Arts and endertainment
Ringing the changes
The bells and bell-ringers of Cesacastina
Bronzes made sacred through religious and ritual use, the church bells of Cesacastina ring out over the surrounding valleys on feast days, when they are swung in their characteristic oscillatory movement. Controlled from the ground by means of strong ropes, almost exclusively by the old men of the town who have inherited the techniques and sequences from their elders, the bells are rung to mark religious occasions, patron saint’s days and weddings. At the foot of the monumental bell gable that holds them, the congregation gathers together to celebrate community events, comforted by the rhythmic striking of heavy metal clappers.
“I always play them. I have even got them recorded on my phone. Nobody taught me, I learned by watching my father and the elders before me, I did what they did, I watched those who did it before me and I did the same.”
Giovanni Toppi, 22 July 2018
The bell is a struck idiophone, usually in bronze, whose sound is generated by the contact of a metal pendulum called a clapper against the internal walls of the instrument. The cultural community sound par excellence, the tolling of bells has taken on, above all in the past, the double function of drawing people in (centripetal) and sending them away (centrifugal). In Christian Europe the sound of church bells has marked the rhythms of daily life, work and prayer, codifying over the centuries an effective system of long-distance communication to signal dangers, deaths, the passing of time and the call to religious services. The bell is “the voice of God”, said the peasants of central Italy, and the magical and exorcising power attributed to the sound of metal has contributed to making it an instrument widely used to try to ward off natural calamities, lightning, hail and storms as well as demons and evil spirits.
In Cesacastina, a village of shepherds and woodsmen lying more than a thousand metres above sea level on a slope near Monte Gorzano, in the Monti della Laga, the local parish church is dedicated to Saint Peter and Saint Paul. Probably of fifteenth-century origin, built entirely in sandstone, the church is dominated by an impressive bell gable for three bells which are still used; the oldest bears the date of 1717 and since then it has been continuously rung by generations of local bell-ringers, key figures of the community who over the centuries have handed down to each other the techniques, ringing styles and repertoires necessary to cover the multiple functions of the instrument.
The three bells of Cesacastina are called the campanella (little bell), campana di mezzo (middle bell) and campanone (big bell). They differ from each other hierarchically in terms of sound and size, and the different characteristics that distinguish them affect the main ringing technique still practiced in the town: two bell-ringers on the ground swing the bells by means of thick ropes ending in knotted rings which make them easier to grip. The particular method is locally defined as “a festa” (ringing for joy) and it is the result of a calibrated synchrony of movements and a cleverly intertwined sequence of tolling. The control of the two lighter bells, the little bell and the middle bell, is entrusted to a single bell-ringer as it would be difficult for two people to play them efficiently, while the big bell is rung by the second bell-ringer. When a bell-ringer is tired, another is ready to take his place, thus guaranteeing the continuity of the rhythm and the coded melody.
Bell ringing in the “a festa” style
Cesacastina di Crognaleto (TE), 12 August 2015.Recording by Gianfranco Spitilli, Don Nicola Jobbi Study Centre Archive /Bambun.
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Bell ringing in the “a festa” style
Cesacastina di Crognaleto (TE), 12 August 2015.Video footage by Stefano Saverioni, Don Nicola Jobbi Study Centre Archive/Bambun.
Cultural transmission and protection
The custom is still alive and deeply felt, especially on festive occasions, when the village is visited by many emigrants who normally live in Teramo or around Rome. However, the skills related to the ringing techniques are known almost exclusively by a few old men from the community, like Giovanni and Luzio Toppi, descendants of a family of bell-ringers, Mimì Michilli, Fernando Gambini and Domenico Giustiniani.
The weak cultural transmission has been exacerbated by an objective difficulty generated by the recent earthquake, which made the church unusable for over a year and consequently prohibited the use of the bells. Recently declared safe, the church and its bell gable, however, need restoration work to restore their full functionality; in fact, the bell-ringers maintain that at the moment it is impossible to ring the bells well, perhaps due to structural alterations caused by the quakes.
Moreover, the earthquakes first in L’Aquila and then in central Italy also caused a drastic demographic decline, even in the periods of the year when the village was usually full of people, like the summer season, Christmas and Easter. In a context already damaged by a progressive loss of resident inhabitants, this phenomenon appears to be particularly negative and puts at risk a transmission of skills based on observation of the elderly, on imitation and constant exercise. You learn to play the bells by trying and trying again, says Giovanni Toppi, just as he did by seeing his father and the bell-ringers who preceded him in action.
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