The journal · the tune explained

The Westminster Quarters: the most-heard tune nobody can name

The Westminster Quarters are the four-note chime that marks the quarter-hour on clocks worldwide: G♯, F♯, E and B, played in five short changes, then the hour counted out. Written in 1793 for the clock at Great St Mary's in Cambridge, the tune answers to two names — the Cambridge Quarters and the Westminster Quarters — and it's the one Big Ben plays.

Four bells, five changes

The Westminster Quarters notes are four: at Big Ben they're tuned to G♯, F♯, E and a low B, all in E major. From those four pitches come exactly five short changes, five orders of the same notes, each three crotchets and a minim long. They're always played in the same sequence:

1. G♯, F♯, E, B
2. E, G♯, F♯, B
3. E, F♯, G♯, E
4. G♯, E, F♯, B
5. B, F♯, G♯, E

The first quarter plays change 1. The half hour plays 2 and 3. The third quarter plays 4, 5 and 1. On the hour, changes 2, 3, 4 and 5 sound in sequence — and then the Great Bell counts the hour out, one stroke for each, an octave below the E quarter bell. The number of changes matches the number of quarter-hours gone.

Hum it badly and you've got it. It was never meant to be listened to head-on; it was meant to be recognised from streets away, by people who owned no watch.

How to hear where you are in the hour

Here's the part worth knowing. The first and third quarters finish on that low B — the note that sounds unfinished, a sentence waiting for its verb. The half hour and the hour finish on E, the note the whole tune sits on, and it lands like a chair when you sit down. So with your back to the clock you can feel where the hour stands: an unsettled ending means it's still off; a settled one means it's here or just gone.

Who wrote it

The job was given to Joseph Jowett, Cambridge's Regius Professor of Civil Law — presumably for his learning rather than his counterpoint. He probably had help, from John Randall, the Professor of Music, or from Randall's undergraduate pupil William Crotch, who was still a teenager. The records never settled it, so the honest answer is "one of those three."

You'll also hear that the four notes come from Handel — the phrase in Messiah, "I know that my Redeemer liveth." It may even be true; the evidence never quite firms up. Pass it on as what it is: a good story with no receipt.

From Cambridge to everywhere

In 1851 the chime was chosen for the new clock at the Palace of Westminster — the clock that holds Big Ben — and fame followed the tower. Doorbells took the tune. Grandfather clocks kept it. Schools across Japan and East Asia play it to mark the end of class. If you haven't heard it today, you'll hear it tomorrow.

Questions people ask

Are the Westminster Quarters the same as Big Ben's chime? Big Ben is the Great Bell; the quarters are the tune the clock plays before the hour. The four smaller bells ring the changes, then the Great Bell counts the hour out. The tune and the count are two different jobs.

How many notes are in the Westminster Quarters? Four notes, five changes. The first quarter is four notes, the half hour is eight, the third quarter is twelve, and on the hour it's sixteen — then the hour counted out. The notes are G♯, F♯, E and B at Big Ben, all in E major.

Why does a quarter past sound unfinished? Because the first and third quarters end on B, the note that wants to resolve to E. The half hour and the hour finish on E, and the phrase lands. With your back to the clock, that's how you know where you are in the hour.

Our Westminster voice plays the same five changes — quarters on if you want them, off if you don't, and the hour counted either way. Two of our five bells play the quarters at all; the rest just count or toll. Where the tune went after Cambridge: Big Ben, and how to hear it from your desk, or why recordings of it always show their seam.

To keep the tune on your own desk, a Westminster chime for your Mac is the buyer's version, and the quarter-hour setting is about the fifteen-minute mark itself. If you're choosing between the five voices, the guide to the five starts with Grandfather and works up.