This is a special episode devoted entirely to a performance on the ten bells of St Augustine’s Church in Alston, played on the carillon by Josephine Dickinson.
The performance took place on the Saturday morning of the 2025 Alston Live Festival and was free to all who could hear it in and around Alston. It included over 20 classical, traditional and popular tunes chosen by Josephine. The performance lasted an hour – a physically demanding challenge that Josephine met with admirable determination and stamina.
Thanks are due to Paul Frear and the organising committee of Alston Live Festival, and Mark Nash-Williams, Vicar of Alston Moor, for their support for the performance; and to the shops and businesses of Alston that helped to promote the concert. And of course thanks are due to Josephine Dickinson, whose commitment to playing the carillon has brought the sound of the bells of St Augustine’s to the people of Alston for many years.
The tunes Josephine played were:
Cavatina (The Shadows) 4m
Do-Re-Me (The Sound of Music) 2m
Everyday (Buddy Holly) 3m
Believe me if all those endearing young charms (traditional air) 1m
You Never Can Tell (Chuck Berry) 2.5m
Stumpie (trad) 1.5m
Grádh gan fhios — Love In Secret (Bunting transcript via Simon Chadwick) 2m
O’Carolan’s Lament (Turlough O’Carolan) 2.5m
Ride a Mile slip jig (trad) 1.5m
The Bramble Briar (song collected by RVW) 1m
Everlasting Love (Buzz Casson and Mac Gayden) 2m
Song for Someone (Bono and The Edge) 3m
Edi beo thu (Anonymous English, late 13thC, secular Christmas song in praise of Mary) 1.5m
Lift Me Up (Rihanna) 3.5m
Heman Dubh (trad) 1m
Fare thee well, my dearest dear (song collected by RVW) 1m
Slide Dubh (Peadar Ó Riada) 1.5m
Smile (from ‘Modern Times’ by Charles Chaplin) 2m
Seikilos Epitaph (trad Greek, oldest known complete song) 1m
I Will Have a Wife of My Own (irregular trad English aka JBa.57) 2m
A Wife of My Own (trad English regular version) 2m
New Road to Alston (trad from a Northumbrian piper’s MS of c.1816) 2m
Carolan’s Farewell to Music (Turlough O’Carolan) 3m
