We have practice tracks for most of our unaccompanied small-ensemble handbell scores (up to sixteen bells). For a small cost, you get a piano-plus-click-track audio version of the score. This provides a way for your group to hear what they’re playing with a guiding metronome.
For our “dual-range” eight-bell scores, there are separate practice tracks for the G5-based and F5-based scores in the package. We suggest purchasing the music first so you can decide which practice track you want to get, because making that purchase later will cost the same (and will take you hardly any time at all).
Each click track starts two bars before the first full bar of music (so, if there’s a pickup note, it’ll be in the second of those two bars). Further, the first beat of each bar is accented. This makes it easy (okay… easier!) for your ensemble to synchronize with the score.
Our practice tracks are recorded at full score tempo. We do understand that not everyone is instantly ready to play music at full speed for some number of rehearsals, though. We recommend getting an app such as Audipo or the Amazing Slow Downer handle this – just load the practice track into the app, and the app provides an interface through which you can adjust the tempo as you require.
Here’s how our practice tracks sound:
