VIN

What's the best method of removing the existing bellows from the frames, preferably without causing damage, any advice would be gratefully accepted. thank you, Vin

I'm hoping that someone will offer me some advice, I recently bought Lachenal English treble, dating I believe, to the mid twenty's, I like it very much but I'm finding the bellows very hard work. I have left them hanging overnight with some weight suspended from the bottom on several occasions but they still seem to want to pull back in. I'm sure its slowing my already very slow progress and is certainly spoiling my fun. It's a very nice concertina but I find that I keep picking up the student model that I bought as a starter. I have read on the concertina connection site that English and Anglo bellows are different to each other in as much as the English in thinner and more supple and if this in the case I am wondering if I may have a set of Anglo bellows fitted to my box. I very much want to use and enjoy my concertina so if it means having new bellows fitted so be it but who can I go to for a good job and also is it worth fittings six or even seven fold bellows? I have uploaded a couple of photos, one with the concertinas side by side for comparison and I would really appreciate members opinions.

If you Google "George case concertina label" you will get a picture of one that you can edit and size yourself, I have done it with lachenal then laminated it and stuck it it the little window and it looks fine, I have also blown it up to almost A4 size and had it printed on a t shirt (yes it is sad), Vin

im a Novice player looking to buy a good English concertina preferably a metal ended treble, but I will consider anything nice around the £1500 mark, I live in south yorks but I don't mind doing a bit of traveling, please leave me a message hear on the forum or send me a PM, ta very much, Vin

Is the concertina still for sale ?

Can anyone tell me the possible range of a 60 button EC advertised as an extended treble, and any pit falls a novice like myself may encounter buying one over a 48 button model, many thanks for any advice, Vin

those are both great reply's and exactly the kind of advice I was looking for, it leads me to believe that it is a more personal thing rather then a set method, many thanks

I'm sorry if this sounds like a daft question but is there a home position that your fingers should adopt when playing the English concertina or is it a purely personal thing, any advice would be most welcome

Could anyone please let me have a simple accompaniment to the song Danny Deever for 30 button Anglo c/g, music or tabs would be fine, as a beginner its something I just cant do, many thanks

Thank you that is exactly the kind of information I was looking for, particularly the repetition of the tune over a long period, I thought it might be just me that had to keep pecking the tune into my head only for it to leak out it helps a lot to know im not alone.

Thank you for you response. I have a wooden ended Lachenal 32 button anglo which I play badly, i would like to be able to play a little of all sorts I like English folk and slow airs. I have a couple of what I think are good books, one being "The Anglo Concertina Demystified" by Bertram Levy and another " Anglo concertina in the harmonic style" by Gary coover which I bought after seeing it on this forum, I have found them both to be very good and I particularly like the video's posted on line with the later, I have learned a couple of tunes from each so far but it seems to take an age to get a tune to stick (or is that just age) I must say that although in my original post I was looking to get together with other players, and ime happy to find that there are some that close to where I live I now find the idea of walking into a room full of accomplished musicians a bit daunting and perhaps more practise is called for, to this end any advice on learning would be gratefully received, for instance, is it better to try and learn a tune all together with the melody and accompaniment or should I try to pick out the melody first then add to it, or indeed any little tricks that may help things to sink in, many thanks in advance for any advice received and apologies for being so long winded,

sorry if this is the wrong forum to post this to but Ive only been playing since march and although I love it ime wondering if there might be any anglo players in my area that I could get together with periodically to maybe get a little push in the right direction,(or even another newbie to share my frustrations with) there seems to be a lot of players in the north west but not a lot around the Doncaster area in south Yorkshire,

Sounds a bit sad considering the level of my playing but I've ordered two, cant wait !!

I've noticed that some notes duplicate on the C and G rows i.e. the note is shown in exactly the same position on the staff just in c or g, forgive me if this is a stupid question as I am an absolute novice but does that mean that I can use either