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Peal Compositions Committee

The Peal Compositions Committee is charged by the Council "to promote the art of composition: to maintain a representative collection of peal compositions and prepare for publication such collections as the Council shall direct; to select, check and prepare compositions for publication in The Ringing World and to encourage the use of aids to composition."

The current members of the Committee are

The annual report of the Committee is typically published in The Ringing World in late April or early May, a few weeks before the Council's annual meeting. Recent report are also available here:

Publication of compositions in The Ringing Word

The most regularly visible part of the Committee's work is proving and reviewing compositions submitted for publication in The Ringing World. Please send submissions for publication to compositions@ringing.org.

Whenever possible, please submit compositions by email. We can more easily, quickly, and reliably distribute electronic submissions amongst committee members and helpers than submissions by other means; they thus can be dealt with faster and with less chance of introducing errors.

When submitting compositions please state whether you intend them for publication in The Ringing World, or just for publication on the web site.

When submitting compositions by email please include them in the body of the message, rather than attaching a separate file. It is often difficult or impossible for those without the same version of the same word processor or other application running on the same kind of machine with exactly the same fonts installed to correctly decode such attachments. Further, please ensure when creating such a message that your mail client is set up to use a fixed width font, such as Courier or Monaco. With variable width fonts (which most fonts, including Times, Ariel and Helvetica, are) columns will not line up correctly on the recipient's machine unless the recipient is using exactly the same operating system with exactly the same fonts as you are. If you both use a fixed width font, even if it is a different font on a different operating system, things that line up correctly on one will line up correctly on the other. Finally, please also use spaces rather than tabs since the interpretation of the tab character varies from machine to machine as well.

Should you not be able to use email (which seems unlikely if you're reading this web page!) you can submit compositions on paper to

Compositions
c/o Roger Bailey
52 Burrows Road
London
NW10 5SH
U.K.

Typewritten submissions are much less likely to be misread than handwritten ones. Indeed, whatever means you use to submit a composition, please double check its accuracy. Ringing compositions are notoriously prone to subtle transcription errors, and over a quarter of the submissions we receive contain errors of some sort.

There is occasionally some confusion regarding the submission of compositions. Unlike some societies that require the submission of the composition to the peal secretary in order to credit the peal to that society, there is no need to submit a composition to the committee unless you wish the composition itself published. Unlike the peal secretaries of various societies we do not maintain records of what composition was rung when. We merely publish peal compositions that may be of interest to other ringers (citing their first performance when known).

Collections

Historically an important part of the Committee's work has been overseeing the creation and publication of collections of compositions. Collections published on behalf of the Committee are generally available from the Publications Committee as long as they remain in print. Recently published collections and works in progress include the following.

A Collection of 10 Bell Compositions (2005) and A Collection of 12+ Bell Compositions (2005), compiled by David Hull and Rod Pipe, and edited by Stuart Hutchieson. Together they form a substantial successor to the 1972 Collection of Ten & Twelve Bell Compositions. Each of the two volumes contains over six hundred compositions, dating from the 1960s up to 2000. The first volume is of individual royal methods, and the second of individual maximus methods, plus a handfull of compositions of individual methods on fourteen and sixteen. Both volumes can be purchased from the Publications Committee.

A Collection of Grandsire Compositions (2004), compiled by Richard Allton. This contains 469 Compositions of Grandsire Doubles to Sixteen. This publication can be purchased from the Publications Committee.

A Collection of Compositions in Popular Major Methods (2001), compiled by Roddy Horton, is a substantial successor to several earlier editions. It contains a wider variety of compositions suitable for a broader selection of methods than earlier editions. This publication can be purchased from the Publications Committee. Corrections to several errors in this printed collection are available online.

The Collection of Universal Treble-Dodging Major Compositions contains a wide range of compositions universally true to various combinations of false course head groups. It is essentially a successor to A Collection of Surprise Compositions (the "Wratten Collection") published in the 1960s, though it covers a much broader range of possible falseness, includes compositions with singles and with the tenors parted, and includes a summary of some musical properties of the compositions included. This publication can be purchased from the Publications Committee.

A Collection of Compositions of Stedman Triples and Erin Triples, compiled by Philip Saddleton. It is now out of print, but is available online. Currently it is only available as a PDF file. However, the entire contents of this collection, plus many more compositions of Stedman Triples, mostly twin bob, are included in the online collection.

A Collection of Compositions of Spliced Surprise (1941 - 1995) compiled by Roddy Horton and now maintained by Richard Allton. It and several updates are available online. It is currently out of print.

Philip Saddleton is currently assembling a successor to the 1983 Compositions of Stedman Caters and Stedman Cinques. Details are available online.

Roger Bailey is currently assembling a collection of compositions particularly suited for handbells. Details are available online.

Rod Pipe has prepared an annotated collection of compositions by the late Peter Border. It is currently available only online.

In addition, we have an online collection of peal compositions available. This online collection currently contains over 8,000 peal compositions, and we hope to continue adding to it over time. However, we do believe that there will continue to be a need for printed collections, as they remain rather handy to carry about for when something is needed at the last minute and the like.

To submit compositions for inclusion in the on-line collection please follow the same process as for submission for publication in The Ringing World. Please state explicitly whether you are submitting the composition for publication in The Ringing World, or just for inclusion in the on-line collection.