BELL ringers from across the country will gather to enjoy the sound of church bells in Pershore, to celebrate a special anniversary.

The bells are to ring for a special peal at St Andrew's Centre from 11.30am on Tuesday, April 16, marking the 30th anniversary of an important bell ringing achievement.

In 1989 Roddy Horton created a particularly demanding combination of not one, but four, different methods of bell ringing, providing a challenge that required a high level of skill, experience and concentration to perform.

This quickly became affectionately known as Horton’s-Four and to mark 30 years since its inception, Mr Horton was asked to revisit his original work and see if it could be extended into something more challenging.

And over a number of years he devised a version that is about 10,000 changes in length and will take nearly six hours to ring.

On April 16 St Andrew's Centre will ring the special peal, with the ringers honouring Mr Horton's contribution.

Martin Whiteley, from the Pershore Abbey Society of Bell Ringers, said: "If you’re in the vicinity of the St Andrew’s Centre on the 16th, hopefully you’ll hear the bells ringing a special peal, ringers honouring one of their own for the contribution he’s made to the ever-evolving art of church bell ringing."

At the Parish Centre there are eight light bells and a peal takes about two-and-a-half hours to perform.

And at Pershore Abbey, the heavy ring of 12 bells at Evesham may take over three-and-a-half hours to ring.

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