the wide range of bells each player covers; in addition, it may be of less use in exceptionally fast scale passages because each ringer may or may not have enough time to move both hands from one pair of bells to the next.
  
  Example: For "Extreme Ringing" at the 2004 AGEHR Area XII conferences in Ontario, CA and Honolulu, HI, I worked out C3-B3 assignments for William Griffin's arrangement of Handel's "Passacaglia" (Level V) with the condition of having two bass ringers. The six-octave arrangement has both runs and chords, and it turns out that neither pure "sequence two" assignment works in an entirely satisfactory way. However, a slight modification of the second six-octave choice (to A2 CDGA3 / GB2 EFB3), with some help from positions 3 and 4 in the chordal passages (about 55 notes' worth) appears to work. (Historical note: Funny thing... this was the first bell piece I ever played! Way back in 1987, my assignment at the Mount Hermon Music Conference bell workshop was... G3 - we had twenty-two ringers, so this piece was a breeze.)

• "Sequence One" / "Lines and Spaces": The two terms are synonymous; it's just that one refers more to the division of the note sequence and the other expresses that division in terms of how it looks on the staff. The single assignment possibility, ignoring ringer transposition, is GB2 DFA3 / A2 CEGB3. Unlike "sequence two", this assignment pattern has no octave issues (that is, unless you have bell hogs who are eating up more than two octaves), and single-note scale runs can be fairly easy. It should also be possible to play moderate-tempo scales in parallel thirds (a common occurrence in the treble bells) because each ringer can damp both bells when the other one is ringing. In addition, scales in parallel octaves are possible because neither position plays more than one bell at a time, and also never plays staff-adjacent notes.
  
  Keep in mind, however, that on really difficult pieces you'll need not just one but two proficient bass ringers.
  
  Example: "Passacaglia", in my opinion, works better if the G2-B3 is allocated a la "sequence one". Then the scales are under control (you'll probably have to practice the sixteenth-note runs a bit), and help is needed from positions 3 and 4 for only about 25 notes..
  
  Example: At the 2000 AGEHR Area XII conference in San Jose, CA, one of the "C" level pieces was Carl Wiltse's "Gospel Praise God" (Level V difficulty). It has a particularly challenging bass part because it's in 6/8, allegro, and nearly constant scale runs in eighth notes in parallel octaves, plus accidentals. Most of the groups in the division were using three or four ringers to cover C3-D4, probably with block assignments. Keith and I decided to divide the assignment by "lines and spaces", and had a great time playing it (you might note that playing every other note in a triple-compound meter means that the strong beat alternates between players... basically, both of us were doing desynchronized hemiolae the whole time. Now, back to our original programming...). I do think, however, that the two of us looked a little like an octopus from the back.
  
  We subsequently proved at the next Spring Ring that "block" assignments of the bottom octave were impossible for two or even three ringers (using scale-sequential layouts) because the notes zipped by too quickly; four ringers could hold it down in blocks pretty well. Overall, however, I think that "lines and spaces" was the best of all the options because it made it so incredibly playable once we got used to thinking in that way.

Frequently, you can start from one of these assignment types and, with a little tweaking, arrive at an allocation of bells that works well with your ringers. Occasionally, a bit more imagination must be applied, but having a starting point helps. And if you're the director and have sufficient confidence in your bass battery, you might just try telling them what range the two or three of them are to cover and let them figure it out!

Here are a few other ideas you might use:

• Chordal sections:
  • Ensure that notes can be sustained for their full length.
  • Have ringers share bells (see the page on teamwork!).
  • If sharing isn't sufficient, consider modified assignments - for instance, move problem bells elsewhere or use non-block assignments.
  • In certain places, it may be permissible to do some judicious note-dropping in the bass (the notes in question for C major are in parentheses):
    • Drop scale degrees other than 1, 3, and 5 first (anything but C, E, G).
    • Drop scale degree 3 next (E).
    • Drop scale degree 5 next (G).
    • Drop the bottom note next (C)

• Linear sections:
  • Ensure that line flow can be preserved.
  • Minimize weaves, or at least don't exceed your ringers' ability to manage layout chaos.
  • Have ringers share bells (see the page on teamwork!).
  • If sharing isn't sufficient, consider modified assignments - for instance, move problem bells elsewhere or use non-block assignments.
  • In certain places, it may be permissible to do some judicious note-dropping in the bass (the notes in question for C major are in parentheses):
    • Drop scale degrees other than 1, 3, and 5 first (anything but C, E, G).
    • Drop scale degree 3 next (E).
    • Drop scale degree 5 next (G).
    • Drop the bottom note next (C)

• Polyphonic sections:
  • Must fulfill the requirements for both chordal and linear sections, plus whatever additional dynamic control is needed to keeping the voices in the polyphony clear.