First Reformed Church » bell choir

Bells Keep Ringing

Erie Beemsterboer — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 16:48:11 +0000

During the worship of February 7th, the bell choir played a beautiful piece. It was a bit more challenging than the pieces we have played before. For March 14th, we are working on a new piece with some other new techniques for most players. As a choir we are growing nicely towards more intricate pieces. We also have started to work on a song that we will play during the Easter worship service.

With the short rehearsal time we have, the whole choir is very grateful that every week Norma comes a little bit early so the bells are all out and ready for us to play when we come to the music room. Thank you, Norma, for doing this every week for us!

Bell Choir Notes

Erie Beemsterboer — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 22:52:56 +0000

We received many compliments after our last performance in June. Thank you all for your encouragement.

The setup was new and it seemed that playing closer together really improved the sound. It also makes it easier for the ringers to hear each other. And for me, it improves the overview: it is easier to look at a group of people in three short lines than in one long line.

To reward ourselves for the hard work we have put in our playing this year, on July 27th, we will go on a trip to visit the Schulmerich Bell Factory in Sellersville, PA. There we will see how bells are made and learn a lot more about the bells.

We start rehearsing again on September 13th. A date for our monthly Saturday rehearsal has not been set.

If you are interested in joining the choir let me know!

Bell Choir and Music Room

Erie Beemsterboer — Thu, 07 May 2009 13:59:55 +0000

We have had two performances not too far apart and the choir did really well. Both times I received numerous compliments about how well the choir sounded. I really enjoy hearing these compliments, but without all the great and hard work of the ringers, it would not have been possible. It is not always easy for the group to practice; most of the time someone is absent. And that makes a huge difference in how the piece sounds. Also, the layout and acoustics of our practice room are quite different from the sounds in the sanctuary. Therefore, it is a big accomplishment for the whole group that we did so well. We are starting a few new pieces so that we will keep enhancing the worship services with this beautiful music.

If you have not been in the music room lately, you are in for a surprise! The room is getting a lot of use; two organizations use the room during the week as their office. The choir director and bell choir director use the room to store their music and bells with all the accompanying equipment in the room.

And we do have a lot of music! I have been working for weeks to catalogue what we have. So far, I have worked through most of our single copy music, that is, music with just one song on it, and we have over 700 different pieces of them. I have a few more to go, and then I can start with the multi-copy music — all the different books we have with two or more songs. That requires a little more work as one wants to know more than just the title of the book. So it will be a while before I am finished, but meanwhile we have been using this catalogue already, which makes me happy as it is a lot of work. However, I see it as very useful work.

How can we ever use all (or at least some of) this music if we do not know what we have! The next step, after all the cataloguing, will be to decide which songs we will never use again. And there are definitely candidates for that, but it must be done with a group of people who know more of our church history and of music than I can do on my own. I will let you know when we can start on this part of the project.