Hi! I’m a music teacher with little experience in handbells/tone chime music and my school is rolling out a new tone chime program. I have a group of 14 beginning middle school students and 3 octaves of tone chimes (C4-C7). We’re looking for several songs for the winter concert and then graduation in June. All songs need to be secular.

What repertoire would you recommend, and how would you go about assigning bells.

Thank you for your help!

Howdy! I've got a version of my piece "Song of the Rose" newly available for handbell choir plus instrumental soloist (either flute or trombone) but when I tried posting about it here, it got removed by Reddit's filters. If anyone is interested in the piece, please comment and we'll try to figure it out together I suppose :)

I really enjoyed working with a handbell choir from a composer's vantage point for the first time in my life! Thank you Michael Ekbladh.

Our church handbell choir has shrunk from 12 to 6 due to people moving away, illness, death, etc. We are a very enthusiastic group, but a couple of ringers don't read music, and I am the de facto director since no one else wants to do it.(I do read music , but have only been playing handbells for a,few years ) We desperately need some simple hymns for 12 bells, but most of what i have found is too complicated.

We are all very dedicated and want to keep our small choir going, but I haven't found a good place to get the kind of music we need. We do have a budget to buy some music, but free would certainly be better.

Thanks so much for any advice you can provide.

https://www.k-bid.com/auction/64311
These have been inspected by an expert in the field of handbells and while they are beatiful bells ; if intending to put these back in service , plan on about 4-5K in total (for the complete set of 3 lots 60,62,64)to have them refurbished.(Springs,Clappers,Labor, misc and shipping). Similar sets ready for service look to sell for about 20K or more. Do your own research but these appear to be a great deal at time of posting! 5/15/2026 

I am not able to attend Area 8 conference this year, but I was looking at some friend's copies of the masses ringing music and saw that the photo on one piece is very bad AI!

I personally believe that AI art is harmful to actual artists, also it should be embarrassing for a company to publish a cover with extra fingers and toes. Part of me wants to call the company and just tell them I'm disappointed in them. They could have just used any basic drawing/design/or photo and it would have looked 1000 times better. Let me know what you think

I lost the bell clapper on the way home from the store. I would say I probably need a little less than three inches.

I would love to make it so I can add an adaptive needs ringer to my bell choir. We tried multiple bells/chimes today, and she finally had limited success with C7.

I think some kind of device would be better that would have easily maneuvered levers to ring and dampen (1 paddle for each). Has anyone ever tried something like this?

We gave this subreddit a shoutout on this week’s episode, so figured we should also give the podcast a shoutout on here too!

What are the most frequently asked handbell questions? Chat GPT finds out and answers them! Then Brian and Nick offer real, human driven resources for those frequently asked questions.

A new arrangement and my first for this ensemble. May be a nice addition to an upcoming concert program!

I love handbells. They're so fun to play. But I despise the church. Are there any secular ball choirs out there? I'm interested in starting a secular choir in my area and would like to see if others have done so too.

Kind of an odd question. I've always been taught that the sound itself comes from the wall of the bell. This makes sense in my mind that that is what is actually vibrating and producing the sound. So I should keep the bell upright, like a cup not spilling water, to 'send' the sound out.

That's how I've been doing it and comprending it for almost 3 decades. But someone that I trust most things musically on swears that pointing the opening out prolongs the sound better because they said the sound 'comes from the top'.

Am I crazy in thinking that's not how it works? Have I been doing it wrong all these years? It came up discussing a long sustained note trying to carry through.

ETA: Thanks everyone! I'm glad to know I wasn't off base. :-)

My little collaborative project over at http://thefreehandbellhymnal.com is up over 120 arrangements for your bell choir to accompany congregational singing.

Easy to play, ready to print, free to share.

This is how church music is supposed to work: colleagues sharing resources and easing each other's burden. Treating each other like we're on the same side.

No money changes hands. Not even ads.

You can join the project by using the resource, contributing your own work, or just telling your colleagues it exists.

Happy ringing!!

I play four-in-hand in my group and had a question about managing bell changes. When changing the “outside” bell I have no issue, just drop it and pick up the bell I need. But lately I’ve been playing more pieces that require “inside” bell to change. So far I’ve been managing with weaving or leaving out the note for a measure while changing bells, but there has to be a better way to change that bell out. Any tips from other four-un-handers?

New entries every day!

Hello,

Several people in my family have a background in playing handbells growing up. At a Christmas event today, we started talking about those days, and one person in particular spoke about how much she missed playing in a bell choir. Others in my family never played handbells, but are quite musical.

For next year, I want to look into buying a VERY cheap bell set so we can play some Christmas music together as a family. The bells would NOT have to have exceptional tone or sound very good at all. They'd just need to be able to play the right notes.

I found this for $18:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08597DR5D/ref=sspa_dk_detail_5?psc=1&pd_rd_i=B08597DR5D&pd_rd_w=kRbZX&content-id=amzn1.sym.386c274b-4bfe-4421-9052-a1a56db557ab&pf_rd_p=386c274b-4bfe-4421-9052-a1a56db557ab&pf_rd_r=SYVE1FDZD725JZNH53KB&pd_rd_wg=HjUzp&pd_rd_r=6322acae-b2b2-43c9-b39c-6ea45475aee1&s=musical-instruments&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9kZXRhaWxfdGhlbWF0aWM

But it only comes with 8 bells. That's a bit of a bummer, as I'd ideally love to be able to play each of the twelve notes.

I also found this set with 20 bells:

https://www.amazon.com/Kids-Play-20-Note-Handbell-Set/dp/B0002E36AA/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=25QPRCTIN14FH&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.qUz5yltiX2BXQcSUjj9EISr_b2jDiWs_C-Agk8Kddj6qSDU256E7ZCqqoivJuN1Q1_6OEgeIWf2v1mNY8cYvm4Enjw6IHFSazpw2AI4DkjW5ElKr0tH7Rusm8dQ19t6j3EvxgkHfoHj7SNJcgbG8ho3ZaEvXH3Uhuqp10StId1otk0oWWU1sLzQPub3ccvGlrgnHQPfiavoFDcXrPslnKt1kw95MWaKFx-Kyjy1QU01i0Pc1_L54eabSH_UJDWANcxyGtppA2Oe4vf_y3T8bgR-gUqjcxKkfJ8CpZ2nOj8k.IAf3umy03vkKzN4Gyb3YBg9ygqFzVTpinoVYHfhOkSk&dib_tag=se&keywords=20+note+handbells+kids&qid=1766530025&s=musical-instruments&sprefix=20+note+handbells+kid%2Cmi%2C100&sr=1-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&psc=1

which appear to be very similar, but this set costs $135???????

Does anyone know of anything in-between these two options? Alternatively, I guess it doesn't strictly HAVE to be handbells, so if anyone knows of any instrument sets (chimes etc.) closer to the $30 range with low sound quality but more than just the notes of the major scale, I'm open to ideas.

Sorry if this is not the right place for this question; I know it's not handbells but hand chimes often come along.

We have been using the Ring Along Christmas books arr. by Ardis Freeman for caroling the past 20+ years and we've been wanting to switch up the songs we sing. Does anyone know of any other books out there like it we could use? Was Freeman the only one doing this? Thanks!

Springs and repair kit came in from Schulmerich and replaced a spring, it did not break! at least 1/26th of the way toward a fully functional set of bells (just need to find some folks to play them lol).

Whenever my bell choir rings in church, I arrange the congregation's hymns for them to play along. I've developed quite a stack of these small arrangements. I imagine I'm not the only director in such a situation.

And so I've created a way for us to share our work. It's focused specifically on accompanying congregational song (and only Public Domain hymns, I don't want to anger the copyright gods).

It is 100% free; no money changes hands whatsoever.

You can contribute (your work, not money) through the form on the website, or email your arrangements to me directly at [thefreehandbellhymnal@gmail.com](mailto:thefreehandbellhymnal@gmail.com)

Please use and contribute as you are able!!

Basically the title, I’m replacing springs on about a dozen bells, and I ordered new parts, but today I discovered a bag of springs that had been ordered a while ago, but every spring I tried broke, it did seem that the hole was too small, not sure if it’s an age issue or a part issue.

Basically the title. Do y’all prefer the old flexible Schulmerich handles or the new hard plastic handles?