75 replies to this topic

[spindizzy]

I recently (a few weeks ago) watched "Tess of the D'Ubervilles" from A&E/BBC, and there were quite a few concertinas shown.....along a cameo appearance of a serpent!
Several of the characters (background musicians) played Anglos, but the hero played an English--I just KNEW he was a good guy! The dubbing was rather painful though. Not quite as bad as I've seen before, but close. Apparently the concertina is easier to appear to play than the violin is.

Yes, Gaelic Storm was in the Titanic.....I've never seen that movie, but I have been to see the band a few times. Oh my gosh--the musical equivalent of caffeine, let me tell you.

Probably the Mellstock Band with Dave Townsend plating English concertina.
(they certainly have a serpent :-)

Chris
BBC Link

[LangoLee]

I was watching Douglas Sirk's technicolor melodrama All That Heaven Allows (1955) the other night, and in the brief party scene in the woodland retreat, while Rock Hudson sings at the piano, a woman accompanies on some sort of anglo concertina. Needless to say, it's an accordion on the actual soundtrack, and totally out of sync with the bellows movement, but then, artifice is Sirk's M.O. (check out the final scene in which a reindeer nudges the giant purple-lit glass window).

Edited by LangoLee, 16 November 2008 - 01:41 PM.

[LDT]

Its not actually a film but I think I remember (memory is a bit hazy) spotting one in the BBC's latest adaptation of Lark Rise to Candleford....it was something squeezable anyway.

[Leo]

Its not actually a film but I think I remember (memory is a bit hazy) spotting one in the BBC's latest adaptation of Lark Rise to Candleford....it was something squeezable anyway.

Hi LDT

Could that have been the melodion mentioned in episode 2 and 3 here: http://en.wikipedia.....ord_(TV_series

By the way, does anybody like Snoopy
It's the Pied Piper, Charlie Brown
http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi2024735001/

Based on the legend of the Pied Piper, it stars Snoopy as the title character, who tries to rid the Peanuts' gang's hometown of mice by playing his concertina, in return for a year's supply of dog food.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytf4YtJrqFY&fmt=18
Thanks
Leo

Edited by Leo, 22 October 2011 - 08:39 PM.

[Ptarmigan]

Your starter for 10. Leningrad Cowboys Go America. http://en.wikipedia....boys_Go_America

Sunny Jim plays an Aeola at 9.06 in this clip from The Vital Spark:

http://www.youtube.c...feature=related

The theme tune was, of course, also played on a Concertina.

Cheers
Dick

[LDT]

http://uk.youtube.co...h?v=qNEraxj559Y
everybody wants to be a cat...what plays concertina

and little mermaid
http://uk.youtube.co...h?v=yKLo8AXPFAU

peter pan
http://uk.youtube.co...h?v=-3s0xx_RP84

Edited by LDT, 30 November 2008 - 01:45 PM.

[Jewish Leprechaun]

I don't think these were mentioned
-Five Weeks in a Balloon= The concertina pops up now and then, great song to play concertina with
-Journey to the Center of the Earth= A guy carries around a concertina through most of the movie, that is until a magnetic field rips it out of his hands
-20,000 Leagues Under the Sea= Kirk Douglas is accompanied by a concertina while he sings Whale of a Tale (I would love to find some sheet music for this song)

[Leo]

I don't think these were mentioned
-Five Weeks in a Balloon= The concertina pops up now and then, great song to play concertina with
-Journey to the Center of the Earth= A guy carries around a concertina through most of the movie, that is until a magnetic field rips it out of his hands
-20,000 Leagues Under the Sea= Kirk Douglas is accompanied by a concertina while he sings Whale of a Tale (I would love to find some sheet music for this song)

20,000 Leagues
The Mellomen played in a lot of Disney and Elvis Presley movies. I suspect that they really are playing in the scene with Kirk Douglas faking the guitar, but I think it was done in the studio after filming. I can't tell for sure, but it might be an accordion.
http://www.youtube.c...T9NyWsFU&fmt=22
http://www.tcm.com/m...index/?cid=2108

Five Weeks in a Balloon
It looks like it was only used as a prop. I don't thing Fabian played an instrument. That is a nice tune. I wish I could find it. One place said the title song had it's origination as a Russian folk song. It was also written by Jodi Desmond, and sung by The Brothers Four.
39 and 50 seconds here: http://www.youtube.c...ChtvgWMk&fmt=22


Center of the Earth
Pat Boone carried it as a prop.

Thanks
Leo

Edited by Leo, 30 November 2008 - 11:54 PM.

[Jewish Leprechaun]

I tried figuring out Five Weeks in a Balloon and I think the beginning (what is first sung) is like this.

E A A E E A A E E F F G F E

Of course my ear for music isn't the best (an understatement). If you figure out the rest of it let me know what it is. I ended up making the next line up when I got frustrated and now I'm very mixed up on how the song really sounds even if I listen to it over and over again

-Lep

I don't think these were mentioned
-Five Weeks in a Balloon= The concertina pops up now and then, great song to play concertina with
-Journey to the Center of the Earth= A guy carries around a concertina through most of the movie, that is until a magnetic field rips it out of his hands
-20,000 Leagues Under the Sea= Kirk Douglas is accompanied by a concertina while he sings Whale of a Tale (I would love to find some sheet music for this song)

20,000 Leagues
The Mellomen played in a lot of Disney and Elvis Presley movies. I suspect that they really are playing in the scene with Kirk Douglas faking the guitar, but I think it was done in the studio after filming. I can't tell for sure, but it might be an accordion.
http://www.youtube.c...T9NyWsFU&fmt=22
http://www.tcm.com/m...index/?cid=2108

Five Weeks in a Balloon
It looks like it was only used as a prop. I don't thing Fabian played an instrument. That is a nice tune. I wish I could find it. One place said the title song had it's origination as a Russian folk song. It was also written by Jodi Desmond, and sung by The Brothers Four.
39 and 50 seconds here: http://www.youtube.c...ChtvgWMk&fmt=22


Center of the Earth
Pat Boone carried it as a prop.

Thanks
Leo

[Fiddlehead Fern]

Watching A Christmas Carol the other night (the version with George C. Scott as Scrooge) I noticed again that there is a concertina (anglo) in the beginning, playing along with a group of children singing the Sussex Carol (On Christmas night all Christians sing/to hear the news the angels bring......).
I love that movie, I always feel like crying at the beginning, for entirely selfish reasons: I was born in the wrong century. Well, it could have been the right century, but I was born at the wrong end of it. *sigh* I guess I'm glad that I live in a world with indoor plumbing, computers and cell phones, but still........

[Fiddlehead Fern]

Oh dear. I found another movie with a concertina the other day: High Society from 1956 with Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly and Frank Sinatra. There's one scene with Bing Crosby "playing" an anglo concertina on board a sailboat. The whole movie was rather...interesting....but that scene was a little more painful than some others. The whole time one is left to wonder "How in the world is he playing a melody without moving his fingers at all and pumping the bellows with no discernible co-ordination with the music? Wait, that doesn't even sound like a concertina.....that sounds like an accordion....!"

At least it had been invented by that time. In Pirates of the Caribbean there's a few times they show a concertina....hmm, while one is never entirely sure what time period they're supposed to be I think I can safely say they are before the 1850s. They took a lot of liberties though, this not by far the least. Then again, I've probably just shown myself to be a fussy history geek who spends too much time watching movies!

[asdormire]

At least it had been invented by that time. In Pirates of the Caribbean there's a few times they show a concertina....hmm, while one is never entirely sure what time period they're supposed to be I think I can safely say they are before the 1850s. They took a lot of liberties though, this not by far the least. Then again, I've probably just shown myself to be a fussy history geek who spends too much time watching movies!

Know what you mean, but you will learn to deal. I hate watching something supposedly set in the middle ages or earlier and seeing the wrong breed of sheep for the area or a squash--an american fruit-- sitting out in the open. Those types of errors drive me crazy. Then I remember it is just Hollywood (or the equivalent working towards the same lowest common denominator that the are from themselves and let it go. And remember, Pirates is just a fantasy, not even trying for historical accuracy.

Alan

[Fiddlehead Fern]

At least it had been invented by that time. In Pirates of the Caribbean there's a few times they show a concertina....hmm, while one is never entirely sure what time period they're supposed to be I think I can safely say they are before the 1850s. They took a lot of liberties though, this not by far the least. Then again, I've probably just shown myself to be a fussy history geek who spends too much time watching movies!

Know what you mean, but you will learn to deal. I hate watching something supposedly set in the middle ages or earlier and seeing the wrong breed of sheep for the area or a squash--an american fruit-- sitting out in the open. Those types of errors drive me crazy. Then I remember it is just Hollywood (or the equivalent working towards the same lowest common denominator that the are from themselves and let it go. And remember, Pirates is just a fantasy, not even trying for historical accuracy.

Alan

I know, and believe it or not I can enjoy movies even though my first instinct is to watch them through a microscope. I can even usually restrain myself from picking too much unless my friends particularly ask about a part they weren't sure about.....ah well.
I'm not sure I could tell the breeds of sheep from one area and time period to the other though, that's impressive. I'll have to work harder in the future!

[Hereward]

I know, and believe it or not I can enjoy movies even though my first instinct is to watch them through a microscope. I can even usually restrain myself from picking too much unless my friends particularly ask about a part they weren't sure about.....ah well.
I'm not sure I could tell the breeds of sheep from one area and time period to the other though, that's impressive. I'll have to work harder in the future!

My wife and I went to a play about a viking raid on Whitby at the weekend. The writer was a British journalist but the actor was an American. I was horrifed to hear them speak about using pepper on their fish, fighting with crossbows and sending sealed letters. The worst mistake was when the hero went into an inn and men were smoking pipes. Surely any schoolboy knows how stupid that all is I thought. Then I remembered it was 2009 and not the 1970s when I went to school.

Ian

[Leo]

Aw c'mon guys. Klaatu and his robot Gort landed in Washington DC in 1951 and forced the UN on us or the robot would destroy us. They came back in 2008 and land in New York to see how the plan was going. Watch the documentaries. The next thing you'll say is that Monty Python and the Holy Grails isn't a great English history lesson, and that the Ark in Indiana Jones isn't really kept in a warehouse in Area 51. After Watching Braveheart I realized William Wallace was from Australia. I know for a fact that Howard Hughes invented the rocket pack. The movie The Rocketeer said so. I've learned a lot from movies. Don't destroy my faith in the Great Silver Screen. They should all be on the History Channel, but they're not.

Seriously, when I was young and started watching movies as a hobby, I used to laugh at the inaccuracies, until I began to overlook the liberties taken in the films and enjoyed them for the entertaining fiction they were meant to be.

Thanks
Leo

Edited by Leo, 20 January 2009 - 02:36 PM.

[Ptarmigan]

I have never played a Concertina in a Movie { YET! } but I did play a Fiddle

Sorry for butting in!

Cheers
Dick

[spindizzy]

I have never played a Concertina in a Movie { YET! } but I did play a Fiddle

Sorry for butting in!

Cheers
Dick

The Beeb is showing this next week
"27 Jan 2009, 23:55 on BBC One (except Northern Ireland, Wales)"

ps Lovely playing, Dick

Edited by spindizzy, 23 January 2009 - 12:27 PM.

[Ptarmigan]

ps Lovely playing, Dick

Psssst, don't tell anyone, but I'm afraid that's not actually me, you hear playing.

I chose the tune, but they dubbed Paddy Glackin & co over the top of us!

I think we do look the part though!

Cheers
Dick