Long time, no ring!

I'm such a ding dong! I met a nice lady who asked me if I would be interested in ringing hand bells at her church. They were looking for someone to ring two little bells. I used to play hand bells at church in Mobile, so I thought it would be fun.

My first practice was last night. Little did I know how much I had forgotten about hand bells and reading music in general. It was pretty bad. It wasn't just two little bells I was in charge of, but four. Thank goodness I did not need to use all four in one piece of music.

At the beginning I was totally lost and I was barely ringing my bells at all. Everyone said it was ok and the ladies on either side of me kept trying to tell me where we were in the piece. They were so nice. I think the only reason why they weren't really annoyed with me is because four people were missing from practice that night. So, they were just happy to have anyone minding those four bells.

By the end of the practice it all started to come back to me. "Oh, that's right! The numbers at the beginning of the bar tell you how many beats per measure! That's why the director is counting!!!" "Oh!!! The little symbol that looks like a 'b' means 'flat'!!" It was insane.

I've got to go back to practice next Monday and actually ring my bells at church on the 15th. Wish me luck!