John Sylte

In a couple weeks I’m going to reply to this post... seems strange right? Why am I posting about posting when I could just post? ?

I would be stoked to find another true miniature Anglo!

And wouldn’t you know... I managed to get my hands on another one. This one a semi miniature in C/G in almost brand new shape.

Wow, Dowright I'm very interested in seeing your other miniatures! I posted my mini 20 button lachenal here in the history section and expected to get more response. Maybe these are pretty common?

Lindsey I wish I could tell you something about it, other than it is precious and beautiful and I would love to hold and play it ? It is certainly a treasure, like mine, but difficult to get more information on. Would you be willing to take it apart very carefully and take pictures of the insides?

Hello again everyone. I've just received this little mini back from Greg Jowaisas after he did some excellent work on it. He is recommending new bellows and I'm on board. I've had a brief email exchange with the Dippers and they have the proper jig to make a maximum seven fold bellows. I'm wondering if any of you have miniatures this size and can offer feedback as to whether I should consider trying to find someone who could make eight fold bellows or is there a reason seven is the max the Dippers use?

The reeds on this little guy are stamped as if it were originally in D/A. The only other metal ended true miniature anglo lachenal in (online) history (that I can find) is the one referred to in volume 9 of the Papers of the International Concertina Association and is also in D/A. This makes sense to me from an engineering perspective because the lowest (biggest) reeds on the left hand side wouldn't fit in a reedpan of this size if they were in a lower key. The fact that mine is currently somewhere between Eb and E suggests maybe this was retuned to be played with another instrument in Bb. Just a guess. An interesting fact is that my serial number significantly predates the other lachenal mini by twenty years or so(?). Does this allow any conclusions? I'm really impressed with this powerful little instrument! Been playing it a lot. It makes my 38b Jeffries feel like a sherman tank when I switch back and forth

Thanks for narrowing it down to issue number nine for me. I found that link online but didn't know where to go. It appears from this article that there is only one other Lachenal mentioned of these dimensions and it has 22 buttons. This is beginning to sound like one of a kind. I am totally in love with it. Surprised it only has six fold bellows, and no c# (equivalent). I'm guessing that's what the extra key is on the other one. I really would like to learn more about this thing. Thanks to anyone and everyone for your help.

Fixed a few notes... She's a player! https://youtu.be/E3oIS2HKwyQ So nobody knows anything about these minis?

I cleaned and cleared a couple reeds and replaced the air pad which brought it up from 60% to about 80% airtightness. The other pads are old too, so clearly that simple task would help. This is really a cool litttle instrument! It's powerful. Just wish it had one extra button for (what would be) C#. Ben, do you know how rare this is? I have found only one picture of a similar instrument online, but shinier and without hand rests.

Check this little 20 button beauty out. Not quite 4" flat to flat. She is right in between Eb/Bb and E/B, and beautifully in tune with herself, but not as airtight as I would like. Serial number 48556 by one source appears to have been made 1876 ish? Is this a rare specimen or pretty common? It has amazing sound for such a small thing...

Got the combo wrong? I bid over 7k, new record for me. A bit of a disappointment to wake up to. Unless you walk away from the ebay account that you used, I suspect you'll have trouble ending the listing.

I placed a bid on this and then this morning the whole listing has disappeared?

Closed at $1950, wow.

Hello Everyone, it's been a few years since I've posted... I saw this on ebay, was curious about your thoughts? I can't figure out why I can't paste a link? I must have been away for too long. The item number is 131603062272. Seller has over 800 transaction history but none in the last year? Is that fishy? Does anyone know the seller?

Is this still for sale?

Hello Everyone, I used to be a regular here, but stopped trolling the forums two or three years ago... I wanted to own a nice vintage anglo concertina back in 2005, but there was nowhere to shop for one in my area. At the time I worked for a software company and had decent paychecks coming in on a regular basis. The strategy I employed was to buy nice looking Lachenals on Ebay, fix them up, and turn them over. For a couple years I really enjoyed learning how to fix them up, and was proud of my work. When I finally found the beautiful metal ended Lachenal I wanted to call my own, I kept it and spent more time playing than fixing. I still play a lot, and I love my Lachenal. The problem is, I have three or four others I haven't finished fixing, and I don't ever seem to find the time to complete them. I have a considerable amount of money tied up in them and they're just sitting in my house. I would like to either fix them up and sell them, or possibly just sell them to someone who could finish fixing them up and put them back into circulation. I was good at fixing concertinas in many regards, but tuning the reeds took a bit of trial and error. I learned many important lessons, and now I am great! Unfortunately, I rendered a few reeds useless working my way through the learning curve... If I am to finish fixing these, I need to find a source for some replacement reeds. I'm not sure it makes sense to order a bunch of replacement reeds from Button Box or David Leese, because I would have to ask for quite a few. So a couple questions: Are there any repair persons here that would be interested in completing these projects? All of my concertinas have great bellows, fully functioning hardware, and all bodywork is in solid condition. Reedwork is primarily all that remains. I really don't want to sell these at rock bottom prices, but I would entertain reasonable offers. I would of course provide pictures and complete descriptions... I should probably just go ahead and do this for each one. My other option is to find some wrecked Lachenals that I could use as reed donors. Is anyone here sitting on some fixer upper projects with GOOD reeds that they would be willing to sell me for a reasonable price? Are there any other options I am not considering? Is anyone selling brand new reed sets that would fit in Lachenals? I would entertain bulk sale offers too, but I wouldn't expect any offers until complete photos and descriptions are available. This on it's own seems a daunting task... I'm just trying to dip my toe in the water here. I need to get these beautiful Mahagony ended Lachenals back into circulation. I have: -30 button steel reed Mahagony ended Lachenal with good original bellows -30 button brass reeded Mahagony ended Lachenal with good original bellows -26 button steel reeded Mahagony ended Lachenal with brand new Leese bellows -20 button Mahagony ended Lachenal with no reeds I would appreciate your feedback! Thanks-

It's been a while since I hung out on this chat group... Hope you all are well! I play a lot of trad Irish and American music. I just finished an album with my American old timey fiddle group Dead Fiddlers Society. On it I play mostly fiddle, banjo, and harmonica. I don't use my concertina a lot in old time music, but on some tunes it works really well. Swannanoa Waltz is a tune written by Rayna Gellert that I recorded on concertina. It is the last track on our new album. You can preview some of our other tracks here... http://cdbaby.com/cd/DeadFiddlersSociety1 Enjoy! Swannanoa Waltz.mp3

I'm on there. Same name. There's another Danish John Sylte who is a priest. I'm the gringo.

Ah hah! Extensor tendon, the exact opposite of my injury. Now I understand! I thought you said flexor in your original post... Definitely do NOT try the rubber band trick! I can't believe this happened to you while pulling your socks off... Makes me wonder about the danger of all the mundane tasks I carry out on a daily basis. Let us know how/when it heals up! Good luck-

Fiddler Joe Bob, So, you severed a flexor, and it's healing in a splint? I don't understand how a splint is going to fix a tendon that is not touching the bone anymore? I must be missing something... I severed mine at "the point of insertion" which is right where the tendon attaches to the bone. That's why it was so difficult for them to repair it. They ended up drilling a hole through my fingertip bone, up through my fingernail, and running my tendon through the hole in the bone, attached topside with a shirt button so it couldn't slip back through. After 6 weeks they took the button off... How did your doctor explain the tendon fixing itself? I'm not trying to trump your doctor by any means! I just don't quite understand how your tendon is supposed to fix itself without being reattached... Are you doing Physical Therapy? (After asking your doctor) Try a fatty rubber band (like those put on artichoke stems or lobster claws) to keep your finger curled. I showed my surgeon how I was using the rubber band and he said there was no better physical therapy than doing exactly what I was doing. Medical statistics predicted that I would never get full flexion after four surgeries, and today I can close my fist completely. I credit that to fiddling with my rubber band for over a year while my tendon was healing... You will fiddle again!

My opinion as a casual American is that the language is way overboard on sarcasm. I would even go so far as to call it unprofessional. However, I get a good chuckle imagining all the employees coughing and wheezing in the shipping room and laughing uncontrollably over the hilarity of their writings... Still, to an outsider, I'd say the writing is potentially offensive (or at least alienating) to most. In the last ten years there has been a HUGE wave of sarcasm in the evolution of America's collective sense of humor. So much so that I often feel I was born in the wrong century.

One of the main reasons I picked up concertina was because of an injury to my left index finger that kept me from fiddling, my primary instrument. On Dec 19, 2005 I was screwing sheet metal roofing onto the roof of my two story home as it was nearing completion. When I started the task it was sunny out. My shoes were grippy and sticky and I was walking all over with no problems. Halfway through the project it started snowing. I was not roped up. To make matters worse I ran out of screws and had no screw heads to walk atop on my way back to the ladder. Fearing a quick slip followed by a long drop, I got on my hands and knees and began to brachiate like a crab, using the ridges of the corrugated metal to keep from sliding off. I traveled 20 feet in what took probably 15 minutes, got right next to the ladder, and my knees slipped, I fell to my stomach, and I began sliding backwards. I had only 3 feet to slide before falling. I grabbed the edge of the sheet metal roofing to prevent myself from going over the edge. In doing so I severed the flexor tendon and nerve in my left index finger. The first two surgeries failed to reconnect my tendon to the bone. After the 3rd surgery, my tendon was reconnected, but bound up in adhesions so it wasn't sliding which made my finger useless for fiddling. The concertina doesn't require the very tip of the fingers to curl, so at this time I decided to expand on my harmonica playing and pick up concertina. I discovered I could fiddle using an artichoke rubber band as a prosthetic flexor tendon, wrapping it around my curled finger. This worked quite well except that it turned my finger purple every couple minutes. 2 years after my accident I had a fourth surgery that freed the tendon from the adhesions, and now I'm fiddling again without any rubber bands. I can no longer straighten out my finger completely because my tendon got shorter and shorter each time they tried to reconnect it, but it bends all the way to make a closed fist, which is what we fiddlers need in order to hit the finger board at the right angle. So three years later, I'm basically fine! I certainly hope no one here has a worse story...

Where do you live Megan?

A thing of beauty! And made here in the states no less. WAY TO GO! I absolutely LOVE the idea of having interchangeable reedpans. I have only once had the pleasure of holding and playing a Bb/f, and I loved the sound. I would prefer that tuning whenever I'm playing alone...