The Bells of... Remembrance

Radio Record, Volume V, Issue 41, 22 April 1932, Page 3

The Bells of... Remembrance

"We are not dead. Short days we lived, Felt dawn, saw sunset slow, Loved and were loved. Now we lie in Flanders fields."

Le THs is the message inscribed in raised letters on one of the great brass bells hanging in the Wellington carillon tower. The bell-the Messines bell-is of sombre note and impressive dimensions, and, together with the forty-eight other bells, will break its long silence when the carillon is dedicated on Monday next. The bells are a link with the past. Behind their music lies memories of Flanders fields, of Gallipoli’s scarred hillsides, of Mesopotamia’s sands, and of the death-dealing seas. The carillon is Wellington’s tribute to the legions that went and did not return. The designing, manufacture, transport and hanging of the bells has been a long and exacting task, but it is complete, and the bells will peal for the first time in their permanent housing on Anzac Day. Each bell has its own message; each was donated by an individual person, a group of persons, or a district, and each carries its special inscription. They range in size from the immense eight-ton Messines bell to the small treble bells. The huge Messines bell was donated to the carillon "To the Memory of the Members of the Government Departments, Wellington, who lost their lives 1914-1918’; there is the Le Quesney bell, with the arms and badge of the Rifle Brigade; the Jutland bell, carrying the inscription "To the Glory of God and the Royal Navy. ‘The Sea is Our Life.’-Jellicoe’; the Palestine bell, "To the Glorious Memory of the New Zealand Mounted Rifles. ‘Nothing daunted these intrepid fighters-to them everything was pos-sible.-Edmund H. Allenby, Field Marshall." Among the other bells is one to the nurses and the V.A.D. from the Hutt Valley and other Wellington suburbs; one to the Anzacs"*The troops had performed a feat which is without parellel..-W. B. Birdwood, Lt.-General"; one in memory of the Somme; another, "My home is in the seven seas. Cherish me as a tribute to the British Mercaiitile Marine, 1914-1918. ‘If blood be the price of Admiralty, Lerd God, we ha’ paid in full.-Kipling."; To Wellington, "Reo Wairua, "To the Glory of God and the memory of 1700 men of Wellington and suburbs who gave their lives in the Great War. Awa! te tangi aroha.’" And so the story is told in the forty-nine bells in the carillon. TR carillon is played by a hand cavalier, or key-board, which is fitted with sixty-one manuals and twenty-five foot pedals, and thus allows for . extra bells to be added. Standard melodies may be played automatically by a system analagous to that of pianoforte rolls, and the machinery starts and cuts off automatically. The Dedication Service will be broadcast by 2YA. Commencing ‘at 11 a.m. the service at the Cenotaph, Lambton Quay, will go on the air, followed at 2.15 p.m. by the Dedication of the War Memorial Carillon. The broadcasting of carillon music is a difficult task, and when the bells were temporarily located in Hyde Park, London, the British

Broadcasting Company’s engineers, after much experimenting, admitted that satisfactory broadcasts were difficult. Carillon music is air-borne and cannot be concentrated into a given space as with other instruments. It would not be satisfactory to place one or more microphones in the tower, as the vibrations of the tons of metal under percussion would be such as to render the microphones useless. The technicians of the Broadcasting Board have been making exhaustive investigations and experiments, and a specially-constructed microphone’ will be located in the carillon tower. Tests have been carried out in the vicinity for the purpose of

* ascertaining the most favourable position for the microphone should the relay from the tower itself not prove satisfactory. The carillonist at the opening ceremony will be Mr. C. Ey Ball, an English musician of considerable experience, who is the official carillonist at Bournville, England. Mr. Ball himself. is a returned soldier, having served with the mine-sweepers on the North Sea and in the Channel as a wireless operator during the War. Since then he has made a speciality of carillon music at the School of Carillon in Belgium. The carillon which he plays in England has 42 bells, the first of which were erected in 1906. It is the first carillon cast by a British bell-founder. Speaking of carillon music, Mr. Ball remarked that it should be slow and well sustained, a good example of this being Schubert’s "Ave Maria." When Mr. Ball plays the Wellington Carillon it will be by no means the first time he has played on the instrument. At the NorthEast Coast Exhibition which was opened at Newcastle-on-Tyne he played the opening ceremony, and subsequently gave over 200 recitals. In Hyde Park he gave over 200 recitals on the carillon. Mr. Ball, who is accompanied by his wife, will remain in New Zealand for about five or six weeks.