Myles wrote:
>>Apropos of ringing St Clement's, the wikipedia page for Oranges and Lemons claims the melody resembles change ringing. Can anyone think of a justification for that? The best I can think of is there are repeated descending lines, and about halfway through "I do not know" is kind of like back rounds. This all seems rather dubious to me. <<
There are intervals all over the Oranges & Lemons song, but even in called changes, some bells would be left out, and not everything is on a diatonic scale.
Here are the clock chimes at St Clement Danes playing the song. In addition to the ten bells hung for full-circle ringing, there is a flat 4th available to the chime mechanism (it's automated).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J93AAYMU4c
These bells are from 1955, because the original bells were destroyed in WWII bombing, but the tuning is about the same as the ones that would have been mentioned in the song. I can't find the newsreel footage of the dedication of the replacement bells, although I'm sure I've seen it in the past.
Aside from that whole chromatic thing, bits of of Thelonious Monk's piano pieces remind me of back rounds,
like the very beginning notes of "Straight no Chaser"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOzIBXhlP8M
Laura Dickerson