28-Key Lachenal - All Buttons On One End.

[chrism]

Dragging the thread back to the original topic ---

 

I've come accross a current one-handed player -- he only has one hand that works, and plays a concertina with that one hand (rather well) for Morris dancing. The instrument's basically the right hand end of a duet, lightly modified because his good hand is the left. The other end is simply blanked off with a strap to go round his thigh -- he's wheel-chair bound.

 

Chris

[nkgibbs]

The Sydney Echo quotation in this article about Martin William Henderson, found on an unlikely site whilst searching for something else, may be relevant ?

 

Best regards,

Neil

 

The Sydney Echo reported thus “…..he played a brief solo upon the piano, after which he gave a duet of exceeding beauty upon the piano and the concertina………he swept the keys of the former with his left hand and manipulated the concertina with his right………in response to augmented applause he illustrated medley methods in the use of the concertina, choosing ‘The Blue Bells of Scotland’ for his theme………his melodious rendering was so heartily appreciated that he was compelled to submit to an encore, for which he gave an imitation of a church organ, his illustration of the ringing of church bells was decidedly realistic and his imitation of a school bell was droll in the extreme. The audience could ‘Hear the Pipers Calling’ when he produced Scottish bagpipe music upon the concertina, for which he obtained another recall“.

Edited April 13, 2015 by nkgibbs

[David Aumann]

I'm bringing this out of mothballs one more time, because I put up a posting on the Australian group Concertina Convergence and it caused quite a bit of interest. Thinking along the lines of an instrument for an amputee (or vaudevillian, or other player who could only use one hand for whatever reason), I'm wondering if someone can put a reasonably accurate date on the instrument. Its serial number is 70510. I took a wild guess at circa 1890 as a date and, as Malcolm Clapp rightly said, this would be too early for a soldier returning from the Boer Wars. But the Brits were involved in may other skirmishes in the late 1800s, including the Burmese War, Zanzibar, Tibet, India, Sudan, Boxer Rebellion and maybe others. It's all a bit academic but it gives me something to think about! Thank you to all past responders who came up with some fabulous theories and snippets of information.