Following last years highly successful English Country Muisc Weekend held at High Bradfield,Sheffield,South Yorkshire another musical weekend will take place in August featuring some of the best English traditional singers and musicians(including many concertina players).The event will take place in a barn and marquee at my home and int pubs in the nearby villages of High & Low Bradfield & Dungworth(home of the "Royal Concertinas"sessions).There will be on site flushing toilets,a real ale bar and on site catering.The cost per person to include camping will be £10.Further details and an application form can be obntained from:-
Mark Davies
Edgemount Farm
Lumb Lane
High Bradfield
Sheffield S6 6LJ
Tel:0114 2851479
Mobile:07850475067
Email:edeophone@aol.com

I have had the pleasure of listening to a recording of the concertina playing and singing from the last weekend organised by Mark.
I would recommend the weekend,which I will attend on the Saturday and also the CD when it is released.Some memorable performances.
Hope to see some old friends and many new.
Al

When in August? I hope to be visiting my mother in Dore (very adjacent to Bradfield) in late August (23rd-29th ish).

I'm currently exiled to southern California, where there seems to be total absence of anything concertina-related.

--
Paul Hardy.

Shouldn't be so.
I believe Stephen Mills' map shows 6 players in the region... 2 anglo, 2 English, 1 duet, and 1 who plays all 3 types.

Where in southern California are you located?

Paul is himself the single red dot east of L.A.

Jim, when you gather at the SSI, raise a glass to the luck of being in the thick of so many fine players in so many styles. You lot in the NE U.S., also, next NESI. My colleague, Ruth, the fiddling Neurobiologist, who’s played at the amateur level with many noted international players and is in the thick of the Irish scene here, has heard only a rumor of another concertina player, besides me, in the Houston area. My daughter's harp teacher, who the Chieftains tap to play their concerts when they're in Texas, hasn't heard of any.

Kurt, you're hosting the next (first) Gulf Coast Squeeze-In at the Baton Rouge Dairy Queen nearest your house, right?

Paul, I’d only suggest you check out the local festivals and slowly grow some contacts. A quick look at southern California netted me Lark in the Morning’s festival, which is, however, in Northern California (Mendocino) at the end of July. I did notice Jack Gilder, a noted concertina player is heavily involved, although no concertina workshops appeared on their schedule.

This link Henk van Aalten once provided lists concertina players. Some, like Chris Cooper, are based in LA.

[Note in edit: Sorry, Paul. You are of course the GREEN dot east of LA.

13th, 14th and 15th August.
Samantha

Whoosh! The scale of the US catches me out again. I was going to say that you had not just a player but a maker on your doorstep, when I thought I'd better check my US road atlas. It's over 300 miles from Houston to Mesquite! You have my sympathy. Come and live somewhere cosy, like England...

Chris

For a visit, sometime pretty soon, I hope, thanks to international scientific conferences. If I'd taken up concertina sooner, I probably would have made it to one in London last year.

For this year, a detour from a meeting in Vermont to the Button Box will have to do, and then, in Australia, maybe I can find a good musical pub in Sydney or Brisbane. Any pub recommendations, you Australian squeezers? Another not exactly cozy country.

London eh ? Odd out of the way place, far off down in the south-east I seem to remember going to some years ago.! Funny how it acts as though it's the centre of Britain when I know that the geographical centre is just 15 miles from me in Lancashire!

Robin Madge

Just out of curiosity, has anybody actually tried balancing Britain on a point, to determine where the centre actually is?

Chris

Trust those Lancastrians to try and nick it - it's actually in Yorkshire!

Probably depends on whether you're taking the center of England, the island of Great Britain (including Scotland and Wales, but not the Hebrides or other islands), or the UK (including Northern Ireland).

I said that I was in Lancashire. I didn't say that the center was, just that it's about 15 miles away!
My wife tells me that they were shown at school how to take the centre of gravity of an irregular object as a physics lesson and that they used a cut out of Britain. It came out as near to Dunsop Bridge.

Robin Madge

I suppose finding a centre of levity in Britain would be rather more difficult.

I should point out that I'm talking about a 2 dimensional centre of gravity. If you start adding in the weight of mountains etc. it will all shift north west further!

Presumably a helium factory is a "centre of levity".

As a point of historical interest, I wonder how much it has moved in the last 30 odd years with coastal erosion and land reclamation schemes?

Robin Madge

Or the loss of Hong Kong?