I have now had my new (2nd hand) Gremlin concertina for a week and can play Mary had a little lamb and the beginning of Mac the Knife really badly.

Thank goodness for the ergonomics forum or I would be feeling a bit discouraged about the difficulties of holding it and my struggles with the thumb and little finger!

What a great instrument - I am happy to be a really slow learner in the distant hope that one of these years I will be able to play anything I like with ease.

Other people find it fascinating to look at and enjoy pressing the buttons.

Hi Pan,

I've just (as of 2 days ago) got myself a Rochelle Anglo, and am delighted with it so far. I can just about work my way through a few simple tunes, far more slowly than I am used to on harmonica, which I am more experienced with, so I'm off to a steady start. We'll see how things go over the next weeks and months.

I've been lurking around here for a few months now and have found some good advice so far (not least the recommendation for the Rochelle), so I'm looking forward to actually contributing eventually...

Rob

I made the transition from harmonica to Anglo, via a short and unsatisfactory diversion into melodeons.

If you learn to cross the rows straight away you will find less temptation to breathe in time with the bellows!

I got my concertina today!!!! I'm quite overjoyed. I think the UPS man was a bit taken aback at my skipping down the sidewalk and beaming at him whilst trying to see the label on the box to confirm that it was indeed my concertina. Ah well, he'll get over it.

I promptly opened up the box, took out the instrument and started making horrid noises on the thing. Great fun, but excruciating for anyone whithin earshot.
I have however, figured out Lavender's Blue- an old (very simple) colonial song, and, of course, Hot Cross Buns.
When I first got the idea to get into all this, I admit I was thinking, "hey, how hard can it be? I know how to read music, and all you have to do is pump the bellows and push buttons. You don't even have to tune the thing!" The complacent violinist inside of me smirked. The warning flags stayed, unhelpfully, out of sight. So, after a while of making the aforementioned noises, I picked up my violin and reflected on how easy it was to play. A full confession, and I humbly ask for pardon.

Anyway, there's my big news for the day.

That's not funny Every time I try to pick out a tune on my clunker C/F Club button accordion (Hohner Preciosa, nice little box), I catch my lungs going with the bellows! So I stick to my Hayden Duets, where I jsut grunt along iwht the notes

You'd think a harmonica background would be a big help, but then I pretty slow on the mouth harp too.
--Mike K.

I hadn't even thought about that breathing thing, so thanks for the advice. I have already started playing tunes in the key of G on the C row, crossing over where necessary for the F#, and it feels very different. I guess the trick is to learn the fingering options for any given note and choose the option that best fits the required phrasing.

Thanks for the advice.

I always thought Lavender's Blue was an English song.

Yes, and it's a colonial song because England is now a colony of America...

I understand the EC is a bit harder to learn than the Anglo so I anticipate I will be still plodding along while all the Anglo players are getting the tunes out!

Fiddlehead your story about receiving the concertina was excellent. My own concertina arrived at the departmental secretary's office. Everybody knew I had been eagerly awaiting its arrival. The departmental head was there when it arrived and said he would file a health and safety report on the grounds that my playing would be a hazard to the other members of the department!

Lavender Blue - there's an idea - I'll try that one too.

Difficult to quantify is that one. I think it pretty much depends on how your mind works and any preconceptions you may have before picking up your first concertina. If you like logical order in your life (and music) then the English keyboard layout initially fits the bill; if you're an intuitive 'play by ear' musician then I believe the anglo is more 'approachable'. That said there's no such thing as a musical instrument that's easy to play well, each instrument will present you with barriers and challenges unique to itself; it's how you cope with those obstacles that defines the instrument that's for you.

Pete. (An EC player who's currently being severely challenged by the diatonic accordion - an instrument that's charmingly called a melodeon in the UK, makes it sound sweet and approachable but it's a bit of devil on the sly!)

I meant that it was from the 1700s.



It was an easy one that came to mind. Others that I've attempted (and managed, I'm happy to say) were Barbra Ellen, Blow the Man Down, the Lass of Paitie's Mill, Maid of Amsterdam and a few random hymns. Good luck!!

Very much so.

That's a bit of a stretch... especially the last part. Each has its own "logic", though the patterns -- and even the kinds of patterns -- are different. But the first time I ever had an EC in my hands, I knew nothing about its keyboard layout or its "logic", yet within minutes I had "intuitively" figured out how to play a familiar tune in 2-part harmony.

I could already read music, but that's not how I learned to play the English concertina. By experimenting (I think that's "intuitively"), I learned where the notes and intervals were, and then I was able to apply that to reading music. Transposing was even more intuitive, as the pattern of the scale in most "reasonable" keys (anything from 3 flats to 4 sharps) feels nearly the same under my fingers. And harmonies and arrangements are still more intuitive than not.

For me, the anglo has gone more slowly, but the process has been the same.

Thanks for the reassuring messages about the EC. I am finding it quite nice to learn -although not as quickly as Jim! Fiddlehead, I see that you also mention Blow the Man down. I have just added that to my incredibly limited repertoire too. I've been humming it ever since I decided to buy the concertina and now I can actually (well sort of) play it! Very satisifying.