Bells, Bells, Bells

Radio Record, Volume I, Issue 47, 8 June 1928, Page 2

Bells, Bells, Bells

See MAGIC OF THE CARILLON ee POPULAR B.B.C. ACTION. LL within range of 2YA will one day rejoice to hear Wellington’s carillon broadeast. It will be a feature of the city’s life, and a splendid memorial. A taste of carillon musie was given last week from 2YA through a fine gramophone record (which was played in the children’s hour), and will be repeated again during an evening session, probably this week. One of the best things the B.B.OC, -engineers have done this year was to take their microphone and equipment to the ‘Carillon Tower at Loughborough, England, and link up this: collection of bells, the largest in the country, with the Birmingham station. The beautiful music which rises and falls in this heart of the green wolds of Leicestershire may now be heard throughout the country, and indeed over half the world. This carillon was built by Loughborough as a memorial to Loughborough men who fell in the war. Now that the recitals are broadcast listeners everywhere may know how beautiful carillon music can be. How the Carillon is Played.

The broadcasting is a triumph for the B.B.C. engineers, for the music of bells is very difficult to broadcast satisfactorily. The note of each bell is rich in what are called harmonics and overtones, and these impose a strain on the microphone. Actually each bell emits five notes when struck, and in the perfectly tuned bell these are all in tune with each other and are therefore not noticed. At Loughborough there are 48 bells, the largest big enough to cover several child‘ren and the smallest no bigger than a small flower-pot. They are played from a clavier, in which the keys are very much like those of the organ keyboard, but they are made of wood and the carillonneur strikes them with the underpart of his half-closed hands, which are protected by gloves. The work is hard, but he is able to cover a wide range of musical expression. The difficulty for the engineers was to find a position for the microphone where it would respond evenly to the whole range of tones and be free from the vibrations of the tower during the recital. Uncle Mike. as they call the microphone, was not easily pleased. It was. tried in and out of the tower, in many positions, but all were disappointing. At last the right position was found by suspending the microphone over 2 rung in a ladder near the top of the tower, directly above the bell chamber. An English Standard. It served splendidly here, and received the silvery notes of the little bells just as well as the booming notes of the large ones. So it was left, and the leads were taken down the outside of the tower to a room half-way down, where the amplifier, connecting with the landline to 5 I T, was installed. The carillonneur at Loughborough, Mr. W. HE. Jordan, is quite a young man, but he is doing much to establish an English standard of carillon playing distinct from that of Belgium, the home of the carillon. They love the carillon in Belgium, At Malines, Antwerp, Bruges, and Ghent, crowds gather in the evenings, when the bustle of the day has died down, to listen to the musie coming softly from the lofty towers,