Editing Change ringing (section)

==Changes==
The simplest way to sound a ring of bells is by ringing ''rounds''. This is a repeated sequence of bells descending from the highest to lowest note, which is from the lightest to the heaviest bell. This was the original sequence used before change ringing was developed, and change ringing always starts and ends with this sequence.

Two forms of ringing changes have developed;
#Call changes: where the conductor of the ringing commands each change.
#Method ringing: where after a word of command to start, the changes are rung from memory by the ringers.

===Call change ringing===
{{main|call changes}}
Most ringers begin their ringing career with call change ringing; they can thus concentrate on learning the physical skills needed to handle their bells without needing to worry about "methods". There are also many towers where experienced ringers practise call change ringing as an art in its own right (and even exclusively), particularly in the English county of [[Devon]].

The technique was probably developed in the early 17th century in the early days of change ringing.<ref>Change ringing – the history of an English Art. Vol 3,  W T Cook & Cyril A Wratten. Pub Central Council of Church Bell Ringers, 1994.  P90-93  “A recent examination  of a number of call change ‘peals’ still practised at Totnes in the South Hams …including the ubiquitous ‘Sixty on Thirds’ discloses a remarkable affinity with the seventeenth century Plain Changes described by Duckworth and [[Fabian Stedman|Stedman]].  The avoidance, where possible, of repetition and the use of hunts, half-hunt and extreme changes are all features of their construction, and together suggest a basically uninterrupted descent from the earlier system, unbroken by the intrusion of change ringing..."</ref>

Call change ringing requires one ringer to give commands to change the order of the bells, as distinct from [[method ringing]], where the ringers memorise the course of bells as part of a continuous pattern.<ref>Bell ringing- the English Art of Change Ringing. Ron Johnson. Pub Viking 1986  P 89.</ref>

====Call change instructions====
[[File:Call changes on eight bells WQT.png|thumb|Call changes on eight bells, with the musical rows Whittingtons, Queens and Tittums. This is not a call change 'peal', but an example of calling changes for a short period for musical effect.]]In ''call change ringing'' each different sequence of the bells, known as a "row", is specifically called out by one ringer, the "conductor", who instructs the other ringers how to change their bells' places from row to row. This command is known as a "call".

The change is made at the next  "handstroke" (when the sally on the bell rope is pulled), after the call.  In calling, the conductor usually has a strategy or plan to achieve the desired progression of rows, rather than remembering each call, and an example of these is shown in the example on eight bells. Conductors can space out the calls at will, but each row is normally struck twice at least because of the difficulty of calling continuous changes.

Calls are usually of the form "X to (or after) Y" or "X and Y"; in which X and Y refer to two of the bells by their physical numbers in the tower ('''not''' by their positions in the row). All cause two bells to swap.  The first form is used for ''calling up'' and ''calling down'', and the second form swaps the two bells mentioned.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://cccbr.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/200010.pdf| title = The Learning Curve: Call changes|work= The Ringing World |date = 6 October 2000|publisher = Central Council Education Committee}}</ref>

As an example of calling up and down, consider the following sequence of rows, and the calls a conductor would use to call them:

{| class="wikitable" style="margin-left: 5em"
|-
! Row
! Conductor's intent
! Call, if calling Up
! Call, if calling Down
! Call if swapping
|-
| style="text-align:center;"| 1,<span style="color:red;">2</span>,<span style="color:red;">3</span>,4,5,6
| ''to swap bells 2 and 3''
| style="text-align:center;"| "2 to 3"
| style="text-align:center;"| "3 to 1"
| style="text-align:center;"| "2 and 3"
|-
| style="text-align:center;"| 1,3,2,<span style="color:red;">4,5</span>,6
| ''to swap bells 4 and 5''
| style="text-align:center;"| "4 to 5"
| style="text-align:center;"| "5 to 2"
| style="text-align:center;"| "4 and 5"
|-
| style="text-align:center;"| 1,3,<span style="color:red;">2,5</span>,4,6
| ''to swap bells 2 and 5''
| style="text-align:center;"| "2 to 5"
| style="text-align:center;"| "5 to 3"
| style="text-align:center;"| "2 and 5"
|-
| style="text-align:center;"| <span style="color:red;">1,3</span>,5,2,4,6
| ''to swap bells 1 and 3''
| style="text-align:center;"| "1 to 3"
| style="text-align:center;"| "3 to lead"
| style="text-align:center;"| "1 and 3"
|-
| style="text-align:center;"| 3,1,5,2,4,6
|
|
|
|}

Thus it can be seen how these ways of calling differ:

*In ''calling up'', The first-called bell moves after the second called bell. 
*In ''calling down'', The first-called bell moves after the second called bell.
*In ''Swapping'', the bells simply swap position
In all cases, the ringer of the bell immediately above (behind) the swapping pair must also be alert, as that bell follows a new bell after the swap. Rarer forms of change calling may name just one of the moving bells, call the moving bell by position rather than number, or call out the full change.

The example on the right shows called changes eight bells being called using the "down" system. The sequence of calls shown gives three well-known musical rows, which are Whittingtons, Queens, and Tittums.

* '''Whittingtons''' – bell 1 and 2 stay in place, other bells ascend the odds and descend the evens
* '''Queens''' – descending odd bells then descending evens
* '''Tittums''' – interspersed light and heavy bells, giving a "tee-tum, tee-tum...." effect.

===Method ringing===
{{main article|Method ringing}}
Method ringing is the continuously changing form of change ringing, and gets its name from the use of a particular ''method'' to generate the changes.

After starting in repetitive rounds, at a given command, the ringers vary the bells' order, to produce a series of distinct sequences known as ''rows'' or ''changes''. In this way [[permutation]] of the bells' striking order proceeds. For example ''123456'' can become ''214365'' in the next sequence.

The method is committed to memory by each ringer, so that only a few commands are given by the ringer in charge (the conductor). Learning the method does not consist of memorising the individual sequences, but using a variety of techniques such as:
# Memorising the path of the bell, not the numbers of the bells it strikes after. This can be by visualising a tracking line in a method diagram
# or by breaking the line into small "work" units which are joined together.
# and looking for visual signposts, such as when the ringer's bell crosses with another particular bell.

There are thousands of different methods, of which two methods on six bells are explained in detail below.

====Plain hunt====
{{see also|Plain hunt}}
[[File:Plain hunt.png|thumb|The "diagram" of change ringing plain hunt on six bells. Two bells are shown.]]
In method ringing, plain hunt is the simplest form of generating changing permutations in a continuous fashion, and is a fundamental building-block of many change ringing methods. The accompanying diagram shows plain hunt on six bells. The course of two bells only are shown for clarity. Each row in the diagram shows the order of striking after each change.

Plain hunt consists of a plain undeviating course of a bell between the first and last places in the striking order, by moving a place in the sequence at each change, but with two strikes in the first and last position to enable a turn-around as the internal bells change over.

Thus each bell moves one position at each succeeding change, unless they reach the first or last position, where they remain for two changes then proceed to the other end of the sequence. All of the bells are doing this at every change, without any words of command.<ref>Central Council of Church Bell Ringers, "Learning plain hunt" retrieved 20.3.2017 [https://cccbr.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/index.pdf]</ref>

This simple rule can be extended to any number of bells, however it repeats the sequence after twice the number of bells hunting.

====Plain Bob====
[[Image:Plain-bob-minor 2.png|200px|right|thumb|The plain course of Plain Bob Minor, shown in red. Note that, for clarity, the row at the bottom of each column is repeated at the top of the next.]]
{{Listen|filename=Bob Minor, Synthesised Bell Sounds.ogg|title=Plain Bob Minor|description=Plain Bob Minor played using synthesised bell sounds. The bells start ringing rounds followed by a plain course of Plain Bob Minor (60 of the 720 changes that are possible on six bells) and finish in rounds again.|format=[[Ogg]]}}
To enable a greater number of changes to be rung without repetition, more advanced methods were developed, many based upon the plain hunt. "Plain Bob" is one of the oldest and simplest of these, and is shown as an example above.

A "plain course" of plain bob minor is shown in [[diagrammatic form]], which has the characteristics:
#all the bells plain hunt, until the treble bell is first, and depending where they are in the pattern, they 
#perform "dodges" in the 3-4 position 
#or perform dodges in the 5-6 positions 
#or sit for two blows if they are just above the treble, then go first again.

The red bell track shows the order of "works", which are deviations from the plain hunt.
#3/4 down dodge
#5/6 down dodge
#5/6 up dodge
#3/4 up dodge
#make 2nds place.
And then it repeats. Each bells starts at a different place in this cyclical order. 
A dodge means just that: two bells dodge round each other, thus changing their relationship to the treble, and giving rise to different changes.

The plain bob pattern can be extended beyond the constraints of the plain course of 60 changes, to the full unique 720 changes possible (this is 6 factorial on 6 bells, which is 1×2×3×4×5×6 = 720 changes). To do this, at set points in the sequences one of the ringers, called the "conductor" calls out commands such as "bob" or "single", which introduce further variations. The conductor follows a "composition" which they have to commit to memory. This enables the other ringers to produce large numbers of unique changes without memorising huge quantities of data, without any written prompts.

Ringers can also ring different methods, with different "works" on different numbers of bells – so there is a huge variety of ways of ringing changes in method ringing.