January 5, 2025

Christmas handbell duets in a rather different holiday season!

At the end of the 2024-25 holiday season, it’s time to look back at our December handbell performances!

The time between Thanksgiving and Christmas is usually our busiest time of year, as far as handbell performances go. However, this year we didn’t have as many duet bookings as usual. That turned out not to be such a bad thing; we found out at the start of the holiday season that a family member in England was in hospital, and we really needed to go over there as soon as possible. Panic set in for while, because making an emergency trip overseas in December is not an easy thing to do. We’ve never cancelled a holiday handbell performance yet, and didn’t wat to start!

We looked at our calendar, and decided that we should continue as planned with our Christmas bookings, then fly to England as soon as they were all finished. We booked flights for December 21st, and a room in a hotel not far from the hospital. Then we took a few deep breaths, and continued with our December as planned.

Two chilly performances at the Kerstmarkt-Holland

Our 2024 holiday season started in the way that’s become a tradition for us in recent years. We always love to begin our Christmas ringing at the Kerstmarkt! This is a European-style Christmas market in downtown Holland. We even met Santa there this year! It was cold on both evenings we played, and we also had snow on one evening. We always wrap up warmly, though, so we’re well prepared. We go to this event feeling extremely wide, with several layers of extra clothing on! Thanks to the Kerstmarkt organizers, particularly Osman Flowers and Firs, and Shady Side Farm, for inviting us to take part in this festive annual event.

Another outdoor performance, at Otsego Hometown Christmas

We were excited to be asked to perform at Otsego Hometown Christmas again this year. This is another chilly outdoor event (we get a lot of practice with those!), but we enjoyed sharing our music there again. There’s always a lot happening at this community event. There are trailer rides, a live Nativity, and a parade, and it’s a fun way to celebrate the holiday season. Thanks to Otsego District Library for sponsoring our performance again this year.

handbell ringers at Otsego Hometown Christmas

Back to the Gary Byker Memorial Library of Hudsonville!

We were pleased to be invited back for this annual celebration with the Friends of the Library. If we’re remembering correctly, this was our sixth year at this event! We always enjoy the opportunity to play carols and talk about our bells with an attentive and enthusiastic audience. This year, we included a couple of accompanied duets in our program. We have lots of 6- and 8-bell accompanied pieces, and we really wanted to play some of them. We decided to try using an mp3 backing track instead of an actual pianist, and it worked well.

As you can see from the photo, it was a bit of a stormy day! We were scheduled to present a handbell duet program at Paw Paw District Library that evening too. Sadly (but wisely), that event had to be postponed. The snowflakes make for a fun photo, but driving conditions were definitely less than ideal! We’ll now be performing at the library on the evening of Thursday, January 23rd instead. We’ll be keeping our fingers crossed for no winter storm that day!

Finally, some indoor performances!

We were happy to be able to add our handbell music to another Christmas concert by the Zeeland Community Band. This festive community event has been a highlight of our holiday season for several years now. Here’s a rare photo of us in action!

We enjoyed a couple of performances for private events, including a luncheon for seniors in Wright Township. As December went by, we decided that we had enough time to fit in a couple of fundraising sessions at the Salvation Army Red Kettle too. We hadn’t done that in a few years! We were encouraged by how pleased people were to hear something different at our local D&W Fresh Market. It also helped that we were able to choose a location indoors. After the first few performances in December, we felt that we’d already done our fair share of outdoor ringing!

A quick trip to England

Our pre-Christmas performances in Michigan were all finished on December 20th. On the 21st, we flew to England, to meet with family in Berkshire. We took some of our handbells with us, packed in a carry-on case. We’ve travelled overseas with handbells before, but never risk putting them in our checked luggage. We spent Christmas Day at the hospital, and played carols for patients as they had their Christmas lunch. It was heartwarming to see how the hospital staff worked hard to make Christmas Day festive for patients there. In our “down time”, we enjoyed acting like tourists in the town of Reading, and admiring the old buildings there. We shared some of the photos from our trip on our Facebook page. Our week in England was over far too quickly, and it really didn’t feel like a vacation at all. There were friends and family that we didn’t have the opportunity to see, but we hope it won’t be too long before we can start planning another trip there.

Back to Michigan, for the last days of Christmas

We arrived back in Michigan, tired and a little overwhelmed from our trip. We’d been looking forward to playing at St. Paul’s United Church of Christ on Epiphany Sunday, though. We actually couldn’t remember the last time we’d played handbell duets in an Epiphany Sunday service! We were thankful for one more opportunity to play carols such as Silent Night, The First Nowell, What Child is This and We Three Kings. It was our first visit to this friendly church, but hopefully not our last!

Thank you!

Thank you so much to everyone who supported and encouraged us through our 2024-25 holiday season! If you booked us for a performance, came to one of our handbell concerts, bought music from Choraegus, communicated with us on our Facebook page, or did anything at all to lift our spirits during quite a stressful month – thank you. We’re looking forward to sharing more handbell music with you in the coming year!

January 31, 2024

Class information from the HMA Virtual Winter Workshop

The Handbell Musicians of America Virtual Winter Workshop took place last weekend. This was an online event, where participants could sign up to attend online class sessions on Zoom, to learn more about a wide variety of handbell skills. There were classes available on subjects such as Creative Ringing Assignments, Starting a Middle School Handbell Choir, Bells and Voices, Program and Concert Design… and more! We enjoyed teaching two classes on two of our favorite handbell-related subjects; Adventures in 8-Bell Music, and The Low Ding Zone: Bass Handbell Skills. It had been a while since we’d taught on Zoom, but after a training session with HMA experts, and a bit of reading online, we felt as if we were getting the hang of it again.

For anyone who attended one or both of our classes, here’s some of the additional information that was covered in each class:

Adventures in 8-Bell Music: Doing More With Less

During this class, we talked about music written for just 8 handbells. We discussed the reasons for playing 8-bell music, assigning the bells for each piece, options for 4-in-hand ringing, and special considerations like when to damp the bells, how to find the melody, and how to match movements and balance the sound within a group.

We also talked about where to find 8-bell music, and we went through some useful websites to look at, one of which was Choraegus. Group participants asked some additional questions, and we’ve provided some info and links here:

Is 8-bell music suitable for groups of ringers who don’t play 4-in-hand? What Choraegus music do you recommend?

Yes, 8-bell music is suitable for ringers who don’t play 4-in-hand. As we discussed in the class, it helps to choose the right level of music for each group, depending on not only the skills of the ringers, but the amount of rehearsal time available. For handbell quartet groups, we recommend starting with some straightforward 8-bell music, such as the Surprisingly Easy arrangements available from Choraegus. If you browse the Choraegus website, you’ll see that a lot of the hymn arrangements in particular are available in two versions; the standard version and the surprisingly easy version. The easier version will usually contain fewer sixteenth-notes, less syncopation, and less tricky stuff generally. We refer to it as “all the music, without the twiddly bits”. The standard versions of Choraegus 8-bell music range from fairly straightforward to fiendishly challenging, as we discussed in our workshop session.

Are there collections of music available, instead of having to buy individual pieces?

Yes. There are collections available, in both standard and Surprisingly Easy versions.

More information about British-style 4-in-hand ringing

There’s an article on our website that describes the method Carla uses to play 4-in-hand. It has descriptions and pictures!

If you’re find the bells too heavy to play 4-in-hand…

there’s an article on the Choraegus website that gives some information about how you can often use smaller bells to play the music in a range that’s more comfortable for you.

The Low Ding Zone: Bass Handbell Skills

If you’d like to purchase a copy of The Bass Ringer’s Notebook, it’s available from Choraegus.

And, just for fun, here’s Larry’s arrangement of Fairest Lord Jesus, bass handbell solo.

We’d like to thank everyone who came to our workshop classes. If you decide to purchase any 8-bell music (or The Bass Ringer’s Notebook), remember to use the top secret coupon code that was given to you, to get 20% off your purchase, for a limited time only.

Thanks also to Handbell Musicians of America for giving us the opportunity to be part of the Virtual Winter Workshop, and for being so helpful in hosting the Zoom calls and helping us navigate the process! The classes from the weekend were recorded, and if you’re a member of Handbell Musicians of America, you can still sign up to watch all the recordings, until the end of February. Look on the Handbell Musicians of America website if you’d like to find out more!

HMA workshop, Larry Sue with bass handbells

January 5, 2024

Our 2023 Holiday Handbell Performances

2024 is here, and our 2023 holiday handbell performances are finished. As we pack away our carols and start thinking about what’s next, we’d like to thank everyone who helped to make December 2023 a fun month for us!

A quieter-than-usual holiday season

The 2023 holiday season was probably the quietest one we’ve had since the pandemic. We were invited to perform at several events outside Michigan, which would have been exciting. Ultimately, though, we ended up sticking with bookings in an area very local to us. Our run-up to Christmas began with a couple of outdoor performances at the Kerstmarkt in downtown Holland. We always enjoy starting our Christmas ringing at this European-style Christmas market. It’s a fun way to practice ringing for a couple of hours at a time, even in icy weather. This time we even had our photo taken with Sinterklaas! We didn’t actually manage to persuade him to do any handbell-ringing, though.

Sinterklaas and handbells at Kerstmarkt Holland

An event that was new to us in 2023 was the Otsego Hometown Christmas. This was another outdoor performance, and wow, it was cold! It was a fun community event, though, and it was very well attended. The Otsego District Library sponsored our performance at the Hometown Christmas, and we’ll be going back there in April, to give a handbell duet presentation in the library.

2023 holiday handbell performances - Handbell ringers at Otsego Hometown Christmas

Handbell duet concerts and demonstrations

Christmas 2023 marked our return to Freedom Village in Holland; the first time we’d given a performance for the residents there since 2018! We also enjoyed sharing our music with the Century Club in Holland, and for the seniors of Chester Township. We made a return to Hudsonville Library, and also to the Village at the Pines in Grand Haven. The Century Club had requested a demonstration of our 19th-century Taylor handbells from England. Last time we played for that group, our Taylor bells were over in Ireland, being restored. We enjoyed being able to play them this Christmas, because they’re so different from our usual bells. You can see them on the table in the photo below:

Another Christmas performance with the Zeeland Community Band

One of our favorite 2023 holiday handbell performances was the Zeeland Community Band Christmas concert. This band just gets bigger and better with every passing year! This year’s Christmas concert was thoroughly festive, with some really good music by the band. This was how they looked from where we were, at the side of the stage:

2023 holiday handbell performances - Zeeland Community Band Christmas

Advent and Christmas worship services

We enjoyed playing handbell duets in Advent services at Ridge Point Community Church here in Holland. It was fun to play in the service on the first Sunday of Advent, then again in the Christmas Eve services on the Saturday evening and the Sunday morning as Christmas Day approached. We always enjoy the Christmas Eve services at this church, and we approved of the purple lighting this year!

Our final Christmas event of the season was at Glenn United Methodist Church, at the very end of the year. We played a total of six 8-bell duets in that service, to a small but friendly and appreciative congregation. The pastor gave a sermon about bells and Christmas, which we really appreciated. There’s definitely something special about bells at that time of year. Yes, we may be biased, but we believe it! It’s a very special church community, in a historic building, and we appreciated the turn-of-the-century architecture there. We also loved having the opportunity to chat and have coffee with the congregation afterwards. When the service was finished, and the coffee cups were put away, we went for a nice walk around the area. If you ever get the opportunity to visit Glenn (not far from South Haven), you should!

Glenn United Methodist Church, Grand Haven

Thank you to all for your support and encouragement in 2023!

As we start our new year, and look forward to snow finally arriving in our part of Michigan (fingers crossed!), we’d like to thank everyone for your friendship and encouragement in our busy holiday season. If you booked us for a performance, thank you! If you came to one of our concerts, or chatted with us after a worship service, thank you too! To the people who made coffee or tea for us, put money into our tip jar at the Kerstmarkt, or gave us flowers; thank you. If you prayed for us, sent us a Christmas card, or wished us safe travels, we appreciate you too.

Finally, thanks to everyone who bought music from Choraegus, liked or shared videos from our Facebook page, and generally helped to keep us smiling during our busiest month of the year. We appreciate you all, and wish you good health and happiness in 2024!

2023 holiday handbell performances - Larry and Carla

August 29, 2023

Escape from No-Note Island – for Handbells

Escape from No-Note Island is a Level 5 original composition for 5-7 octaves of handbells. Larry actually wrote the piece in 2018, but we’ve only just recently managed to record a demo video for it. It’s the perfect piece for the Position 11 diva in your handbell choir!

The story behind Escape from No-Note Island

Here’s Larry’s account of the story behind the piece, from Choraegus:

“Handbell compositions are usually written for note ranges that constitute complete octaves of bells. Having this agreed-on convention between manufacturers, composers, publishers, and performers makes it easier to maintain consistency within the ringing art. For instance, “five octaves” refers to the range C3-C8. Because of this, we start with a common knowledge about the music to be written and the bells needed to play it.

Although this is an excellent way of doing things, the resulting music tends to prefer the middle of its designated note range. This often results in the lowest and largest bells seeing less action. Bass ringers can often accept this situation because it means they can get a short break between spates of heavy lifting.

It’s a different matter for the upper treble ringers. Treble ringers generally prefer being active and occupied, and so there are some who have an aversion to being sent to the far right end of the table, which to them is a desolate place known as “Position 11”. This aversion has led some to label Position 11 with epithets such as “no-note island”.

This piece is dedicated to those of you who feel marooned and forsaken when you’re sent to the topmost position. I hope you’ll feel better about being there when you play this work.

Escape from No-Note Island is dedicated to our friend Caleb Onstead, who is also a published handbell composer. Caleb’s use of the phrase “no-note island” to describe the Position 11 assignment was the inspiration behind this piece. During the recent Bay View Week of Handbells event, Larry had the opportunity to present Caleb with a copy of the score.

More information about Escape from No-Note Island

Escape from No-Note Island is available to purchase and download from Choraegus. You can either purchase an individual copy (useful for massed ringing events, or for preview), or purchase the full choir license. Purchase of the full choir license gives you our no-fuss permission to print up to 15 copies for your group.

Your purchase of the full-choir license allows you to perform, broadcast and live-stream this piece as part of a concert or worship service. There’s no need for any additional license or fee. We ask that you credit the composer (Larry Sue) and publisher (Choraegus) in any printed media such as concert programs, and online (in video descriptions). Please see our licensing agreement for full details.

We appreciate your help in spreading the word about Choraegus handbell music. If you record a video of your group playing any of our pieces, we’d love to see it. You’re welcome to share it with us by email or on our Facebook page!

Please note that Choraegus handbell music is designed to come to you as a downloadable PDF file. You’ll be responsible for printing your own music, and you won’t receive anything in the mail. If you haven’t purchased music online from Choraegus before, we recommend our step-by-step guide. We designed this guide to help you navigate the purchase and download process in a (we hope!) stress-free way.

Any questions?

If you have any questions about our music, please start by reading our Frequently-Asked Questions. If someone has asked us a question even once, it will be there, along with the answer. Please contact us if you don’t find the information you need, and we’ll be happy to help.

August 4, 2023

Larry’s Town Crier article about the Bay View Week of Handbells

The 2023 Bay View Week of Handbells starts on Monday, August 14th! Larry recently wrote an article about the event, and an abridged version was published in the Bay View Association’s newsletter, the Town Crier.

There was a lot of information in Larry’s article, but not enough space to publish the entire thing in the Town Crier. Click on the photo of the Town Crier below to read the article in full, and enjoy finding out more about the concert on Thursday, August 17th, this year’s music repertoire, and some interesting inside information about the composers and arrangers!

Larry's Town Crier Article - Bay View Week of Handbells

See you at the concert!

Remember to mark your calendar so that you don’t miss this year’s Week of Handbells concert! As mentioned in Larry’s Town Crier article, it will take place in the John M. Hall Auditorium on Thursday, August 17th. The concert starts at 7:30pm. It’s a popular event, so be sure to arrive early to get a seat in your favorite spot!

The two of us have been participating in the Week of Handbells since 2010. As always, we’ll be posting photos from this year’s event on our Facebook page, and you’re welcome to contact us if you have any questions about the concert, or the event in general.

We look forward to seeing you on August 17th!

July 21, 2023

Our Handbell Concert in Madison, WI

After a busy Saturday morning of handbell workshops, we presented a handbell duet concert in Madison, WI. The sanctuary at Westminster Presbyterian Church is a beautiful performance space!

We played a whole concert with music using just eight bells at a time, although not the same bells for every piece. You’ll notice in the photo that we used three tables for the concert, even though we were only playing 8-bell music. We decided to do that because then we’d have a place to put our sheet music after we’d played it, and also because we used handchimes for one of the pieces. We don’t actually need a lot of space generally, but when we do have room to spread out, we do appreciate it!

Our concert program

Our concert was designed as a sacred concert. We added a couple of not-quite-sacred arrangements, but most of our repertoire consisted of hymns. Chopsticks was a fun addition; added fairly last-minute because we remembered how the audience had enjoyed it at our recent duet performance in Decatur, MI.

Here’s the program for the concert, listing the pieces we played:

It looks like a lot of pieces for one concert, but we don’t take as much time to reset our bells between pieces as a “standard size” handbell choir usually would, so we can fit more music into the program. We were grateful to Joe Chrisman from Westminster Presbyterian, who played piano for two of our pieces. We’d been rehearsing with an mp3 backing track played on a phone, so it was a real treat to have an actual pianist with us!

Here’s a video of Amazing Grace, with thanks to Larry’s brother Aj, who was at the concert:

Our 8-bell music

All of our 8-bell music is available for purchase and download from Choraegus. The helpful thing about Choraegus handbell music is that (with very few exceptions) it comes with fuss-free permission for performance, broadcasting and live-streaming. No one need worry about applying for separate licenses to perform or broadcast the pieces. We want to make it easy for other handbell ensembles to be able to perform our music too!

We’re thankful to everyone who came to our handbell concert in Madison. It was our first time performing there, and we appreciated the warm welcome we received. After the concert, on the Sunday morning, we played in two church services in Madison. We played prelude and offertory music at Covenant Presbyterian Church, then drove back to Westminster Presbyterian in time for offertory and postlude there. We’d had some doubts about being able to play in both services, but it turned out to be no problem at all, since the organizers Joe and Melissa had worked out the timing of everything so perfectly. The two churches were only a 6-minute drive apart, and we weren’t even out of breath when we arrived at Westminster. Playing in worship on the Sunday morning was a nice way to end our visit to Madison, before starting our long drive back to Michigan.

During our stay in Madison, we were able to visit the Wisconsin State Capitol building, which was opened in 1917. It’s a fascinating place to visit. When the trip was over, we drove back to Petoskey through Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, stopping at various places along the way. If you’d like to see more photos from our trip, take a look at our Facebook page!

Thanks again to everyone who made this Handbell Weekend possible. We hope to visit Madison again someday!

July 21, 2023

A Handbell Weekend in Madison, WI

Last weekend’s Handbell Weekend in Madison, WI was a lot of fun! The event was organised by two churches — Westminster Presbyterian and Covenant Presbyterian — who invited us to visit Madison and lead workshop classes on various handbell topics. We appreciated the opportunity to talk about handbells for an entire morning, with around 40 workshop participants from churches and community groups in the area. We taught five classes between us, and shared a lot of information during that time.

Handbell Weekend, Madison, WI event poster

Larry’s Bass Handbell Class

Larry’s class for bass ringers aimed to answer questions submitted by workshop participants before the event. He covered topics such as: how to lift bass handbells safely, how to assign parts when short-handed, bell placement on the table to avoid weaving, and how to use mallets effectively. The session also included an photo opportunity with bass shelleys; a chance for all the class participants to demonstrate their ability to hold two bass bells at the same time!

Notes for class participants: If you were at Larry’s class on Bass Ringing, and you’d like to learn more, you can find out everything you need to know and more by reading his very own book, The Bass Ringer’s Notebook. This book is available for purchase from Choraegus. If you were at the workshop and you regret not buying the Notebook at the special discount price, get in touch with us, and we’ll arrange to make that possible (although you’ll still need to pay for shipping). Alternatively, use the coupon code given out at the event to save 20% on Choraegus purchases.

Carla’s Treble Ringing Class

Carla’s treble ringing class focused on some of the challenges treble ringers face, including topics such as how to make quick bell changes, how to play stopped sounds, and how to make martellato easier.

Adventures in 8-Bell Music

We enjoyed sharing some of our 8-bell music with workshop participants. We talked about the reasons for playing 8-bell (or small group) music, handbell assignment, space requirements, and the challenges and considerations to bear in mind. Then we all enjoyed playing some 8- and 12-bell music together as a group. We were able to add higher and lower bells to fill out the sound, and it all sounded great!

Note for class participants: If you enjoyed our 8-bell music class on Saturday morning, you can find lots of small-group music available for purchase from Choraegus. Don’t forget to use the coupon from the event to save 20% on every purchase!

British-Style 4-in-Hand Ringing

This is not actually an accurate representation of how it’s done, but Carla always enjoys the opportunity to teach other ringers how to play 4-in-hand in the traditional British way. Some of the class participants were trying 4-in-hand for the first time, while others were proficient in the ring-and-knock style most often used here in the USA. Either way, learning a new technique is a challenge, but everyone rose to the occasion and eventually succeeded in making it work!

Note for class participants: If you went to the class, and your hands forgot everything the minute you left the room, you can find more information (with extra pictures) in this detailed article on our site. If you’re wondering where you can find some free music to practise your new skills without spending any money, you can find it here!

Choraegus “Speed Reading” Session

This was a top-speed sight-read though some of the full-choir music available from Choraegus. Some pieces were more challenging than others, but we kept the session low-stress, and just enjoyed making music together as a group.

The following pieces were included in the session. Click on each title to find out more!

Celebration

3-5 octaves, Level 1. An original composition with lots of chords! Suitable for worship or concerts.

Infant Holy, Infant Lowly

3 octaves, Level 2. A new arrangement of this peaceful Christmas carol, to play on either bells or chimes.

Let Us Break Bread Together

2-3 octaves, Level 2. An accessible arrangement of this popular hymn.

Newness

3 or 5 octaves, Level 1, 2 or 3. An original composition, available in 3 levels to suit your choir.

Kingsfold

3-5 octaves, Level 2+. An arrangement of the traditional English hymn tune, with a little extra challenge.

Peace

3-5 octaves, plus optional handchimes, Level 2+. An original composition for worship or concerts.

Five

3-5 octaves, Level 2+. An original composition, with FIVE sharps, and FIVE flats in the key signatures!

The Heavens Declare Your Glory

3-5 octaves, Level 3. For more advanced groups, this uses mallet and mallet lift techniques in the bass.

‘Twas in the Moon of Wintertime

3-5 octaves, plus optional 3-octave handchimes. An interesting arrangement of the traditional Huron Carol.

Processional

3-5 octaves, Level 2+. An original composition, suitable to memorize as a processional.

Jingle Bells

3-5 octaves, Level 3-. A laid-back, jazzy arrangement of the popular Christmas carol.

Woodlands

3-5 octaves, plus optional 1-octave handchimes, Level 3+. For groups looking for some extra challenge, this is a recent arrangement of the hymn Tell Out My Soul.

Of the Father’s Love Begotten

3 or 5 octaves and handchimes (3 octaves), Level 4. A fun, mixed-meter challenge for advanced handbell choirs at Christmas, this arrangement has options for suspended mallets, handchimes, and “unusual” bells. There’s also an additional cajón part, available for purchase separately.

All the “thank you”s

We’re thankful to everyone who worked so hard to make the Handbell Weekend a success. Thanks to Joe and Melissa, from Westminster Presbyterian Church and Covenant Presbyterian church for being such wonderful and welcoming hosts. Thanks also to the Madison Area Concert Handbells, who helped so much with the loan of equipment for the event, and to all the participants who came to the workshop and shared in the fun. We hope to be back in Madison to do it all again someday!

May 18, 2023

Our handbell performance in Decatur

It’s been a while since we played handbell duets for an audience; in fact, we haven’t done that since February! Our handbell duet performance in Decatur gave us a chance to visit a new place, and to meet the friendly women of First Presbyterian Church. What a warm welcome they gave us!

The event was a Mother’s Day tea, and we played a variety of hymns and traditional melodies for an enthusiastic and appreciative audience in this small sanctuary. It was an ideal performance space for a small handbell ensemble, and the sound carried surprisingly well, even without amplification.

The 8-bell arrangements we played included Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee, Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing, Greensleeves/What Child Is This, Amazing Grace, Lucerna Laudoniae, To God Be the Glory, Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise, The Gift of Love (The Water is Wide), and Sakura. We also played our fun arrangement of Chopsticks, and demonstrated our handchimes by using them to play Ma Navu.

All the above arrangements are available to purchase from our music site, Choraegus.

During our handbell performance, we gave the audience the opportunity to ask questions. They came up with some interesting ones! We talked about how we met, how often we rehearse, and about Larry’s experience with ringing bass handbells. We also talked about the Kalamazoo Ringers concert coming up on May 21st in Kalamazoo, and encouraged people to go along and see bass chimes taller than Larry!

After the performance, we all went downstairs and enjoyed a reception with coffee and cookies. We received a kind gift of a little glass rooster and some lovely flowers to take home with us.

Our thanks go to the women of First Presbyterian Church for inviting us to give this handbell performance in Decatur. We hope to be back to see you all again someday!

December 27, 2022

A busy month of holiday handbell performances

Christmas Day has been and gone, but we’re determined to celebrate the full twelve days of Christmas. We’re at the blissful stage of the year when we can finally take a break, catch our breath, and relax after a busy month of holiday handbell performances!

The holiday season is always our favorite time of year. We get the chance to go out and share our Christmas handbell music, meet new people, and visit new places. We were fortunate that the recent snowy-blizzard weather waited until the second half of December to hit West Michigan, so we didn’t have to make any long drives in bad conditions. It’s always a risk when we arrange our holiday performance schedule, because we all know how unpredictable Michigan winter weather can be! Having said that, we’ve lived in Michigan since 2016, so we’re more used to driving through the snow now. Remember when we drove six hours a day for Larry’s radiation treatment in the winter of 2021? If we can survive that, we can survive anything!

Our 2022 holiday performances

Our 2022 holiday performance season began early this year, on November 19th, with our first of three performances at the Kerstmarkt. This Christmas market in Downtown Holland is always a highlight of our holiday season, but this year was a bit different! The opening day of the Kerstmarkt arrived on a day when snow was falling, and the temperature was… well, chilly, to say the least. Still, we’ve never cancelled a performance yet, so we were determined that this one would go ahead. We still managed to have fun, and we admired the courage of anyone who came out to shop in such terrible weather!

Handbells in the snow

For anyone worrying about our handbells and how they cope with extreme cold, we did take some precautions. We took the bells out into the garage a couple of hours before the performance, so that they’d get used to the drop in temperature gradually. We also didn’t play them too loudly when we got to the event. When we play in the cold, we always notice the change in the way the bells sound, so we don’t put any undue strain on them. There are some bells that really, really don’t like the cold, and they simply refuse to play, so we generally leave everything higher than G6 in the case, and don’t play any pieces that involve any “unhappy” bells.

Holiday handbell performances - Kerstmarkt bell ringers in the snow

Fortunately, we had two more opportunities to play at the Kerstmarkt. The weather was never as fierce as that first session, and we even had a bit of sunshine and blue sky!

We were privileged to be invited to perform two duet concerts during Advent. The first was at First United Methodist Church in Kalamazoo, as part of their lunchtime Advent Concert Series. It was wonderful to be able to share our music in such a beautiful space.

Our second concert was at Second Reformed Church in Zeeland. We performed as part of their Second Series: Sublime Art in a Sacred Space concert series. We didn’t have piano accompaniment this time; just an hour of seasonal handbell duets. It was fun to meet and chat with audience members at the post-concert reception.

Second Reformed Church Zeeland handbell concert

“Return visit” handbell performances

We’re always pleased to be invited back to give handbell duet performances for groups we’ve played for in past years. This year was our fourth Christmas performance at the Gary Byker Memorial Library in Hudsonville. It’s always a popular event, run by the Friends of the Library. We also spent another evening in concert with the Zeeland Community Band. We’ve been at the ZCB Christmas concert since 2016, and it’s become an annual tradition for us. The band has been growing in number over the last few years, and they sound better than ever! We made return visits to several senior communities and local organizations this year too.

Corporate parties are some of our favorite holiday events, and we had fun playing at DeVos Place in Grand Rapids. We played Christmas music to welcome guests as they arrived at the party.

Concerts with the Kalamazoo Ringers

This December, we also enjoyed playing in a couple of concerts as part of the Kalamazoo Ringers. We took part in the annual Christmas in Kalamazoo event and the group’s Christmas concert at Grace Harbor Church. We even played one of Larry’s arrangements – Gaudete – and the full concert is now available to watch on YouTube.

Thank you to everyone who helped make this holiday season fun!

If you booked us for a performance or Christmas program or wrote a review of our performance – thank you. If you came to one of our concerts, we appreciate you too! To all those who offered us coffee or a meal, chatted with us, or prayed for us – thank you. We enjoyed sharing our handbell music with you, and we hope 2023 will be a happy and healthy year for you all!

October 6, 2022

A Concert for the Monday Musical Club

The Monday Musical Club is a non-profit organisation dedicated to music education and promotion of creative and performing arts. Based in St. Joseph, Michigan, they hold a wide variety of education events and music performances. We were excited to be asked to present a shared concert with our friends Gary and Martha Matthews!

About Gary and Martha Matthews

Gary and Martha also live in Holland, and they’re a talented couple! Gary studied organ, music education, and sacred music, and holds a doctorate in Worship Studies. He served as Pastor of Worship and the Arts at Highland Park Baptist Church in Southfield, MI, and at Christ Memorial Church in Holland, MI. He’s a published composer, and has been performing for more than forty years, with piano, organ, trumpet and voice.

Martha holds a Bachelors in Music Education and a Masters in Flute Performance. She has played principal flute with Florida Symphonic Pops, Florida Wind Symphony, Gold Coast Opera, Gold Coast Ballet and the Washington Idaho Symphony. Martha directs the Kalamazoo Ringers, and is a sought-after handbell clinician. In concert with Gary, she plays flute, whistles, bell tree, and piano.

A concert with handbells, flute, piano, trumpet, and more!

We held our shared concert at First Congregational Church of St. Joseph. This is a beautiful sanctuary for a music performance! It was a treat for the four of us to be able to perform together. We’d spent most of our summer at our cottage near Petoskey, and Gary and Martha had been in Holland. Planning a concert and rehearsing is a challenge when you’re in different towns! Thanks to the power of email, and our individual rehearsals, we made it work.

Our program included music on a variety of instruments, including handbells (of course!) Gary and Martha opened the concert with a piece for piano and trumpet, and we continued with a couple of our favorite handbell duets. We also enjoyed the opportunity to get together as a quartet to perform some pieces – including Larry’s infamous arrangement of Hark! The Herald Angels Sing that the four of us had previously played for one of the Kalamazoo Ringers’ online Christmas concerts. We all played Blessed Assurance together, with a brand-new flute part that Larry had written specially for this concert. It was fun to find that some of the audience hadn’t seen handbells played in our 4-in-hand style before. We talked to audience members afterwards, and answered questions about our technique and the way we move.

Here’s the full program!

We enjoyed listening to Gary and Martha’s pieces, particularly Brent Olstad’s I Love to Tell the Story. Martha’s flute-played was enthralling to hear, and the audience clearly loved this piece. We finished the concert with an extra surprise – Larry’s lively arrangement of Ding Dong, Merrily on High. This is another arrangement for handbells, piano and flute, and it makes a perfect ending for a concert.

Our thanks go to the Monday Musical Club for inviting us to share our music in concert, and to everyone who came to listen. We hope to have the opportunity to perform in concert with Gary and Martha again someday!

If you’d like to provide an opportunity for us to perform in concert with Gary and Martha again, or you’d like to host a handbell duet performance, please get in touch with us, and we’ll talk more!