Virginia Bells

A friend of mine, Rg Huff, is leading a handbell festival in Virginia next year. He was looking for a three octave piece without a lot of extra 4 and 5 octave notes. The group he will be leading will be a level 2 or 3 type group with many new ringers and he didn't want them distracted by all of the parethises that the extra octaves add.

He thought my arrangement of Immortal Invisible published by Beckenhorst would be just right.

You can follow this link to an earlier post and on that post is a link where you can hear it.

http://bearhollowmusic.blogspot.com/2008/05/immortal-invisible.html

Immortal Invisible

I love this old Welsh hymn tune.

The text has a very mysterious quality to it.

"Immortal, Invisible, God only wise.

In light inaccessible hid from our eyes.

Most blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of Days.

Almighty, victorious, Thy great name we praise."

So when I set this tune for handbells I began the piece with a rather mysterious sound with the lower bells played quietly with mallets. The tune is then played in a mode - not quite minor, not quite major, which adds to the mysterious sound. Later the tune is played in a bright major key before it returns the the modal quality of the beginning. It ends with exciting shakes of big chords to the phrase "Thy great Name we praise!"

You can hear it by clicking on the link below.

http://www.beckenhorstpress.com/lister.asp?qry=arranger&qryTitle=R.+Lyndel+Littleton&qryStr=183