Playing in all keys

[fernando]

- In both sides of the [English] concertina, the notes G# and Eb are repeated in all the octaves. There are keys that it is clear which one of the two sides to play, but some keys it is not clear at all, any guideline in this regard?

It's generally more useful to consider the buttons next to G and D to be G# and D#, but consider those next to A and E to be Ab and Eb. Then in any standard key signature from 3 flats (Eb major and its associated modes) to 4 sharps (E major and its modes) the standard choice is obvious, since it will be a note within that key signature. (E.g., there is an Eb in the key of Bb, but there is no D# in that key.)

 

The scales in all of these keys/modes share a simple pattern in which the scale alternates ends of the instrument, while all the notes on one end (every other note of the scale) alternate sides of the center line, forming a "walking" pattern "up" (or "down") the end.

 

In keys which have more flats than 3 or more sharps than 4 this pattern breaks down, but consistent (though different) patterns can also be found for these keys. In these keys at least one note needs to be "replaced" by its enharmonic (same pitch, but different name) equivalent, which will be on the opposite end of the instrument from that required by simple alternation. When this happens, it should also be reasonable to replace any of the duplicated notes with its enharmonic equivalent, if that results in a more comfortable fingering sequence. (It's a good idea, though, to keep any such changes consistent through all octaves.)

 

But then you should experiment with the different combinations to find a sequence for each scale that is comfortable for you.

 

As an example, the C# major scale is C#, D#, E#, F#, G#, A#, B#, and C# again. But E#, A# and B# don't exist in positions close to E, A and B; instead one needs to play F, Bb and C. Then the scale can be constructed as C#, D#, F, F#, G#, Bb, C, and C# again. But I like to use Eb instead of D#, so that the button sequence is C#, Eb, F, F#, G#, Bb, C, and C# again.

What does this gain me? A button sequence for the scale which has some nice internal repetition and symmetries. In playing an ascending octave scale, I first have two notes on one side of the instrument, then two on the other, and then that 4-button pattern repeats exactly, but "higher" on the keyboard. Describing it is clumsy, but in playing it, it's easy to feel the symmetries.

 

I wish you happy experimenting.

 

Jim wonderful! that's it! this is the kind of stories I was expecting to hear when I started this topic! I'm against the eternal debate English against Anglo... we can learn from each other! I'm learning a lot from the Anglo players here in Ireland.

 

I will have to try to understand what you wrote in there, I did not get everything, but I will eventually.

 

I play mostly by hear, and I use a lot the symmetries. The english concertina is the concertina of the "triangles". At the beginning I only played these triangles, but as you well say, there are keys that these triangles are broken. But I'm sure this is like another language to learn, this can be learnt. But these fingerings are more unique, they don't repeat as much as the triangles fingering.

 

I see here that anglo players, they are used to alternate buttons with the same note that are in both sides of their concertinas, and they do that playing within the same tune. Well, I think that when the symmetry of the triangles is broken in our concertina, we can do the same.

 

What kind of music you play Jim? maybe We can agree to play one common tune and we can start talking about the fingering we do. That would be great, if you like the idea of course.

 

Thanks a lot for the technical advise Jim!

Edited October 22, 2010 by fernando

[JimLucas]

What kind of music you play Jim? maybe We can agree to play one common tune and we can start talking about the fingering we do. That would be great, if you like the idea of course.

I like the idea. But I won't have time to consider doing anything about it for at least a week or maybe even a month. I've already postponed a trip twice because of interruptions by other issues more urgent.

 

But that's not meant to discourage you. Instead, feel free to remind me about once a week using PM or email via concertina.net. Eventually, I'll get to it.

 

In fact, if you want to choose a tune now, then I could think about it in free moments, such as when I'm on the train.

[fernando]

What kind of music you play Jim? maybe We can agree to play one common tune and we can start talking about the fingering we do. That would be great, if you like the idea of course.

I like the idea. But I won't have time to consider doing anything about it for at least a week or maybe even a month. I've already postponed a trip twice because of interruptions by other issues more urgent.

 

But that's not meant to discourage you. Instead, feel free to remind me about once a week using PM or email via concertina.net. Eventually, I'll get to it.

 

In fact, if you want to choose a tune now, then I could think about it in free moments, such as when I'm on the train.

 

That's good Jim! ok, I don't know if you like English music, but I saw this guy in youtube playing this beautiful tune:

 

 

I like it very much. I don't play any chord at the moment. I think it is in C Major. In my concertina of 48 buttons I can play it in three octaves, this means that for the fingering you can get all the small triangles in all positions for both hands.

 

I've been changing the key as well, and I found one with a very interesting fingering. If I'm right about the C Major, this key is B Major.

 

If you don't feel like playing this I can tell you more tunes Jim, from traditional music of other countries if you prefer that.

Edited October 24, 2010 by fernando

[JimLucas]

...if you want to choose a tune now, then I could think about it in free moments, such as when I'm on the train.

That's good Jim! ok, I don't know if you like English music, but I saw this guy in youtube playing this beautiful tune:

 

Nice tune. I'll try to learn it.

[fernando]

...if you want to choose a tune now, then I could think about it in free moments, such as when I'm on the train.

That's good Jim! ok, I don't know if you like English music, but I saw this guy in youtube playing this beautiful tune:

 

Nice tune. I'll try to learn it.

 

Good stuff! there is no rush for this Jim, whenever you get some of the tune, even if it's only part of it, we can start commenting on the fingering. At the moment I haven't put chords, and not too much ornamentation, only the usual cuts I do when I play.

 

It's a nice tune, isn't it? this guy says it is a hornpipe, but I think this has a 6/8 time signature.

 

I tell you how I hold the concertina: I put it on my left leg, the whole thing resting on my leg, close to the knee. I'm going with the bellows in and out trying to do the same thing as the Anglo players. I have one lever for the air release, but I never use it when I play. I never use the pinkies, only three fingers from each hand.

 

Enjoy your playing!

[Tootler]

Interesting thread and for me, timely.

 

I have just joined a wind band, so am playing my anglo along with flutes, clarinets, saxes, brass. It is interesting. Most of the stuff at the moment is in C, so no real problems.

 

One piece, Colonel Bogey has a fair smattering of accidentals which makes things a little interesting and one piece is in Bb which is definitely interesting. I am playing off a flute part which is mostly in the 2nd & 3rd octave, so I have to play it an octave lower than it is written so definitely interesting. It certainly makes you find your way round the keyboard.

 

I am essentially a melody player, so I am not too worried about chords and the harmonies are taken care of by the parts anyway, so playing chords is not really essential.

 

The actual sound of the concertina blends well with the other instruments in the band and doesn't sound out of place. The conductor's comment was that it had a similar quality to an oboe.

[Anglo-Irishman]

The actual sound of the concertina blends well with the other instruments in the band and doesn't sound out of place. The conductor's comment was that it had a similar quality to an oboe.

 

Tootler,

My concertina ensemble playing is rather different - in a folk group. We have a double bass and a fiddle as well as my Anglo, and we do Carolan pieces in Baroque style. After all, Turlough O'carolan was an older contemporary of J.S. Bach! We use fiddle and Anglo as 1st and 2nd violin, with the double bass bowed and a wire-strung guitar chording along. Sometimes I'm the "1st violin", sometimes I play chords between the fiddle and the bass. We like it. The blend is very good. And contrary to some opinions, you can play a nice legato on an Anglo.

 

I normally play my metal-ended Stagi Anglo hybrid, but when I got my Crane duet, which is a vintage, wooden-ended Lachenal, I took it along to a practice evening and tried the Carolan pieces on it. The unanimous verdict was that I should stick to my "old one" - the cheap, much maligned hybrid - because it blended better!

 

Anyone had similar experiences? Is a hybrid actually better for some purposes than a traditionally-reeded concertina?

 

Cheers,

John

[Tootler]

 

Tootler,

My concertina ensemble playing is rather different - in a folk group. We have a double bass and a fiddle as well as my Anglo, and we do Carolan pieces in Baroque style. After all, Turlough O'carolan was an older contemporary of J.S. Bach! We use fiddle and Anglo as 1st and 2nd violin, with the double bass bowed and a wire-strung guitar chording along. Sometimes I'm the "1st violin", sometimes I play chords between the fiddle and the bass. We like it. The blend is very good. And contrary to some opinions, you can play a nice legato on an Anglo.

 

I normally play my metal-ended Stagi Anglo hybrid, but when I got my Crane duet, which is a vintage, wooden-ended Lachenal, I took it along to a practice evening and tried the Carolan pieces on it. The unanimous verdict was that I should stick to my "old one" - the cheap, much maligned hybrid - because it blended better!

 

Anyone had similar experiences? Is a hybrid actually better for some purposes than a traditionally-reeded concertina?

 

Cheers,

John

 

My concertina is a hybrid - A Morse Ceili. Whether it blends better than a traditionally reeded concertina I can't say, but it does seem to work.

 

I also play in a folk band but I play flute/recorder and harmonica in that. After "rediscovering" the harmonica recently, I had rather neglected my concertina so joining the wind band was a way of playing it in an ensemble as I find that playing in an ensemble helps you to develop in ways that you can't by just playing at home.

 

Geoff

[Cornerstone]

A few days ago a friend suggested we play some pieces he plays in a West Gallery band. Three and four flats..........interesting.

 

John,

I take it West Gallery music is church music - hymns and such?

 

Hymn books are a good illustration of why so many different keys are used. The purpose is to get the range (lowest to highest note) of the tune within the collective singable range of a congregation of mixed sex. That is, to ensure that the sopranos can still reach the bottom note, while the basses can reach the top note. This overlap between the high and low voices is, I believe, referred to as the "common octave" (and, as I recall hearing in a radio programme, varies from country to country). This "window of singability" is rather small, and different tunes have different top and bottom notes in terms of doh, re,mi ... , so the key has to be adjusted fairly exactly to fit in the common octave, and a semitone can make the difference between 2 sharps (D) and 3 flats (Eb).

 

An individual singer, of course, has a greater range than a mixed congregation. So art songs intended for solo singers don't have to be in the common octave. But there is still a multiplicity of keys. The reason here is to get the range of the tune into the middle of the singer's voice range, and to make sure that extreme high or low notes are still singable. For this reason, art-song scores are available in (usually) 3 editions: for high voices (tenor/soprano), middle voices (baritone/alto) and low voices (bass) - with the same songs transposed to different keys.

 

Instruments generally have a greater range than even trained singers, but here, too, the choice of key for a particular piece may be important. Concertinas tend to get squeaky in the upper reaches, so if most of the tune is up there, it will sound better if transposed to a lower key. Each instrument sounds best when the bulk of the notes in a piece are in the middle range, with the proviso that the top and bottom notes must not "run off the end" of the instrument.

 

Apart from range, there's difficulty. This is not an issue for singers - they can sing in any key the composer or accompanist likes, as long as the top and bottom notes are reachable. But on many instruments, there are "easier" and "more difficult" keys.

Guitarists and fiddlers find C major and the "sharp" keys (G, D, A, E ...) easier than the "flat" keys. WInd players prefer "flat" keys. This is a result of how the notes are formed on the respective instruments.

On keyboards and chromatic free reeds, the beginner perceives a slight increase in difficulty, the more sharps or flats there are in the key signature, but nothing that practice will not remedy. In the case of the 20-button Anglo, on the other hand, two keys are simple, and the rest are simply impossible. On the 30-b Anglo (assuming you want harmonies), two keys are simple, two keys are manageable, and the rest are very difficult to impossible.

 

So why practise one tune in several keys on your concertina?

One reason would be that you have to accompany different singers. What will work for a high girl's voice will not work for a deep man's voice. In the folk-song repertoire, it's often enough to have 2 keys available - like the C and G of the two rows of the Anglo. A reasonably practised singer will be able to sing almost any song in one or other of those keys. (My mother, a soprano, sang most songs in G to a single-key autoharp in G, and as a baritone, I sing most songs in C, and the few that I can't manage in C, I can sing in G, so the Anglo suits me well as an accompaniment).

 

If your different singers are also accompanied by guitarists, you can forget the "flat" keys. C and G are fine with them, and if they want to play in D or A, you can find the chords quite easily on a 30-b Anglo.

 

If, however, your friends are wind players, and you want to stay with the Anglo, you'd better get an ex-Salvation Army Ab/Eb instrument, which was specifically for playing with brass bands.

 

In the case of an English or Duet, you can practice playing lots of sharp keys or lots of flat keys, depending on what instruments you usually mesh with.

 

In short, the only reasons for playing in all keys are a) to accommodate mixed-voice unison singing, as in church; b ) to play with classical players, who may be using a score with an extreme key signature, e.g. a hymn book.

 

Cheers,

John

[spindizzy]

The presbyterian hornpipe (a 3/2 tune) is a tune that I've been learning to "stretch" myself.

Danny Chapman has enjoyable version

and there's a version, more like the one I play ie I think it's in the same key (Gminor) from what I can see of the fingering.

here - starting at ~2:15 (link corrected)

That version stays down right at the bottom of the EC range at the end, Danny lifts that part an by an octave so I suspect is playing it in another key (G seems common).

 

Another really fun tune nominally in Gminor is Joe Scurfield's Favourite - which was written (by Joe) and uses every tone of the 12 twelve!

 

Chris

Edited November 10, 2010 by spindizzy

[fernando]

The presbyterian hornpipe (a 3/2 tune) is a tune that I've been learning to "stretch" myself.

Danny Chapman has enjoyable version

and there's a version, more like the one I play ie I think it's in the same key (Gminor) from what I can see of the fingering.

That version stays down right at the bottom of the EC range at the end, Danny lifts that part an by an octave so I suspect is playing it in another key (G seems common).

 

Another really fun tune nominally in Gminor is Joe Scurfield's Favourite - which was written (by Joe) and uses every tone of the 12 twelve!

 

Chris

 

Hi Chris! I love the Presbyterian Hornpipe! the version I play is the second one you say, I think the link you posted is again the Danny Chapman video. The link for the tune is this:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQw07poGrLU

 

And you are right, this version goes lower. Still playing the same notes I think, but changing the octave at one point and going lower. I didn't know this was Gm, thanks for that.

Did you try to change the key of the tune? if you try to play it in another key give me a shout. This is a good one to experiment because it has a wide range of notes.

 

I'm trying to look for the second tune you say in youtube, but I cannot find it, do you know where I can find a recording of it?

 

Fernando

Edited November 10, 2010 by fernando

[Larry Stout]

Presbyterian hornpipe is a great tune. I play it in Gm, too.

[spindizzy]

The presbyterian hornpipe (a 3/2 tune) is a tune that I've been learning to "stretch" myself.

Danny Chapman has enjoyable version

and there's a version, more like the one I play ie I think it's in the same key (Gminor) from what I can see of the fingering.

That version stays down right at the bottom of the EC range at the end, Danny lifts that part an by an octave so I suspect is playing it in another key (G seems common).

 

Another really fun tune nominally in Gminor is Joe Scurfield's Favourite - which was written (by Joe) and uses every tone of the 12 twelve!

 

Chris

 

Hi Chris! I love the Presbyterian Hornpipe! the version I play is the second one you say, I think the link you posted is again the Danny Chapman video. The link for the tune is this:

 

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=LQw07poGrLU

 

And you are right, this version goes lower. Still playing the same notes I think, but changing the octave at one point and going lower. I didn't know this was Gm, thanks for that.

Did you try to change the key of the tune? if you try to play it in another key give me a shout. This is a good one to experiment because it has a wide range of notes.

 

I'm trying to look for the second tune you say in youtube, but I cannot find it, do you where I can find a recording of it?

 

Fernando

 

 

This should be the second version Laura Mackenzie and the Lads

(I've edited my post)

[fernando]

The presbyterian hornpipe (a 3/2 tune) is a tune that I've been learning to "stretch" myself.

Danny Chapman has enjoyable version

and there's a version, more like the one I play ie I think it's in the same key (Gminor) from what I can see of the fingering.

That version stays down right at the bottom of the EC range at the end, Danny lifts that part an by an octave so I suspect is playing it in another key (G seems common).

 

Another really fun tune nominally in Gminor is Joe Scurfield's Favourite - which was written (by Joe) and uses every tone of the 12 twelve!

 

Chris

 

Hi Chris! I love the Presbyterian Hornpipe! the version I play is the second one you say, I think the link you posted is again the Danny Chapman video. The link for the tune is this:

 

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=LQw07poGrLU

 

And you are right, this version goes lower. Still playing the same notes I think, but changing the octave at one point and going lower. I didn't know this was Gm, thanks for that.

Did you try to change the key of the tune? if you try to play it in another key give me a shout. This is a good one to experiment because it has a wide range of notes.

 

I'm trying to look for the second tune you say in youtube, but I cannot find it, do you where I can find a recording of it?

 

Fernando

 

 

This should be the second version Laura Mackenzie and the Lads

(I've edited my post)

 

I discovered yesterday that The Presbyterian Hornpipe in Gm played in the high octave is very nice playing in the English Concertina. The highest notes are played, but the fingering is very interesting.

 

Fernando

[Marien]

It is true an anglo can play all notes, but you will have to change direction a lot when you want to play a sequence like C, C#, D, D#, E etcetera.

 

On a 30 button anglo it is impossible to play full chords in every scale.

 

Early classical music (before 1800) and contra danses often don´t use much different scales, and much of it can be played on a 30 button anglo, but on a C/G anglo I wouldn´t try to play tunes in G# or F#. Or if you want to try jazzy improvisations, better take an english or a Duet, although it sometimes makes fun to try and get strange noise out of an anglo - using its limitations and the specific features of the possible combinations over three rows.

 

Still there is a lot of the less complicated work of Bach and Schumann that can be played on an anglo.

 

Marien