ANZAB - Australian and New Zealand Association of Bellringers

Photo of bellringers in action

The Australian and New Zealand Association of Bellringers was formed in 1962 to promote the art of change ringing in our two countries. There are currently around 400 members who ring at more than 70 bell towers throughout Australia and New Zealand.

Non-ringers might like this introduction to bellringing. Groups interested in a tower tour, or a guest speaker are invited to contact our Regional Contacts in the first instance. Ringers and potential ringers can contact our association's office bearers or local towers and ringers.

Updated: 11 September, 2026

Using BellBoard

ANZAB has been using BellBoard as our primary mechanism for reporting ringing performances for over 10 years. The Peal Secretary uses entries submitted to BellBoard for ANZAB performances, to inform their publication in Ringing Towers and to provide summaries and various analyses of ANZAB performances (quarter peals or longer).

Our instructions on how to submit performances to BellBoard have been updated recently. See our Peals & Quarters page with the instructions and links to recent performances, leading towers and ringers for 2026, etc.

BellBoard queries can be tailored by modifying the web address of your search. For example, I added ?association_id=9&year=2025&add_cols=donation,sent_to_rw to a standard BellBoard search (full search here) to determine that in 2025, about 1/3 of ANZAB performances were shown on BellBoard without being printed in the Ringing World. Of the 176 performances published in Ringing World just over half had a donation listed. Other BellBoard searching options are shown here.

Deryn Griffiths
ANZAB President

Armidale Ringing Featured

Screengrab
The double page spread showing the article

Summit is an Armidale Regional Council magazine featuring stories of innovation, opportunity and community. The Armidale bellringers were interviewed and photographed, leading to a double page article in the July 2026 issue. See some of the photos here.

Handbell Practices

Mini bells (shown) work well with complete beginners

We know of two regular handbell practices open to anyone, and have created a Handbells page detailing them. Find it under the drop down menu "Tower & Rings", alongside the Tower Directory. If you have a handbell practice that is open to anyone, let the webmasters know about it.

Belinda Keir sent this report from the August practice in Sydney.

We had a lovely afternoon with nine people attending. Four ringers with varying amounts of experience on handbells rang Rusty Walters' bells. Another four people were total novices who had seen a notice in the St James pew sheet and turned up for a look. I worked with this group using mini bells (see photo) and reading from cheat sheets. The little bells turned out to be ideal for people handling bells for over an hour and for the very first time, and particularly for one person who had a hand injury. By the end they were happily ringing plain hunt minor.

A third activity was ringing eBells with the “Handbell Stadium” simulator which people found interesting and which gives another avenue to pursue change ringing in hand.

A Peal with Footnotes

The Peal Band with Bill Perrins second from left

The peal rung at Christ Church St Laurence Sydney on Saturday 29th August is notable for its large number of footnotes. Phil Goodyer organised the peal to mark the 50th anniversary of the first peal rung at Christ Church St Laurence, the first peal he conducted.

A footnote that caught my attention was "100th 1st peal ringer for a peal". Checking with Bill Perrins he confirmed that there are now 100 different people in whose first peal he has rung, including himself in that list, in his first peal in October 1964.

Bill wrote: I hadn't kept track of such things at all but Pealbase does provide the statistic and I noticed a couple of years ago that I was up around 97. Fairly quickly I snapped up Marion Brown and Cassandra Olive from Hobart. Because of some surgery earlier this year I had to withdraw from what turned out to be Alan Cutter's first peal but Philip's rerun of the CCSL peal provided an opportunity with Richard Winkler in the band. And so it turned out at the second attempt. It was gratifying that Richard came in at number 100 as I had a hand in his early lessons at St Mark's.

Bill added: Mainly first pealers are the only one in a band. I think my record would be four in the first peal at Castlereagh in April 2003. Of those four, only Thomas went on to ring any more peals. I can't equal Rusty's five in the local peal of Bob Minor at St Philip's on ANZAC Day 1986.

Deryn Griffiths

ANZAB CPR Training and First Aid Assistance

ANZAB offers funding to all towers for ringers to train in Cardio-Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) and First Aid, to a maximum of two ANZAB members per tower. Each tower is also being offered a free poster providing details of CPR.

as shown on BellBoard

see other performance links on the
Peals & Quarters page

Updated: 11 September 2026

Rosemeadow. Our Lady Help of Christians
Ordination Service, Saturday 12 September. Contact: