my grandfather had kept a *concertina* in the closet of his home in hawaii for MANY years. after giving it to me, he told me it belonged to his father's father. i looked at the instrument and tried to figure out as much as i could about it. it is a Black Hohner. there are 12 Bass buttons and 31 other buttons, (one row of 10, one of 11, and another of 10.) it was made in Germany and the handcarved serial number is 1032. can anyone help me?

Wow - it belonged to your great great grandfather! But.. it isn't a concertina. It's a three-row diatonic button accordion. Button accordions aren't the focus of this web site, but we're a friendly bunch, some of us play button accordions, and we'll offer what help we can. Do you have a picture of it you could post for us?

On the right hand side, each row is like a separate harmonica in a different key. You'll probably find that the keys are a fourth apart from outside to inside, for example G-C-F (G would be the outside row) or A-D-G. There are many key combinations, even Bb Eb Ab.

Hohner is still making new button accordions, and they are still a popular brand. They have a reputation as solid instruments that you can get a lot of music out of. I don't know a lot about Hohner button accordion history, but sound quality and responsiveness seem to vary dependiing on the particular model and when it was built. My oldest button accordion is a Hohner Corona II in G-C-F from about 1950, and to my ears it has a really sweet sound.

By chance do you know what kind of music your great great grandfather played? May we hope that you are thinking of keeping this button accordion and learning to play it?

For a quick gathering information, just type "button accordion" or "melodeon" into a search engine. For a start, you may want to look at the Button Box web site (http://www.buttonbox.com) - they also have a list of links to other sites. Another similar site that comes immediately to mind is Hobgoblin . They have stores in England and in the U.S. - http://www.hobgoblin.com

An instrument that old may well need some attention. Concertina.net members who also play button accordion (and there are a number of us) will be happy to suggest repair people if you are interested.

You may also want to check out a "new" web site for button accordion aficionados that Lester Bailey just told us about: http:www.melodeon.net.

Regards,
Brian

Brian has covered the subject pretty well, and a picture could speak a thousand words, but there is room to throw in a couple of comments:

First of all is it an antique ? Well it could be, depending on what definition of "antique" you use, but most unlikely if you mean in the strict sense of it being more than 100 years old, as Hohner only started to make accordions in 1903. However, if the casework is constructed of black-painted wood it was probably made before the Second World War, but if the casework is covered in black celluloid it cannot be more than about 70 years old.

Secondly, the key system is almost always stamped into the bottom edge of the wooden keyboard, so you may see something like GCF there, but they used German note names, so be warned that you might see a B for Bb, H for B, or Cis for C# !

Cheers,