St Mary's Bellringers To Celebrate Easter Sunday

Catholic Communications, Sydney Archdiocese,
8 Apr 2009

On Easter Sunday the bells of St Mary's Cathedral will peal joyously across the city for the first time in more than five years.

With people attending the 9.00 am Easter Sunday Mass becoming so large that time ran over, foreshortening the customary 30 minutes of bell ringing before the Solemn Mass at 10.30, it was decided instead to let the bells remain silent.

But this year, to the delight of Sydney-siders everywhere, whether the earlier Mass runs over time or not, the bells will be heard.

As well as pealing before the Solemn Mass at 10.30, the bells will also be heard from noon until 1 pm as well as on Easter Saturday at 8 pm as part of the Cathedral's Service of Light and Easter Vigil.

With its 14 massive bells, St Mary's Cathedral bell tower not only has possibly the most famous bells in Australia, but the most comprehensive and modern ring ?as a set of bells are called. Although the ring has 14 bells, a maximum of 12 are only ever rung at one time. The extra bells instead are used to give a wide variety to different peals chosen and at times 10 or eight bells are rung rather than the expected 12.

Each Sunday, the bells are rung before Mass and they are also rung on Wednesday for an hour from 12 to 1 pm, as well as on special occasions such as Weddings.

While the sounds of St Mary's bells are a cherished and integral part of Sydney life, what is less known is that the music made by the bells is all due to the skill, talent and professionalism of a small team of volunteer ringers.

Under the direction of the Captain of the Bell Tower, Dr Jim Woolford and Ringing Master, Mary Symes, a group of around 20 local bell ringers meet each Thursday evening to rehearse. Then on Sundays, Wednesdays and whenever there is a special event on - such as a wedding ?whatever members of the team are available climb the 111 steps to the bell tower and create their special brand of music.

"Bell ringing usually starts as a hobby and quickly becomes a passion," says Mary Symes, who is photographed on the right in the St Mary's Cathedral Bell Tower with fellow bellringers, Billy Clarke and Kathi Downs.

Kathi is currently Vice Captain of the Bell Tower and Mary is one of the first women to be elected Ringing Master at the Cathedral.

"In the early days of bell ringing back in the 16th and 17th centuries, it was very much a male-only occupation," Mary says, adding that this changed 60 to 70 years ago.

"Women bellringers are no longer rarities and in our group about half are women and half are men," Mary says.

Along with emancipation of women, one of the reasons for women taking up this art form is that physical strength is no longer an issue.

Before the advent of technological advances such as steel frames and ball bearings, church bells were framed in wood and rung by pulling on leather straps that dried out and made them diffiucult to or gather leverage. Brute strength was needed for the clapper to strike the bell. But not anymore.

These days, even though the heaviest bells at St Mary's tip the scales at 1741 kgs and 1248 kgs, Mary has no difficulty handling them.

"Bellringing these days is all about technique and concentration," she says and adds that two other essentials are a good sense of rhythm and co-ordination. "I read somewhere that the closest thing to bell ringing is drumming and that if you can play the drums, you'll be able to ring the bells."

It also helps if to have a good head for figures and feel for maths as Australia's bellringers generally follows the English tradition of "change ringing." This entails a process where each of the bells, which range from tenor (the heaviest bells) to treble (the lightest bells), is struck one at a time, with the order in which they are struck creating the different melodies.

"Like pianists and other musicians, most experienced ringers have a repertoire of five or six tunes committed to memory," says Dr Woolford, who between his duties as Captain of the Bell Tower is a senior academic in education at the Australian Catholic University.

"These combinations are called 'methods,' and can vary from simple and straight forward the more complex and advanced," he says.

President of the Australian and New Zealand Association of Bellringers (ANZAB) for the past six years, Dr Woolford says his love affair with bellringing began when he around 11 to 12 years old.

"I was in the choir in the North of England when my voice suddenly broke. No longer any good to the choir I was sent off to meet the new bellringer and see what that was all about," he says.

From his local village church, Dr Woolford learned the art of bell ringing and on reaching adulthood became one of the conductors at Britain's famous York Minster Cathedral as well as ringing the bells at St Paul's Cathedral in London and at Trafalgar Square's St Martin in the Fields.

Immigrating to Australia when he was in his mid-20s, Dr Woolford joined the bellringers at Sydney's St Andrew's Cathedral before transferring across to St Mary's Cathedral. Elected Ringing Master in his first year with the Cathedral, he was later made Captain of the Bell Tower.

Swapping between different churches, cathedrals as well as denominations is part and parcel of being a bellringer, says Mary, who puts this down to the fact that the supply of experienced bellringers is dwindling.

"We're always on the lookout for bellringers but the pool seems to be getting smaller and smaller," she says. "The ones who are around are middle-aged or older and what we really need is young blood. We are all keen to train young people to be bellringings, no matter which church or cathedral we are with. But for some reason young people today don't see bellringing as cool!"

But for those who do, bellringing is not only a great way of making music but offers the chance of being able to ring bells in churches and Cathedrals from New York to Nanking and all stops along between.

Having just spent several years in Britain, Mary says spent most weekends to peal the bells for services at churches all over England.

"I rang the bells at St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle and at many other churches and met and made friends with some wonderful people," she says.

"It's great to be able to get the feel of different bells and meet other ringers. It doesn't seem to matter where you travel in the world, fellow bellringers are always delighted to have you join them for a practice or one of their services."

According to Mary as a hobby, bellringing has everything going for it.

"You meet terrific people, work together as a team, use very expensive equipment for free and have tremendous fun along the way,' she says laughing.

Mary, who works in computers, says she fell in love with bellringing back in the mid 1980s when she was studying for her Master's degree at the University of Technology, Sydney. Heading along George Street on her way to uni, she says she heard the bells of the heritage-listed Christchurch, St Laurence Anglican church in the Haymarket and enchanted by the sound, decided to investigate.

"Until then whenever I heard church bells, I never gave a thought to who or what was on the end of the ropes. But that day I suddenly realised that the amazing sounds I was hearing were being made by actual people and I couildn't wait to have a go."

But it wasn't at Christchurch St Laurence that Mary signed on as a trainee bellringer. Instead she joined the bellringers at the historic St Philip's Anglican Church on the corner of York Street, near The Rocks where she was taught by Robert Walters, one of Sydney's most outstanding bellringers and a member of the team that rang the bells at St Mary's Cathedral for the first-ever Papal visit to Australia by Pope Paul VI's in 1970.

Robert Walters generously passed on to Mary not only his expertise and skill but his lifelong love of bellringing as well.

According to Mary, the first time St Mary's Cathedral's bells were heard was on New Year's Day 1844. These bells were replaced in 1882 and then a century later in 1986, a whole new ring of 14 bells was ordered and fitted with a steel frame. Although there are 14 bells, 12 are the maximum rung at any one time with the additional bells giving more options and variety.

Each of the 14 bells is named after a Saint and has a different weight and sound.

"But no one has a special favourite or can play just one bell. As bellringers we have to be able to ring any one of them with equal skill and ease," Mary says.

For Mary and her fellow ringers, bellringing is both challenging, exciting and always great fun.

"Every time we ring the bells is special but it's the extra happy days such as Christmas Day and Easter Sunday which are filled with joy that we remember and treasure the most," she says.

For those interested in learning bellringing, contact Dr Jim Woolford, The Captain of the Bell Tower, St Mary's Cathedral, phone 0412 553115