News / Ringing in the Games
THE 2012 London Olympics got underway this morning with Shetland playing its part in the very first opening act of the global event.
The aptly named Belle Spence was joined by 40 others on the UK’s northernmost beach at Skaw, on Unst, to ring in the Games.
After being interviewed on Chris Evans’ Breakfast Show on BBC Radio 2 at 8.12am, Belle and her entourage joined others across the country who rang their bells as hard as they could for three minutes.
The All the Bells project was dreamed up by Turner Prize winning artist and musician Martin Creed, with bells in more than 5,000 locations – church bells, school bells, town hall bells, bicycle bells, doorbells and Big ben – being rung all over Britain.
Belle’s bell was originally used to signal the start of a fish auction at the Baltasound herring station, a floating fish market on board the Norwegian vessel Lunde moored in the harbour in the 1900s.
The bell was loaned by the Unst Boat Haven for the event. Other bells at Skaw included the school bells from Westing school, which closed in the mid 1940s, Haroldswick school, which closed 15 years ago, and the still open Baltasound junior high school.
This is Belle’s second Olympic experience after being a torchbearer in June, for which she was chosen because of her efforts behind the fundraising event Relay for Life.
“It’s been amazing getting to take part in this. I’m really pleased to get to be both the UK’s most northerly torchbearer and the UK’s most northerly bell ringer,” she said.
Shetland Arts has worked with local sound artists to capture the unique soundscape of the 40 bells, including school bells, sleigh bells, crystal bells, and cow bells, ringing with the sound of the waves, wind and wildlife in the background.
And here is what it sounded like.
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