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Concertinas And Sea Music


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How do you explain the apparent metal clip on the thumb strap ? (Both it, and the buttons, become visible if you lighten the image by 100%.)

If that bright spot is indeed on the thumb strap (something I'm not absolutely sure of), it isn't necessarily an "Edeophone clip". In this photo

4englishes.jpg

are two Æolas where the the thumbstrap doesn't fold over the edge, and the big flat head of the screw that holds it is in a similar position. Of course, you should know better than I whether such a feature might have been found on instruments in Shackleton's time.

 

As does a long, narrow metal name badge, like that of an Edeophone, rather than the more squat Wheatstone one ?

I think that's really too blurry to be sure of either its size and shape or its not being due to reflections and shadowing.

 

Meanwhile, the surface between the thumb and index fingers of the man's left hand appears flat, not angled, which rules out a 6-sided end, and I think the angles do, too.
Not if you make the image 100% brighter, when a facet appears next to the tip of his left thumb, suggesting the instrument is 12-sided !

Again, I don't think that's clear. Too much variation in illumination, not enough resolution. Can you be sure where the bellows folds begin? I can't.

 

We may have to order a copy of the print to resolve this one,...

I think that's a good idea in any case. But when I used the "Calculate Price" link, I couldn't see the result of the calculation. I ain't gonna buy it without knowing the price.

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How do you explain the apparent metal clip on the thumb strap ? (Both it, and the buttons, become visible if you lighten the image by 100%.) 

 

 

My Lachenal has a metal clip on the thumbstrap - confusingly engraved WHEATSTONE, but the picture seems to show a roundish blob, if anything.

 

Here's a piccy....

post-758-1105916173_thumb.jpg

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How do you explain the apparent metal clip on the thumb strap ?
My Lachenal has a metal clip on the thumbstrap - confusingly engraved WHEATSTONE, but the picture seems to show a roundish blob, if anything.

Here's a picture of the kind of clip Stephen means:

 

amboyna_edeo.jpg

The kind of "clip" on your instrument is a design that Wheatstone used in later years. If it says Wheatstone and your instrument is a Lachenal, then the thumb straps and mountings must have been replaced some time after the instrument was made.

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If that bright spot is indeed on the thumb strap (something I'm not absolutely sure of), it isn't necessarily an "Edeophone clip".  In this photo are two Æolas where the the thumbstrap doesn't fold over the edge, and the big flat head of the screw that holds it is in a similar position

That's a nice selection of concertinas Jim, though I'm not sure that the bass would have enough range for the Bach cello sonatas ? ;) I think the Casals recording is sublime :), by the way, though not at all "authentic". :rolleyes:

 

Of course, you should know better than I whether such a feature might have been found on instruments in Shackleton's time.

It was only used on tenor-trebles (like my "new" one) and larger models, but I don't recall seeing one that was made like that before 1914.

 

Meanwhile, the surface between the thumb and index fingers of the man's left hand appears flat, not angled, which rules out a 6-sided end, and I think the angles do, too.
Not if you make the image 100% brighter, when a facet appears next to the tip of his left thumb, suggesting the instrument is 12-sided !
Again, I don't think that's clear. Too much variation in illumination, not enough resolution. Can you be sure where the bellows folds begin? I can't.

The left hand of the player, Joe Irving, is hiding the bellows too much to make anything out there, but the facet I am referring to appears to be in the woodwork of the side, where a line extends from the tip of his thumb towards the right hand end of the concertina, it seems to be visible on the opposite side too.

 

We may have to order a copy of the print to resolve this one,...
I think that's a good idea in any case. But when I used the "Calculate Price" link, I couldn't see the result of the calculation. I ain't gonna buy it without knowing the price.

You need to register to get a price, which depends on the purpose you want to use it for, but they really cater for publishers and advertising agencies and don't have a category for the likes of you and I, or C.net., or our purposes. The lowest price I got quoted was £100 !

Edited by Stephen Chambers
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And whilst it is evidence for the use of concertinas by sailors, it is equally evidence that they also played fifes and cornopeans (the old English name for the cornet, another relatively new & fashionable instrument at the time).

That is the way it is starting to look - that sailors used all kinds of instruments including, in the later years, gramophones.

 

But, remembering that the concertina has always been a quite rare instrument on land, the number of references to tham aboard ship seems quite high.

 

In fact, to me, the connection between concertinas and sailors came from the fact that before I even thought of playing a concertina, the only two I had ever seen were played by sailors.

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That is the way it is starting to look - that sailors used all kinds of instruments including, in the later years, gramophones.

 

But, remembering that the concertina has always been a quite rare instrument on land, the number of references to tham aboard ship seems quite high.

Though maybe I should mention that the 1860's, the decade in question for the "Alabama" reference, was the time when the inexpensive German concertina was at the height of its popularity, before the melodeon came along in the 1870's.

 

(I bet that sailor was probably playing a Bb/F German concertina.)

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I have also read that Shackleton played the concertina (per The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music) , but have found no mention of it in any of my other readings

about him.

 

I also read somewhere (but I forget where) that Shackleton played the concertina. It was this that I was trying to verify when I found this book in the library. Could it be that Shackleton had a Wheatstone in addition to this (Edephone?).

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You posted while I was busy, in fact you could have spared me the time.

 

Yes - sorry about that. If I had been following the thread more closely, it could have saved a lot of speculation, but on the other hand, we would have missed the photo of Jim's beautiful array of instruments. (Likely to stir up another epidemic of COAD - Concertina Obsessive Aquisition Disorder)

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Could it be that Shackleton had a Wheatstone in addition to this (Edeophone?).

That is always a possibility, certainly Joe Irving (and presumably this Edeophone) did not reach the Antarctic, having been :

 

... discharged from the ship (with three others) in Argentina (for cause).

 

Of course another possibility is that the Wheatstone went with Ernest Shackleton on Scott's Discovery Expedition of 1901, or his own Nimrod Expedition of 1907-09, or even his final Quest Expedition of 1921 ?

 

I have sometimes wondered if there was any confusion with J. Howard Shackleton who arranged music for the concertina, published by Wheatstone's between 1906-25, or were they even related ?

 

Edited for typo.

Edited by Stephen Chambers
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In the picture I have, the instrument is definitely 12 sided - I am including a crop of it,...

Definitely an Edeophone. Excellent! I withdraw my previous arguments.

 

...I hope this doesn't violate copyright.

'Twould be an interesting question. The original image is well beyond copyright. Does copying something that's in the public domain onto a new medium allow the copier to copyright the copy? I guess that should be a separate Topic.

 

If that logic were applied to tunes and songs, then I would be violating copyright every time I played a 250-year old tune that I learned from somebody else's recorded performance of it, or a sea shanty from Stan Hugill's book. (His descendants could become rich by suing folks like us.)

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... discharged from the ship (with three others) in Argentina (for cause).
I have sometimes wondered if there was any confusion with J. Howard Shackleton who arranged music for the concertina, published by Wheatstone's between 1906-25, or were they even related ?

And for what "cause" were those sailors discharged? Maybe for appearing in a photo with an Edeophone, after J. Howard had helped his "cousin Ernie" negotiate a contract with Wheatstone that he would use his high-profile voyage to promote Wheatstones?

 

(See how rumors get started. :ph34r: ;) )

 

[Oops! This is post #2600 for me. I need to show more restraint.:)]

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That is the way it is starting to look - that sailors used all kinds of instruments including, in the later years, gramophones.

 

But, remembering that the concertina has always been a quite rare instrument on land, the number of references to tham aboard ship seems quite high.

I think maybe there is a distinction here between sailors and fishermen. Its obvious from Ireland that they were very closely connected to the fishing industry on the West Coast, and a Dutch friend remembers them being played by fishermen in her childhood, in the 1950s. I've recently come across a photo of a Maccann Duet which the caption attributes speculatively to use on a Cape Horner.Swansea Heritage

 

As to the concertina being rare on land, it really depends on what period and location you choose. Stephen has commented on the height of popularity of the German instrument in the 1860s, but then we also have the Concertina Bands of the turn of the 19th Century, the Salvation Army use, etc. Lachenal seems to have produced around 200,000 anglos roughly between 1860 and 1935, so they must have been fairly common, even if we only have few references to their use.

Edited by wes williams
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As to the concertina being rare on land, it really depends on what period and location you choose. ... Lachenal seems to have produced around 200,000 anglos roughly between 1860 and 1935, so they must have been fairly common, even if we only have few references to their use.

Rarity is also relative in other ways. Those 200,000 Lachenal anglos compare to how many babies born in England during those years? Or to how many violins, banjos, guitars, accordions, flutes, or even pianos produced during the same period?

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