I play the English Concertina for only a few months now, and I quickly found out that the 'usual' stuff is way too fast for me. Jigs and hornpipes up to speed will take me at least a year I think. The Three Sea Captains, The Ash Grove and Walz Young Jane is about as far as I get for the moment.

Can you advanced EC players remember which tunes you started with and which ones were particularily fun to learn?

I'm not advanced, but I think it's worth obtaining Wim Wakker's tutorial, that comes with Jackie. I think it's laid out pretty well, with dyverse music arranged for beginners.
Why limit yourself to Jigs and Reels? Why not attempt to learn classical pieces, folk and contemporary compositions from other cultures? EC is multi-key instrument, able to use harmonies.
I would also suggest not to worry about speed, but instead make that slow Jig you're playing a well sounding tune, that may not pass as a jig, but still be listenable.
Glenn Gould, for example, later in his career, liked to play pieces twice slower. It allowed him greater expression.
If you work on a slow waltz, try to vary accents, you'll be working like a road builder, I guarantee.
And record yourself constantly, because one thing is to imagine all accents you put into playing, and another is to hear their absence from the recording.

I've been playing much longer than that and find 3 sea captains a tricky one (er.... it's usually played pretty fast round here though!)

Where can I find music for 3 sea captains?
Thanks.

It's in Mozart Allan's Irish fiddler, which can be found in abc if you try hard enough. I have a paper copy, so I don't have the reference handy. I rather like it, though many of the versions of tunes are either not played that way anymore or are currently not played at all. I particularly like the collection of hornpipes.

On the original question: I play for English country dancing, so when I started on EC the tunes I played first were Winster Gallop and Steamboat. I also worked on Thady You Gander because it was a favorite of one of our callers and was a major pain in the right arm to play on a fiddle. (It's all the same dotted rhythm, played at 160 forsooth, and it goes on forever!) The two Barnes books of English country dances have a wealth of material which sounds nice on EC.

Click to view attachment
Click to view attachment
I've uploaded the version how I play it. I've added a few notes... And on the original it says 'set dance'. How fast is a set dance??? Since I'm a beginner, I hope they don't dance that fast. I've recorded it quite slow so that I can follow...

Thanks.
Anybody has arrangement with harmony? Or in two parts? (Hi, I'm Michael, and I'm Lazy)
Not a bad tune, and it should sound very well on EC. I think even better than on AC, it probably can benefit from fast smooth runs.
I'll adapt it to my repertore. First Irish tune in a long run.

Hi again - I love your website! Its going to be a great resource - have you shared it with everyone yet?
If not folks its really worth a look at the following:

http://www.tangosite.com/concertina

BTW I have a brilliant EC tutor from the 1930's that was published by The Salvation Army. Its got a wide range of songs/melodies to get your teeth into from simple hymn tunes through to 3part arrangements of the Hallelujah chorus. It's what I started with. I don't know if its available online at www.concertina.com. If not pm your address and I'll post a photocopy of it to you. Finally, I just have to ask you this - do you play any piazzola in your tango ensemble? I am struggling with some tango nuevo on the piano accordion. I'd love to get a transcription of 'Adios Nonino' for EC. Mind you I'd also like the next six months off work to learn it as well!
God Bless, AL

Hello Al.

Yes, we play some Piazzolla. Most of the time however, we play 'guardia vieja', the old style, because we play with one of the few surviving old style bandoneon players still alive: Alfredo Marcucci. I've put some videos on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/user/michelvdm

but if you search YouTube for marcucci, bandoneon you will find also other videos of the master.

Adios Nonino on EC? Hm. It's worth a try. I will see if I still have the scores. However, I have prepared another tango of Astor Piazzolla for EC... it's called 'Rio Sena' and it's particularily suitable because this Piazzolla was a very clever composer, and he knew that non-tango musicians would have a go at his music, so he wrote the tango in the arrangement: it will still sound tango even if you are not used to play that style. Even my computer gives a reasonable impression of it

I'll upload it on my site tonight. Do you have a piano player??

Michel

"Adios Nonino on EC? Hm. It's worth a try. I will see if I still have the scores. However, I have prepared another tango of Astor Piazzolla for EC... it's called 'Rio Sena' and it's particularily suitable because this Piazzolla was a very clever composer, and he knew that non-tango musicians would have a go at his music, so he wrote the tango in the arrangement: it will still sound tango even if you are not used to play that style. Even my computer gives a reasonable impression of it

I'll upload it on my site tonight. Do you have a piano player??"

Hi again Michel - just been blown away by 'Oblivion' - your bandoneon player is stunning! Sadly I don't have a piano player - my daughter is my piano player and she has just gone off to university. But Piazzolla on EC would go down a storm I think - time to grab him back from the accordionists. I also play a tenor concertina which has got to be a reasonably close match to a bandoneon??? Though and extended tenor / treble would be best I guess. AL

I've got some other stuff almost ready: two milonga's and the tango waltz 'Palomita Blanca' we play (it's on YouTube). All for treble EC and piano. I'll try and do some more Piazzolla stuff. We play in Ulm, Germany this weekend, so I'm going to try to get the piano parts of Oblivion, Palomita and Adios Noniño then. Tenor is REALLY an asset: it has the range and timbre of a tenor sax, so it wil sound really nice when you play jazz on it. Problem with tango is that it's not easy to sound convincing comparing against a big cannon as the bandoneon. This music and this instrument are made for each-other. It's like trying to imitate The Beatles.

I'm thinking of making sort of play along recordings of the tunes with only the piano and maybe very softly the EC in the background, so that I can excercise and learn to play together with other musicians. Could be like some street musicians who bring along an amplifier with pre-recorded accompagnement... Would that be helpful?

Try this one - I love it! And it sits beautifully within range for the EC treble.
Click to view attachment

Thanks. Seems a very nice tune indeed. Far too difficult for my music reading abilities at present though I'm afraid.

Rio Sena - playing it tonight! wonderful, big thanks, AL

For those EC players who want to squeeze outside the box: I've added another tango arrangement for EC and piano to my site: Adios Noniño, perhaps the most famous composition of Astor Piazzolla. This is a very, very clean arrangement. Since it's an tango classic, many musicians have tried to make the most elaborate arrangements on it in the past, but I think you should just leave it and let the melody speak for itself. Astor composed the first part as a dialog between the bandoneon and the orquestra, although Alfredo Marcucci admits he answers himself with his left hand on bandoneon as well. The second part is a lament, so I slowed down the tempo. When the piano takes over, I let the Concertina play along in 2 parts and the speed is increased up to tango tempo.

Astor Piazzolla wrote this in 1959 as a farewell to his deceased father.

I'm not advanced (I started in April) but the first few tunes I played were:
Lavender's Green (it's a little weird on the EC with the fifths, but not too hard. It was my first attempt at actual music on the beast.)
A-Roving (also known as Maid of Amsterdam, this one is quite fun to play and was easy for me to learn)
The Lass of Paitie's Mill
Parson's Farewell
A Hole in the Wall
Barbra Ellen
"Of all the Simple Things" (that's the only name I know it by, I'm not sure if it's right though)
British Grenadiers (sometimes called War and Washington, on this side of the puddle )
and the Garryowen

I found these to be pretty easy, if played slowly and then worked up to speed. Of course, I already played all of these songs on the fiddle, and just moved them over, so I was used to them fast, but learning is the time for playing slow.
Hmm, wouldn't my violin teacher would love to hear me say that!

I'd stay away from single line melodies, and start learning more complex pieces from the onset.
The best source for such are accordion books, they come with great variety of music and for players of different level.
Then there is Danny Chapman's website with plenty arranged pieces, but they tend to be more complex and you must have an extended Treble, with notes below G to play as written. Or you may simply drop them off.
If you like music of British Isles and some Irish, Alistar Andersen's Tutor is very useful, but with lots of doodling tunes, that are very similar to each other, which becomes rather boring, esp. for people around you.
Piano scores with bass cleff omitted work sometimes, but not always.
Get Palmer-Hues Accordion books, get some music for young piano players.
I'd stay away from Mary-had-a-little-Lams of the world, there is no reason why you can't start learning with Italian Polka by Tschaykovsky or violin or Cello pieces by various composers, like Bach or Mozart.
Not that I'm maestro, giving you precious advice, but having gone that way myself, don't see any value in three note tunes, unless they are what you "want" to play, or just prefer to learn very slowly and stagnate.
If you really like to play melody only (which may inhibit your further learning, btw), Tune-o-tron is full of such tunes, with MIDI player, so you can play along.
Then you can find these tunes on Youtube or SoundLantern and see how various people play them, and try to learn that way. For which you probably need Amazing Slowdowner and a software, allowing to rip audio from Youtube clip.

Thanks! Can you tell me where I can find the music of these? I only found the Parson's, the Hole, the Grenadiers and the Garry Owen's jig... the others I was unable to find.

I think I 100% disagree with this. If it was a good way of learning we would start children on physics and calculus at infants school? My view is when setting out on the concertina journey (it si long and it has no end) trying to play complex tunes will just teach you to fail. Start with easy stuff and work your way up when you have decide which way your "up" is.

I agree with you. You simply misunderstood my idea.
Nobody said that:
a. pieces with two parts or harmony are necessarily too difficult
b. pieces with single line are necessarily easy.
But learning two part arrangement will develop your finger dexterity faster. Granted, a piece will take a bit longer to learn, but it will make you a better player twice faster.
And it sounds richer, so you have you gratification. A single like playing is more difficult, because without all the "fluff" self-taught beginner's inability to present phrazing and rhythm will be more evident. It takes frustratingly long enough without man-made obstacles.