Tintinnabulation - a performance of music by Marcus Vergette (double bass) and Coach York (drums) using one of Vergette’s unique Time & Tide Bells.

Tintinnabulation refers to the ringing of bells, and is the title of Vergette’s album. According to BirdLife International nearly half of the world’s bird species are now in decline, with only six per cent having increasing populations. Tintinnabulation is a composition structured on the idea of a world with birds, and a world without birds. The composition utilises the interaction of bells and birdsong for its harmonic and melodic content. It also includes piano and double bass.

At the centre of this performance is Vergette’s Time and Tidebell: a handmade instrument which creates sound with the rising sea levels. One of the bells is ringing at any given time of day as the tide wraps around our coast, retreats and returns again. There are eight bells currently scattered across the UK’s coasts, each existing as a democratic artwork owned by the local community. Sounds from this bell are interspersed with instrumental improvisation, including Vergette on double bass. 

6-7pm 

£10

Watch short film about Marcus Vergette.

This event coordinates with Talk and Poetry Reading with John Clarke at 4pm the same day: £5. 

*Special offer of £12 for both events. Please choose this price for one of the events and we will process your free ticket for the other.

Tintinnabulation trailer

Marcus Vergette is an interdisciplinary artist working as a sculptor, musician and bell-maker who is producing critically acclaimed work across the UK and Europe. He has exhibited in the Venice Guggenheim, Tate Modern, and made public sculpture in Hungary, Armenia, Czech Republic, U.S.A., and the U.K. He makes site-specific installations that engage with each community, using bells as a catalyst for other creative activity. Over the last twelve years Vergette has been creating a constellation of site-specific bell installations in coastal locations around the UK, designed to toll on the high tide - the Tide and Time Project – to alert local communities to rising sea levels. He lives and works in Devon where he and his wife have been farming and practising nature conservation and ecological land management for over thirty years.

Coach York has worked extensively in all jazz idioms, from free improvisational duos with Lol Coxhill or Lou Gare to the tightly-arranged compositions of Mike Westbrook's 25 piece Uncommon Orchestra. He works regularly in many small ensembles and accompanied many touring soloists including Slim Gaillard, Soweto Kinch, Peter King, Jean Toussaint, and appeared on stage with various members of the Bristol trip-hop band Portishead.

Recent performances have included the EFG London Jazz Festival, International Guitar Festival, Cheltenham Jazz Festival and two sold-out nights at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club. Coach has taken part in many recordings with line-ups as diverse as Mike and Kate Westbrook, the Craig Milverton trio, a duet of house music with west country saxophone colossus Charlie Hearnshaw, soundtracks for BBC Natural History programmes, and a solo project for David Jay from the gothic rock band Bauhaus.