Daniel Hersh

I'd also be curious about any notes that you might find written inside the concertina. And if you're able to add the interior photos to the listing (or post them, or links to them, here) then we could all see them. Daniel Hi Simon, Thanks for the contact. It's great that you took the time. Unfortunately, some of these scammers know how to steal identities so feedback isn't always a safe guide. I'd be interested in the pictures. Thanks Paul

Agreed...but the seller never responded to my message, and the auction is about to close. We'll see if whoever buys it winds up asking about it on c.net later. Daniel I think Geoff is on to something. Pictures! Pictures! We need pictures! Greg

It's here. Any comments? Daniel

I believe that you can just as effectively delete the old photos and leave the posts intact, if you'd like that better. Daniel

Thanks, Geoff! I too wondered if those might be non-original ends, but hadn't known about the South Africa possibility. I've asked the seller to post some interior photos and will post a follow-up message here if that happens. Daniel

That's not unusual on the old German-made Chemnitzer etc. concertinas--the point is to distinguish it from the similar-looking bandonion, which many of these makers also made. I like the apple corer idea though...

You're right re the sheet music of course, and you know far, far more than I do about Chemnitzer history. But I'm a little surprised that a "Bb" Chemnitzer would be the one normally played with Bb instruments, if that's what you're saying. It would certainly work better than one in "C"...but wouldn't one in "Ab" (5 press F, with the home rows in F and Eb) be better still, if you could find one?

It would be helpful to see a picture of the right hand side too. Concertinas more or less like this one have recently been selling on eBay in roughly the $300-$500 price range. Daniel

It's here, with a Crabb plate on one side and a Wheatstone one on the other. The fretwork looks pretty odd to me, though my experience is limited. Comments? Opinions? Daniel

A German maker, I believe.

Very informative post, Jim! Where did you learn all that? I thought I was pretty well-rounded musically, but only knew maybe half of it already... Back in the concertina world, I would add that Chemnitzers and Anglos are also routinely made in multiple keys, as clarinets, for example, used to be. Chemnitzers are particularly odd in the way their key is described. A Chemnitzer with its "home" rows in the keys of A and G is described as being in C, probably because its lowest note on the right-hand (melody side) is middle C. But it's actually most easily played in A, D and G, not in C, and the same instrument is also described as being in the key of "5 press A" because if you press button number 5 on the bass side you get an A. If you really want to play in C, you're better off with an instrument in "B flat" aka "5 press G." Daniel Why build a box that way, what is the advantage. Why not just play in the key of F, for example, on a box in a standard key? Rich's answer is incomplete. The reasons are human and cultural, and almost certainly started with wind instruments (flutes, trumpets, clarinets, etc.). Instruments come in families with different ranges. If you want a flute or trumpet that plays lower notes than the standard, you get a bigger flute or trumpet, a longer tube producing lower notes (or smaller, shorter for a higher range). But then the same fingering will produce different notes. If you want to be able to write down the music for both instruments so that they'll both play a piece in the same key, there are two solutions: ... One is to always write the notes just as they sound, but learn a different fingering for each instrument. E.g., the note D on a D whistle is obtained by covering all 6 holes (3 fingers in each hand), but on a G whistle it's only the top 2 holes (2 fingers of the left hand). ... The other is to write (and read) the music so that the same fingering is always indicated by the same written "note". That results in a different note sounding on each instrument, but it means that the player only needs to learn one pattern of correspondence between what's written and what the fingers do. And that is what is known as a transposing instrument. In the above example, music written specially for use with the G whistle would indicate an A, since the same fingering which produces an A on the D whistle will produce a D on the G whistle. Historically, some families of instruments have tended to use the first system, while others have favored the second. ... The recorder (block flute) family uses the first system, more or less. An alto recorder is pitched in F, i.e., the fingering that would produce a C on a soprano or tenor recorder produces an F on the alto. But the sound C is still written as C for the alto, and one learns that this requires a different fingering than on the soprano. (The "more or less" above is that for the same written note the soprano and tenor sound notes an octave apart. What's written as middle C for the soprano actually sounds an octave higher, but it's still a C.) ... Music for the viol family is also normally written just as it sounds. E.g., the viola sounds a fifth lower than the violin, but a low C on the viola is notated as such, not as if it were a low G on the violin. ... An exception to this is found in some people's notation of traditional fiddle music where the fiddle is in non-standard tuning. E.g., if the bottom string is tuned to A rather than G, then the notes A-B-C# will be written as G-A-B, because those fingerings will produce the desired notes. (Played as written on an instrument which is in standard tuning, the result can be bizarre. ) ... Because they were neither chromatic nor tempered, early brass and woodwinds were generally made with separate instruments for each key in which they were to be played. To standardize the notation, certain fingerings were designated "C", regardless of what pitch they actually produce. For woodwinds, it's "all 7" holes closed (with the result that on flutes and whistles with only 6 holes, the lowest fingering is "D"). For brass instruments, it's an "open" (no valves depressed) tonic. Thus, e.g., on a Bb trumpet the open "C" is really a Bb. ... This practice has continued to this day, even though most orchestral instruments are now fully chromatic and at least nominally in equal temperament. Each type of instrument has mostly been standardized to certain pitches: trumpets and clarinets are in Bb; flutes and oboes are in C; English horns and French horns are in F; alto clarinets and alto saxophones are in Eb; alto flutes are in G; etc. Why the different types of instrument have been standardized in these disparate keys, I don't know. One can also find clarinets in A or C -- and parts written for them, -- trumpets in C or D, etc., but they're much less common. ... For some strange reason, "transposing" bass instruments still have their music written in "true" pitch. I.e., the open Bb on a trombone, tuba, or baritone horn is written in the bass clef as Bb, not as C, though baritone horn parts are sometimes written in the treble clef, and then the Bb is written as a C. Weird? This finally brings us to why one might want a "transposing" concertina. At one point, concertina marching bands were popular in England. It was easy for them to use already-published music written for "brass" bands (which usually included a few other instruments, especially flutes), but many of those parts were written in transposed notation for instruments in Bb (trumpet), Eb (alto horn), etc. So to play those parts correctly one would need to either learn a transposed fingering or get a transposing instrument. Why not just play all those Bb parts on C instruments, so the entire arrangement is transposed up a step? Well, the first problem is the Eb parts; to play them in the proper relative key, you'd need a concertina in F. Hmm, isn't that just the tenor concertina the Button Box has for sale at the moment? There's also the problem that the bass parts are not written transposed, so players of baritone and bass parts would then have to transpose their parts. (Also, anyone playing from a flute part would either have to transpose or get a concertina pitched in D.) So some bands had made entire sets of instruments deliberately pitched in Bb and Eb. By the way, I have taken this idea of transposing instruments in the other direction. Reading fiddle or flute music on a Bb trumpet or soprano saxophone requires transposing, and I don't play these instruments frequently enough to be good at that. Instead, I've gotten both a trumpet and a sax pitched in C.

Here's the latest oddity: why did this Mayfair go for about the same price as this Wheatstone? Especially since the Wheatstone was sold by a real concertina person (and purchased by one--the ubiquitous Chris Algar) and the Mayfair was not. The only reason that I can come up with was that the Mayfair listing had more hype ("beautiful...exceptional...brand spanking new") than the Wheatstone one. Or did the fact that the Wheatstone was in Australia scare some people away? I realize that the Wheatstone is a late one, and wooden-ended, but I would still think that it should be worth much more than an accordion-reeded Mayfair of roughly comparable age. Daniel

Agreed, relatively speaking...but a lot of money nonetheless, especially with the key unknown. Both bought by the same person, too, I believe. I wonder if he/she is among us on c.net? Daniel Compared to the first one that is a steal!

I finally got a chance to dig my set out and (literally!) dust them off. I've got these three and one more: Revenge of Reader's Tape, which features 7 tunes by Jody Kruskal and is the only one with a copyright mark on the cassette or the case (c 1992 Concertina & Squeezebox). I've got the liner notes for all of them too. I'd still be happy to lend these for archival copying if Geo gives the ok. Daniel

Agreed! To boldly go where no Chemnitzer has gone before... Daniel

If you do decide to go for a G/D 20-button, Chris Algar has one listed on eBay here. You'll indeed get the C# that way, though you'll lose the F natural in return. Far more people play C/G Anglo than G/D, but G/D certainly has a following, I believe especially among players of English tunes and singers. Daniel One thing to keep in mind is that with a 20-button C/G you're missing the C#, which is going to hamper you on a lot of tunes in D. If you get a 20-button G/D you won't have that problem. Again, talk to Chris and read the past posts on the 20- vs 30-button topics. Even if you decide to get a good C/G when you have more money later the time spent learning on the G/D will not be wasted. The Rochelle sounds very interesting too. Wakker is highly regarded and the Jackie/Jack reviews are excellent. It sounds like it would be worth waiting for. Good luck. You've got nothing but good choices to make -jeff

Do you play 30-button Anglo? If so, your best bet is probably to learn cross-row fingerings so you can make more of your own decisions about when to change direction. Once you're at the point you can try to make your direction changes at a time when the phrasing of the tune fits with a break in the legato flow. Daniel

I would tend to agree. Chris Algar gives a price of "£3750+ for any decent old Wheatstone or Jeffries concertina (prices £sterling at Jan 2006)" on his site. And then you would have a concertina dealer with an excellent reputation standing behind the instrument, rather than an eBay gamble from an antique merchant. Not that I haven't made plenty of eBay gambles myself...but this is an awful lot of money to risk. Daniel

I believe that I have a full set of these, hardly played, and would be willing to lend them for copying. From the previous thread it seems that the rights are not a problem, though it would probably be a good idea to check with Geo again before proceeding. Daniel

He tried, but that was followed by a last second snipe. Instrument sold for USD 5,350.00 !!!!! And just like that... another one appears, in somewhat better shape.. Which would be this one. Has anyone tried to get a look at it? How about a guess as to the final price? It looks very much like my own Anglo, except mine has no nameplate and is therefore "worth" considerably less. Daniel

Yup...about $1,000 higher than I had expected. It's amazing what people will pay for that Jeffries nameplate now. Anyone have any guesses about the cost of getting this into playable condition? Figure new bellows and what I would imagine to be many, many hours of work on those reeds as a starting point... Daniel He tried, but that was followed by a last second snipe. Instrument sold for USD 5,350.00 !!!!!

Somewhat blurry pics available here. Anyone recognize the name? Is this just a re-badged Lachenal or Jones? Daniel

Not on the C.net home page, because it doesn't belong to C.net; it belongs to Henk. But the link is part of Henk's signature on any message he posts. Just click on it. Might be useful, though, if the link were listed on the C.net "Links" page under "Recorded Tune Links Page", in addtion to its listing as Anglo-Concertina.net. Would a "pinned" message on the Tunes/Songs forum be a possibility? I would think that would help too. Daniel

Have you heard the solo album The Nervous Man by the great Irish Anglo player Micheal O Raghallaigh? He has a backup harp player named Michael Rooney whose playing you might like--he's got an energetic and rhythmic style. Daniel

I am tempted - but not now. We can take the idea through a spin in October, your place. Press = press key, pull is press key + modifier key. Which? Space?/Henrik Space bar sounds good to me. But how do you deal with the problem of varying the duration of the notes, or do you just make them all equal? And what about the possibility of more than one note sounding at a time, or would that be too difficult? It sounded concertina-like to me and is represented to be that on the site, but it's hard to be sure. I'll contact the site owner and invite him to join this discussion. Daniel