Gordon Stearns Memorial Carillon

*Location:

   First Church of Christ, Congregational
   South Main Street, in town center
   West Hartford, Connecticut, USA
   LL: N 41.76105, W 72.74164

Site locator map

*Carillonist:

   Eve Schmitt

*Contact:

   First Church of Christ
   12 South Main Street
   West Hartford, CT  06107-2046
   T: 860-233-9605   F: 860-232-8183

*Schedule:

   Sundays throughout the year;
   summer series with guest recitalists.

*Remarks:

   Original two-octave practice keyboard
   no longer exists.  The enlargement of
   1985 was done by Tim Hurd and Olympic
   Engineering, assisted by Norman Bliss.
   Meeks, Watson & Co. later rehabilitated
   sealed bearings in transmission.

*Technical data:

   Traditional carillon of 50 bells
   Pitch of heaviest bell is A# in the middle octave
   Transposition is up one octave
   Keyboard range:     A#C   /    A#C 26
   There is one missing bass semitone
   There is no practice console
   The instrument was enlarged in 1985
     with bells made by Whitechapel  
   Prior history:
     In 1969, the instrument was begun with 24 bells
       by Whitechapel 
       Pitch of heaviest bell was C  in the treble octave
       Keyboard range was:     C C   /    C C   
   No auxiliary mechanisms known
   Tower details: 
     Height of console:                 17 meters above ground
     Height of lowest level of bells:   (unknown)
     Height of highest level of bells:  (unknown)
     Belfry openness:    %
   Year of latest technical information source is 2006

The church Website has an iconic tower sketch on the home page.  In the Music section there is a Carillon page, which includes photos of the tower and bells and gives the summer concert schedule. 

A Web page on Connecticut Carillons (archived in 2003) has brief descriptions of 10 of the 11 carillons in this state, with thumbnail photos linked to larger JPEG files.

Where the initial phase of this work lies in the sequence of output of the Whitechapel bellfoundry, in this region and in the world.
Where the final phase of this work lies in the sequence of output of the Whitechapel bellfoundry, in this region and in the world.

Ranking among all North American traditional carillons by weight.
Ranking among all North American traditional carillons by size (number of bells).
Ranking among all North American concert class carillons by year of completion.

Other concert carillons with similar keyboard ranges.

Index to all traditional carillons in CT.

Index to all tower bell instruments in CT.

   This page was built from the database on  4-Nov-23
   based on textual data last updated on 2023/06/22
   and on technical data last updated on 2006/04/07