I figure we could allow bass bells to be below the opening as low bells are more powerful and their sound less directional. But a better solution, also available, is to move everything up a bit. And jiggle it around to best effect. Installing low bells would be disruptive, it would invite you to get everything else right at the same time. It would require a study into the load (and impact) capacity of the building, although it looks suitably immense to my unqualified eye.
I think all of that is best left to the future, when the instrument's social value has been proven and money a little easier to come by. For the moment, I'd be happy enough with a successful birth, and worry about child development later. Seventy five years labour is too long!
I can see there's not much enthusiasm for the MIDI augmented model! I can't see any technical reason why MIDI bell notes should be deficient in partials or decay time, but there could be many reasons why they might be. MIDI depends on making a good recording of a good original sound under good conditions - I can see lots of room for error there!
I suddenly thought of our domestic keyboard instrument and searched through its hundreds of voices and found "church bells" and "carillon". Both were totally laughable! So laughable I wonder if they are MIDI at all; perhaps they are synthesised. By comparison the pianos sound very plausible. Not only do they sound like pianos, as you move from piano to forte they change the partial balance like a piano does. That's the kind of thing a plausible MIDI carillon extension would need to do. I'd certainly want to hear one before I bought it!
Hmmm, I checked out the sample sounds available on Verdin's site:
http://www.verdin.com/carillons/digital-carillon-sounds.phpThey have several tunes, each divided into Traditional, w/Harp, and American. American has a totally different tonal structure to Traditional. Anyone know what that's all about?
Terry