Advanced Ringing Academy

The Society will be hosting the first ‘Advanced Ringing Academy’ in August 2024, aiming to give unparalleled ringing opportunities to our younger members, and prospective members.

Over the course of eight days, those attending the ARA will be able to consolidate, develop and push their ringing as far as they want to go, with support from experienced members of the Society.

The ARA will be organised from a Birmingham base, from where a good variety of good rings of bells are easily accessible.

Format

The format is inspired by the very successful ‘UKxx’ tours organised every three years since 2005 by Simon Linford for overseas-resident members of the Society. These tours provide an intensive development opportunity for their attendees, focusing on achieving high quality but demanding ringing on 8, 10 and 12 bells. There are usually just three towers per day, but the practices are long (typically two hours) in order to give sufficient time to ring longer touches.

One difference from the UKxx tours will be the evenings, which will feature a range of entertainment – expect a bowling evening, crazy golf, a quiz night, and maybe a party or two! These will also be mixed with a small number of talks, presentations and workshops.

Accommodation

Accommodation is being negotiated in university halls of residence in Birmingham city centre (for those under 18), as well as at a nearby backpacker’s hostel (for those over 18). The student accommodation is in cluster flats so we will be able to have appropriate groups with adult supervision.

The organisers will do as much as possible to keep costs down.

Attendance

The Advanced Ringing Academy is primarily aimed at members under the age of 25 and prospective members. Ideally attendees would do the whole eight days but shorter attendance can probably be accommodated.

Finally, this isn't a tower grab type of event, although over the course of the eight days we are likely to go to 20 or so different towers. This is all about learning and developing ringing skills - method ringing, striking, and conducting (if that's what you want to develop), particularly on higher numbers where experience is harder to get.

Expressions of interest should be sent to Simon Linford.