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Dave Weinstein

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Posts posted by Dave Weinstein

  1. Arise, from the depths of time.

     

    So, I haven't been working on the Concertina much in recent years (the 20's have been stressful, go figure).

     

    However, a monthly Bluegrass jam started up just up the road from me. Nice, friendly, and an idiom I definitely don't know.

     

    I'm contemplating starting by just working on bass lines (since I have a deep low end on my instrument), and doing chords and backing, rather than trying to jump right in and play melody lines at bluegrass speeds.

     

    Thoughts and advice?

  2. There is a stylistic risk to over-avoidance of bellows changes, depending on the genre of music, because bellows changes can be desirable even if there are options without them being required.  

     

    It'd be interesting to see what they full contraint set could look like (making sure to balance the bellows to minimize the need for air buttons, but also to try to be consistent on phrases, and to include bellows changes for emphasis and how much genre awareness the constraints need for that)...

     

  3. On 10/2/2019 at 7:37 PM, Dana Johnson said:

     I have never seen a D/G,( only a fourth apart, where the normal interval between the main rows is a fifth) though Bob Tedrow had a reversed G/C which had the C row as the inner row and the G as a middle row.  He was good on it, but it threw me for a loop!  I think he said he’d copied that layout from a German concertina, but doesn’t make them like that normally.  D/As are pretty common and are nice bright instruments but then you might bemoan the abundance of G#s.  

     

    I have a pair of D/G instruments (one by Bob, one by the Dippers), G in the middle, D as the inner row but down a 4th rather than up a fifth.. 

     

    The biggest challenge (other than the lack of instructional materials) for an Irish sound is that you can very easily play very long runs in one direction across the rows, which gives less of a bounce than Irish concertina tends to have.

     

    Oh, and you have to commission the instruments separately, and you can't really play other peoples' instruments. The enforced quasi-immunity to Gear Acquisition Syndrome may be construed as a benefit in some circles.

  4. I use Heritage Music Insurance (http://www.musicins.com/) for my instruments, but they only cover the instruments once I have them. However, I have been able to purchase specific riders from them (inexpensively) that specifically covered the instrument in transit (whether to me, or off and back for maintenance).

     

    (I have fortunately never had to make a claim, I was pointed in their direction by a local luthier)

  5. One of the interesting things I've found is that a lot of the unpleasant harmonics are most evident when you are right on top of the instrument.

     

    I'll ask people to compare two notes (that is to say, the same note, but two different reeds), and often the one I like more is *not* the one that sounds better 10 feet away.

     

    Similarly, I can listen to Jody Kruskal play a passing close third harmony and it sounds great, but playing the instrument that close third (admittedly, not as passing as Jody can play it) just *grates*.

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