Des Moines Register, IA
04-30-07
Carillon to peal as days of yore
Fundraiser for bells atop UNI campanile aimed at renovation
By DANNY VALENTINE
REGISTER CORRESPONDENT
Cedar Falls, Ia - The University of Northern Iowa's carillon, a musical instrument
at the top of the school's 101-foot campanile, once sent its music across the
Cedar Falls campus once a day.
Now the instrument's 47 bells are heard only on special occasions.
The UNI Foundation, citing the carillon's role as a campus landmark, wants to
remedy this problem and is already $25,000 into a $300,000 restoration project.
"There is incredible ambience walking across the campus, hearing the music
coming from the bells," said John Vallentine, director of the UNI School of Music.
"Those who experience it understand it."
Over the past 80 years, the bell tower has become a campus landmark, a place
to go in times of joy and sorrow, and has been endowed with numerous
traditions, such as kissing a sweetheart at midnight before homecoming.
"Then you were a real coed," recalled Robert Beach, a 1951 UNI graduate who
has lived in Cedar Falls since 1947. Beach said he hasn't missed a homecoming
in 60 years, and he said the instrument used to be played at every homecoming,
and then again after the football game - if the team won.
"It a historic carillon," he said. "I think it is important to have something like that."
When the bells stopped chiming on a regular basis in 2004 after Robert Byrnes,
UNI's 32-year carillonneur, died, people took notice - especially students.
"It was really student government that started the main push," Vallentine said.
"The students are behind this 110 percent, especially the older ones who heard
the instrument when they were freshmen and sophomores."
Karel Keldermans, a carillonneur with the Rees Memorial Carillon in Illinois, said
he has experienced a similar reaction to the instrument.
"At UNI, after I played, people came up to me and said it was good to have the
carillon played again," said Keldermans, who has played at numerous UNI
events as well as around the country. "It just becomes part of the musical and
cultural fabric of the university."
A carillonneur since age 13, Keldermans, 57, said the UNI instrument needs
major renovation to attract good musicians. The instrument's 47 bells weigh a
total of 12.5 tons, with the largest coming in at 5,000 pounds and measuring 5
feet in diameter.
Fixing the expensive instrument isn't cheap. The UNI carillon, installed in 1926,
was last upgraded in 1968.
Among the items needed are a new $80,000 D-sharp bell, a $50,000 practice
keyboard - no musician wants to practice in front of an entire school - a $60,000
replacement keyboard, and $23,000 in hardware to connect the keyboard to the
bells.
Iowa State University, which owns another of the three carillons in Iowa, raised
$350,000 in 1991 to restore its Stanton Memorial Carillon. After the fundraiser,
an anonymous donor gave a million dollars to ensure that the bells would keep
ringing.
There are about 45 carillons in the Midwest, 179 in North America and a tight-knit
worldwide population of about 600 carillonneurs, according to Keldermans and
ISU.