Story last updated at 8:29 a.m. Tuesday, December 14, 2004

Ringers reunited

Old and new Rollings students bond as they play bells for Palmetto Bronze

BY PAUL BOWERS
INK contributor

Bronze bells are spread on tables across the stage, shimmering under the lights. As the ringers take up their instruments and begin to play, they create unified vibrations that flow from the sheet music to the audience's ears.

WADE SPEES/STAFF

Spencer Wiesnet (right) and David Collins find something to laugh about as they and other Palmetto Bronze bellringers rehearse at Rollings Middle School of the Arts.

The ringers are members of Palmetto Bronze, a newly founded community handbell group led by Marcia Brantley, handbells director at Rollings Middle School of the Arts and Summerville Baptist Church.

The group is composed of former and current Rollings students who have studied handbells at the arts school. For those not familiar with Rollings, it is a public school in Summerville where students audition and are placed in a core art area, such as theater arts, vocal music, dance, visual arts, strings, piano and until recently, handbells.

Handbell ringing is not just for Santa Claus impersonators collecting money around Christmastime, and there's more to playing them than simple swinging motions. The bells can be damped when slammed on a cushioned table, and the larger ones can be drummed with mallets to make a more percussive sound. When these and other techniques are combined, handbell music has a truly distinctive sound. Much like a rock band, handbell ringers mix up styles and effects to create their own distinctive sound.

Brantley started Palmetto Bronze earlier this year when she received an invitation to a celebration in Norfolk, Va., for the 50th birthday of the American Guild of English Handbell Ringers. She gladly accepted and asked Rollings alumni and current students to try out for a new group to play in Norfolk.

The high schoolers pounced on the opportunity to play handbells again. Kendalyn Paulin, 16, a junior at Fort Dorchester High, saw it as an opportunity to reconnect with former Rollings classmates, including some she hadn't seen since eighth grade.

Much like team sports, handbells can create real, bonding friendships. "After four years at Rollings," explains Terrilyn Stephens, 17, a senior at Summerville High, "I just kind of missed it."

So the group began practicing in the summer, going over their favorite old songs in addition to more difficult arrangements. Fort Dorchester High sophomore Kelsey Lewis, 15, admitted that, for the high schoolers, "It had been a while, and we were all a little rusty."

With ringers in grades 7-12, one of their greatest difficulties was learning to play together, says Sara Trinkl, 15, a sophomore at Fort Dorchester. "We all have to stay on the same level."

Scheduling was difficult, too, since many members had summer jobs, and when four or five players are missing, the music is incomplete. "Everybody is essential," Brantley says.

That's part of what makes handbells a unique conduit for musical creativity: It's not like a symphony, where each player can play his own instrument separately.

When each ringer is responsible for playing only a certain set of notes, teamwork plays a crucial role. "You can't just worry about yourself," Kelsey comments. "You have to worry about the person next to you."

It took extensive practice throughout the summer before Palmetto Bronze was ready to perform in Norfolk at the end of July. "It was a huge honor to be able to play there," says David Collins, 17, from Fort Dorchester. "Everybody there was involved with handbells and knew if you were making mistakes." This was not like the group's local performances, which were attended mainly by family members and fellow students. In Norfolk, the ringers performed in a hotel ballroom packed with hundreds of people who eat, sleep and breathe handbells.

"It was really intense and nerve-racking," says Spencer Wiesnet, 13, a Rollings eighth-grader.

The appearance went extraordinarily well, though, as Palmetto Bronze performed favorites such as "Tempest," "Carillon" and "Furioso." One particularly moving song was called "Prayer for Peace," an arrangement inspired by the events of Sept. 11.

The song began with four chords, representing the four planes that the terrorists used as weapons, and the rest of the song reflected the need for peace in the world.

The group was heavily congratulated afterward, and the ringers met composers who arranged some of the songs they performed. Summerville High junior Cherie Bennett, 15, says one composer told them they played his song "better than he could imagine it."

WADE SPEES/STAFF

Ringers (from right) Jessica Pye, Catherine Stillwaggon, Laura Johnson, Lauren Hendricks and Terrilyn Stephens must switch their focus from sheet music to Director Marcia Brantley as they play.

Brantley hopes to continue Palmetto Bronze and possibly open it to others in the community. School officials recently announced that Rollings is phasing out handbells as a core area, which disappoints former students such as Sara. "It was an amazing program," she says, adding that "not everybody owns a set of handbells.

With the middle-school handbells program coming to an end, members of Palmetto Bronze hope their group can provide the missing venue for student ringers.

HOLIDAY PERFORMANCE

WHAT: "Holiday Bronze: An Evening of Holiday Classics." Palmetto Bronze, a newly formed group of teenage bellringers, will perform secular, sacred, traditional and contemporary selections.

WHEN: 7 p.m. Friday.

WHERE: Summerville Baptist Church.

COST: $5. Proceeds will help fund Rollings Middle School of the Arts and Palmetto Bronze programs.

Paul Bowers, 16, is a sophomore at Summerville High School. E-mail him at soccerdewd88@sc.rr.com.