'Church bells are the coolest instrument in the world'
Wellington bellringer Dylan Thomas - 21 - trains other young people in the ancient art of the 'peal'.
After falling in love with the sound of church bells as a child, Dylan Thomas is now Ringing Master at Wellington’s Cathedral of St Paul.
Next Sunday, to mark the end of Matariki, he and 11 other Australasian bellringers will attempt a historic 'peal' - a 3.5-hour bellringing marathon.
"You have to make a decision - do you risk having to go to the toilet halfway through? Or do you not drink and feel horrible and dehydrated? It's a bit of a battle, but you have to do it. I prefer to go down the dehydrated route," Thomas tells Saturday Morning.
Dylan Thomas (second from left) rings the bells at Wellington's St Paul's Cathedral.
Simon Hoyle
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In Germany, where Thomas spent time growing up, church bells ring out three times a day and are just part of daily life, he says.
Years later, back in Wellington at his mum’s Film Commission office parties, Thomas would gaze out the window to St Peter’s church on Willis Street and wonder about its bell tower.
In 2018, when he eventually went into St Peter’s for the first time, Thomas was intrigued to read on a little board that its church bells were "unringable".
After discovering that Wellington had a cathedral with a working set of bells - St Paul's on the corner of Hill and Molesworth Streets - ringing them became a huge part of Thomas’s life.
People imagine that pulling ropes to ring church bells requires a lot of strength, he says, but bellringing is about 95 percent technique, which reduces the amount of force required.
While Thomas loves their rich history, mainly it's the fantastically complex and resonant sound of church bells that does it for him.
"It's not just this 'ding-dong' noise… That's not just one note that you hear; it's thousands of notes that come out of a church bell.
"I think it's the coolest instrument in the world. It's fantastic, there's no better instrument."
When you’re close enough to the ringing of St Paul's church bells - particularly its large bronze tenor bell - their sound resonates powerfully through the body, Thomas says.
"It's like a rock concert, genuinely, not joking. It's like ‘Wow, this thing is really resonant."
Listen to the bells of Wellington's Cathedral of St Paul:
