Jim2010

6/8 3/4 I like to be in A | me ri ca 1 2 3 4 5 6 1 2 3 O kay by me in A | me ri ca Think of the 1/8 notes as grouped like this. In the example, there are no 1/8 notes in the 3/4, so I just wrote 1 2 3 I could have written 1 3 5, meaning the notes start on the 1st, 3rd, and 5th 1/8 notes in the measure. 6/8 3/4 123 456 | 12 34 56 1 2 3 1 3 5

I'm not sure why I didn't think of this earlier. Another example of two time signatures being "equal" mathematically but very different musically is the case of 3/4 and 6/8. Each measure has a duration of six eights notes, but those eight-note-durations are grouped differently. In 3/4 there are 3 beats (each consisting of 2 eight notes), and in 6/8 there are two beats (each consisting of 3 eight notes). A good way to hear the very obvious difference is by listening to the song "America" from the musical West Side Story, where measures of 3/4 and 6/8 alternate. This alternating of 3/4 and 6/8 is sometimes called guajiras rhythm. Here is a youtube link. The guajiras rhythm starts at about one minute in.

I decided that for me, at this time, smaller, lighter, and newer (2020) outweighed additional notes, larger bellows capacity, and older (2012). I liked the sound of both, with a very slight preference for the Albion.

I would like to thank everyone who offered information about the Morse Albion and Geordie baritones. I had a chance to try both for a few days and I purchased the Albion baritone from the Button Box. This is my second transaction with Doug Creighton and the Button Box. Both transactions have been a pleasure.

I just listened to the youtube video again and I think the first six minutes address your question directly. Mathematically, 4/4 and 2/2 both consist of the duration of a whole note or two half notes or four quarter notes or some other combinations. But there is a subtle difference between emphasizing four beats in a measure vs emphasizing two. If you march around the room counting/emphasizing 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4 over and over, you will get one feeling. If you keep marching but only count/emphasize 1---3--, 1---3-- over and over (leaving out the 2 and the 4) you will feel something different. Marching 1-2-3-4, bam, bam, bam, bam over and over gives a feeling of "straight ahead," "directed," "purposeful." Marching 1---3--, 1---3-- over and over gives a lighter, "swaying side-to-side feeling."

Mollie, here is a comment by ceemonster that may be be of interest. The link doesn't take you right to the comment. You need to scroll down to ceemonster. JIm

Thank you bellowbelle.

Thank you, Steve. I hadn't been thinking about multi-octave chords.

Thank you Tiposx and Little John. Every bit of information helps me in my thinking about these instruments.

I will have an opportunity to play both the 37-note Albion and 45-note Geordie Baritones this weekend. If any baritone players (any maker) are reading this discussion, would you give me your opinion on the relative importance of the 8 additional high notes on the Geordie. If the instruments both sound good to me, I likely will prefer the smaller, lighter one. But I wouldn't want to sacrifice too much musical potential by "losing" the eight additional notes. The highest note on the Albion is d'' and the highest note on the Geordie is a''. The lowest notes are the same. Thank you for any opinions.

Thank you for that information.

Thank you, Geoff. I will be keeping that in mind.

Thank you, Tiposx. I just received a "private" message from a member saying that starting around 2014 a change was made to the construction of the Geordie that enabled the lower reeds to speak more quickly. Is your instrument from before or after 2014?

I have been reading as many concertina.net comments as I could find about these two instruments. Most comments are favorable and, with a couple of one exceptions, the only distinctions between the two seem to be physical dimensions (Geordie is 8oz heavier and 3/4 inch bigger than the Albion) and the number of notes (Geordie had 8 additional higher sounding notes). One person thought that the smaller sized of the Albion limited its capacity for playing the lowest sounding notes. Another said that their Geordie was a little slower to speak than their treble Albion. I think that was reference to playing in sessions, which would not be of particular interest to be at this point. I simply am considering a lower-voiced instrument. Are there other significant distinctions between these instruments that would lead you to prefer one over the other.

"Improvised obbligato" is an intersting musical concept. Usually, obbligato means a part that needs to be played exactly as written rather than being improvised. In any event, one place to start is to start singing yourself. In the sections of the music that Alan has identified, what would you sing/hum to add a little something? What does your ear tell you to do? If you don't think your ear is good enough, start listening to other accompanists. What kinds of things do they do? Let your ear guide you.

Very, very nice, Mike. Beautiful. You don't hear the Arcadelt Ave Maria much these days. Everybody is going more for the new kids: Bach, Schubert, and Piazzolla.😀

You don't see neumes everyday. If you start playing concertina from neumes, you will be creating the newest of the ever expanding notation systems that players use. Neumes were the first notation I ever saw as a child, singing in a boys choir in a cathedral. That was before I reached the age of reason, and started playing trumpet in the school band. Trumpet was better because we got out of class a half hour early on Wednesdays.

Regarding mirrored layout... CBA players who play freebass accordions (except for some Russian models) play on mirrored instruments. If I am not mistaken, Wim Wakker had them in mind when offering a mirrored option. When I think of playing a mirrored concertina, I think of the relationship of the hands as generally similar to playing a harp. The harp notes go in one direction in relation to the body (highest pitches closest to the body, lowest notes farthest from the body), and the hands are simply positioned on either side. Whatever right hand fingers a harpist uses to play a chord or series of notes, the left hand can do the same. You could build a bi-directional harp, but you would need two sets of strings. The right hand strings would have their lower pitches closest to the body, and left hand strings would have their higher pitches closest to the body. With that setup, a harpist could have the fun of using different fingerings for chords and melodies depending on which hand they were using, while keeping in mind which direction the pitches ran on either side of the harp. It might seem confusing and unnecessarily complicated to an experienced harpist. But they could get used to it. Concertina players play this way without any trouble.

Wonderful music, wonderful performance Didie. Thank you for posting.

I have a BA in music with classical guitar as my main instrument. At the time, my university did not have a professor of guitar. As a result, all the classical guitarists studied with professors from other nearby universities or teachers unaffiliated with universities. The unaffiliated teachers were acceptable if the university considered them to be of approximately the same level as the professors who taught the other instruments. Show Toronto or Victoria don't work out for some reason, other universities might be possibilities. Above, jduray mentioned Joan Cochran Sommers. She is professor emerita at the University of Missouri Kansas City. She may know of universities that would welcome a PA accordion student. Search for her name + accordion and you will find her email address.

Could it be It that there is some kind of "spring mechanism" that pushes the bellows up (pull) unless the player is pushing them down (push)?

A wonderful performance.

Some nice recordings from the 2021 Northeast Squeeze In (NESI) by regular contributors to concertina.net Not all of of the videos have been posted, so there may be more performances by familiar names still to come.

I reconfigured the diagram to match the view from the camera position shown in the video. Is the right hand layout correct? Is the left hand layout correct (the right hand rotated 180 degrees)? On the left hand, are the higher sounding notes at position 1 or position 2?

Didi, Do you mean it looks like 1 or 2?