How to play carillon?

The carillonneur sits with erectness in front of the keyboard. He clenches his hands (not too strong and not too weak), holds the clenched hands with the smallest fingers below and presses the sticks (i.e. the rounded keys) with that bearing of the hands. If the hand will be spread, it is possible to play for two voices with each hand. The deep bells will be operated by the pedals. That means that hands and feet can play six different notes at the same time. But, due to the special acoustic characteristics of a bell, playing too much notes simultaneously does not produce harmonic sounds. Especially the minor third, dominating in the sound spectrum, makes itself felt unpleasant in deep triads.
The carillonneur should be able to differentiate the dynamics in pressing the sticks and pedals as refined as possible to achieve musical effects and to avoid too long resonance of the deep bells.

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Last Update: January 1, 2009