So… a month or so after I completed the walk, John Ward and I showed up with all his gear in the tiny but intensely evocative early 11th century pre-conquest Saxon church at Newton, just outside Castle Acre. This was on a cold, windy, rainy day in November as the sun was going down. The place feels ancient, with its small barrel-ceiling nave, Saxon stonework, a wonky central tower with dead-end stairwells that ascend to a long-lost gallery above the departed rood screen, and an even smaller chancel and modest altar, which you can just about touch both walls of. The floor and skirting are dripping with moss and damp, and nowhere does the building contain a right angle. You can see the moss in between the bricks in the photo; no kidding.

This is one of the few churches actually on the Peddars Way; however, the village must have shrunk considerably some time ago, now merely being accompanied by a large farm, a roadside pub, and a few houses; and now cut off from even most of them by the busy main coast road. Presumably the rest of the congregation had shifted allegiance to nearby Castle Acre when superseded by the Normans with the grander Church of St James, the Norman Motte and Bailey (there to show who was in charge), and the sprawling late 11th century Cluniac monastery about two miles up the road. Another statement of domination by a fresh wave of conquerors, leaving this small Saxon church & hamlet thoroughly cowed.

It was dark in the church; and difficult to get any usable photos with my vaguely crap aged tablet. While John set up his gear (a mike, a speaker and a laptop), I walked around the space, giving random claps, listening to the echoes and slapback. As the rain beat down, John gave several frequency sweeps in differing locations, the most interesting being under the central tower. The sweeps are kinda spooky, as you stand there listening for something to happen for the first 5-10 seconds before a low rumble appears, and then wonder what else is happening after it disappears, standing quietly until it quietly bleeps to inform you it’s finished. This, you realize, (of course) just brings home the amount of your very own hearing loss. There is stuff happening in the silent sections, but now it’s just music for dogs (here’s one of my particular faves:). So here’s the sweep result:

We got this profile from the center of the church; unlike most of the returns, which are on the haphazard side; usually containing what look like a number of harmonic spectra from several random bass notes; this is interesting as it shakes out to a slightly flat (10-12 cents) E G C; with an additional top octave C is sharp by about 20 cents; an inverted C major triad: a concord, of sorts.

Confession: I was disappointed; I have trouble with simple consonances with my composer hat on. This should not be the case.