By Peter Kelley
For Northwest Asian Weekly
Gabriel Manalac at work in a tiny room at the top of Denny Hall. He plays the carillon three mornings a week for about 10 minutes. The sheet music shows that he's playing the Beatles' Yesterday, which Robin McCabe, his instructor and the School of Music's former director, also played on the UW's carillon when she was an undergraduate. (Photo by Mary Levin/University Week)
Resonant, bell-like tones from Denny Hall sound the Westminster Chimes and mark the hours each day. But — have you heard? — three mornings a week, those magnificent chimes play music, too.
It’s the sound of the carillon, a beloved campus feature dating back nearly a century, in one form or another. The chimes each hour are preprogrammed, but if you hear other tunes emanating from Denny — perhaps as you pass on a foggy morning with coffee in hand — that’s the work of Gabriel Manalac, a graduate student in music who was born in the Philippines.
Manalac mounts the stairs to Denny’s fourth floor to a small room — “It’s pretty much a cement block of a room with a keyboard in it,” he said — just after 8 a.m. every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. He plays on the carillon for about 10 minutes, playing it slowly so the echoing notes don’t compete with each other as they drift through the air.
It’s one of the coolest part-time jobs on campus.
Photo by Mary Levin/University Week
“I love it because being a pianist and practicing all the time, the carillon is a pleasant change of pace,” Manalac said. “My teacher jokes with me, saying, ‘Playing the carillon, you’ll have the biggest audience of your career.’”
That teacher is Robin McCabe, professor and former director of the School of Music, who hired Manalac for the job — and held the same position once herself.
“As an undergraduate music major, I was thrilled to have the job,” McCabe said. “It’s a singular position, if you will, and an opportunity to have a bit of fun. I keep a lookout for someone with the right character comportments — who’s outgoing, does not feel daunted, and has an intuition to know that some pieces would not sound good.”
Manalac fills the bill nicely. “We’ve been lucky, this is his second year,” McCabe said. “He’s one of those personalities that thrive in that situation. He’s creative, with wit and imagination.”
Still, he’s something of a secret up there in Denny, playing away like a capeless Phantom of the Opera. “I don’t talk about it that much,” he said. “Not a lot of my friends know I play it — probably because they are not awake that early.”
And that funny line about him playing to the biggest audience is based on the truth, McCabe said. “It was the largest captive audience I’ve ever had in my life,” she said with a chuckle. “Even at Carnegie Hall, people could get up and walk out!”
But an unexpected challenge awaits any carillon player that Beethoven himself might have appreciated. The keyboard room is so isolated, it’s impossible to actually hear the notes as they boom across campus. “I honestly don’t know how it sounds outside,” Manalac confessed. He tends to ask others whether the songs he plays are recognizable, and adjust his playing as needed. And as with most anything, there is a small downside. The loud carillon generates a few complaints every year from campus neighbors who find the chimes distracting. For that reason, its playing is limited to the short time between classes on those three days, and certain special occasions.
Manalac exits Denny Hall, where he makes bell-like carillon music three mornings a week. (Photo by Mary Levin/University Week)
The carillon will celebrate a centennial soon. Gary Louie, the media maintenance technician for the School of Music and a longtime UW employee, is something of a local expert on the instrument. Louie noted (and proved with old news clips) that the first carillon was in a refurbished water tower on 17th Avenue Northeast, near the observatory. It was a real carillon — an array of huge bells donated by then-Seattle Times publisher Col. Alden Blethen.
That carillon was destroyed by a fire and was replaced by an electronic version in 1949. When it started wearing out, it, too, was updated in 1994 with one that plays digital “samples” of real carillon bells, broadcasted by speakers.
And so finally comes the question, what songs work best for the carillon, that huge instrument whose player can’t really hear what they’re playing?
“I like to try and mix it up,” Manalac said, adding that the music can’t be too complex. He said he tends to prefer “stately hymns that are rhythmically stable.” He added, “The way it is, you play a note, and it really rings out across campus.”
He said “Amazing Grace” sounds good on the carillon, as does “America the Beautiful.” He also likes certain show tunes such as Gershwin’s haunting “Summertime” or the lovely “When You Wish Upon a Star.” Manalac keeps a book of notes about which songs succeed and which do not.
One has to ask, though — is Manalac ever tempted to throw in a relatively recent pop song? The music graduate student replied, “Not to say anything bad about today’s tunes but a lot are — not as melodic in a way.” On the other hand, Cole Porter tunes tend to sound good on the carillon, he said.
McCabe said she had great fun when choosing what to play, and found that even a couple of Beatles tunes such as “Yesterday” were carillon-worthy. She said, as a big game drew near, she liked to play the opponents’ fight song, but as a slow, mournful dirge. Another time, she said, “I played the WSU fight song in E flat minor. It was the day before the game, and people were in hysterics over it.”
But she, too, said that the carillon must be played slowly, to allow the notes with room to drift. Clearly, part of the fun is trying things out. “Most succeed, but there are a lot of failures,” Manalac said good-naturedly.
So if you’re near Denny Hall one morning and hear a hymn or a Cole Porter tune drifting through the mist, you know you’re listening to a UW tradition. And Gabriel Manalac, the man behind the music this year enjoys making the campus carillon sing.
To a point, that is. He does tell this story, “I was asked to play for three whole hours for convocation, at the end of the year. I said yes without hesitation. But in those three hours, I felt I aged 20 years.” ♦
Editor’s note: This story first appeared in University Week, the faculty–staff online newspaper for the University of Washington. Peter Kelley is its assistant editor. The story and its photos have been reprinted here with permission.
Peter Kelly can be reached at kellep@u.washington.edu.