Bell Ringing at Gloucester Cathedral, Glos

0:10 Test rounds and an excerpt from a quarter peal of Yorkshire Maximus
2:41 Bristol Major and downwards on the back 8
6:32 The front 4 lowering, showing the ringing room and ante chamber containing Great Peter
7:02 Great Peter, the three tonne medieval bourdon bell

The Cathedral at Gloucester is a magnificent building, rich in decoration and history. It has origins in the 7th century; the current building was begun in 1089, and started life as an Abbey (it became a Cathedral, the seat of the Bishop of Gloucester, in 1541). The nave is Norman, and the tower, rising to 225 feet (69m) high, dates from the 15th century. Gloucester Cathedral is the resting place of King Edward II, gruesomely murdered at nearby Berkeley Castle in 1327. The building was almost destroyed under Oliver Cromwell in the 1600s, and restored by Gilbert Scott in the late 19th century. In more recent times, the Cathedral has been well used for filming purposes, including Dr Who and Harry Potter.

In the bell ringing world, the city of Gloucester is best known for the Rudhall family of bellfounders, who cast over 5,000 bells in the city from 1684-1835. Ironically, only two Rudhall bells form part of the twelve change ringing bells in this tower (the tenor and eighth). The bells were a ten until 1978, when they were rehung, the front five recast, and two more added to make twelve, the work being done by Whitechapel. In 2007, the 11th bell cracked, and was welded.

The bells hang in a modern wooden frame, which doesn’t do them any good at all; they are not easy to ring accurately, and the “go” of some of the back bells (notably the 11th) is questionable for a relatively modern job. They sound pleasant enough, although the front ones are quite shrill and started to grate after a while, and acoustically the bells are not particularly good either. The 9th and 10th bells, dating from c1392, pre-date the present tower! The treble bell is also “listed” bell, as it has a facsimile of well-known bell historian Fred Sharpe inscribed on it.

The ringing chamber itself is a “box” within the tower, as can be seen at 6:32 (you can see the pipes the ropes travel up, from the ceiling of the ringing chamber to the bells themselves). In the ante chamber outside the ringing room sits Great Peter, the only surviving medieval bourdon bell in Britain, who was probably cast by the monks in the mid-1400s (possibly concurrent with the tower being built). He is swung (by motor) for services, weighs 59-3-14, and is “tuned” to C.

Tenor 23-3-14 in Eflat

http://www.ringing.demon.co.uk/towers...