Martin Essery

A friend visited and was expressing how long it was since we last met and I responded, "It must have been several concertinas ago!" 😄

Can I place an order? I have a reed organ that was sold as playable, but is not, so I could harvest the reeds 🙂

I am! 🙂 But he makes the coffin shape, not the regular hexagon, which I would prefer. Mind you, he seems to be the only option to get my hands on one in less than two years 😄

Thank you so much, that is a great help, I wonder who I can get to make one? 🙂

I am trying to work out if Cormac's 'bass' is the normal G/D, or whether it is a 'contra-bass' in C/G? I have not come to a conclusion yet, can anyone do better?

Does anyone know what Cormac is playing here? Whatever it is, I want one!

Page 9 in the Rutterford Tutor 🙂 Rutterford-Duet-Concertina-Tutor-FourthEd.pdf I bought it to play the Bach cello works at pitch. Long way to go yet.

Excellent, so, even though a lesser quality, how can Startone make a concertina with 12,000 moving parts for 850 quid?

If we are into parts count, then it is 12,000 for a big accordion. They may have more space, but have a lot more moving bits too. I will accept the market forces argument though, and economy of scale. If this Startone tunes out to be even vaguely decent, I shall enquire if they want to start making concertinas, the cheap ones on the market that I have tried are unplayable!

Yet he does that all day every day for years and stillhas all his fingers 😄 Accidents only happen to people not paying attention, and no amount of safety procedures and equipment is going to stop that.

I thought I would reawaken this thread, as I am about to put my money where my mouth is. I played accordion in my youth and am curious how much has changed for me in the half a century since, but do not want to commit multiple thousands for a decent accordion just to satisfy my curiosity. So, I am getting a 120 IV bass Startone from Thomann's, 850 quid. So for the price of a top of the range Stagi, I get this monster. Now I am not expecting anything fantastic for sure, but I am expecting it to be playable. Thomann is a large company, also selling some decent stuff, and this comes with a 30 day money back offer, and 3 years warranty, so it would seem foolish of them to be selling these if they were complete garbage. I am not expecting the best tone, but I am expecting to be able to play music. Let me compare: there are 41 treble keys, and just one bank of reeds is more than the Stagi, but there are 4 banks of reeds selectable in 11 different sets plus two repeats, plus a master control, so, reed wise, already worth 4 concertinas! Then there is the 120 bass with another 4 banks of reeds, selectable in 7 different sets. Although 120 bass is not 120 reeds, that is still a lot of complex mechanism. Is Stagi a fair comparison? Maybe a cheap Chinese concertina for a couple of hundred quid would be better? But this instrument still has way more in it than 8 concertinas. When I first wrote this post, some were saying you could not get an accordion for the price of a concertina, well, here it is. It was also pointed out that economy of scale would bring the price down, but, really, that much? If this company was to make a concertina, I wonder how much it would cost? Already paid for, awaiting delivery, but sharing my thoughts ahead of time. Maybe, I should rephrase the question to, why are concertinas so expensive?

If I feel overwhelmed by the MacCann pattern, I look at a bandoneon and feel much better 😄

I am really hoping it was only oriented thus for the photos. Buying off the net from non-concertinists is always a gamble, but where is the fun in certainty? 😄 I am buying with the expectation of having to repair, then I can feel all cheerful if I do not have to.

Thank you for the response. You are indeed right, and I have spent much time staring at the charts 😄 Part of me would like one of each, excep the 62 which, for me has little point. However, I already have a 57 Edeophone Mac waiting for parts, and for me, the 55 going up that extra 4th to the top C is more important than the lower right hand end. Although it is a 'duet', I am actually going to be digging into the classical repertoires of violins, flutes, recorders, clarinets, ... so the cross over is not radically important. When I get them functioning, I shall spend time playing and see which I am more comfortable with. Maybe I will keep both, maybe I will exit one and get a 67. I already have two 81s to choose between when I get them both fettled, so a middle sized 67 might be good. Need more experience as only just starting with MacCanns. Exciting journey 🙂 I did try the English system, but splitting my brain in two was not comfortable for me, and once I got used to the pattern, felt more at home on the MacCann, except for that D#. I mean, what did he do wrong to be left out of the party? 😄

Thank you all so much for your advice and encouragement ❤️ I am buying off the net, a Wheatstone MacCann 55 on ebay, and have already found that a non concertinists assertion that "it works" is absolutely no guaranteed it is a playable instrument 😄 So, always a gamble. However, I have spent a life as a goldsmith, craftsman, and musician, tuning my concert harp every day, so I am pretty sure I can repair and tune a concertina. I am about to find out 😄 No repair cost, just my time. You never know, if I turn out to be good at it and enjoy it, you may have a new repairer on the block 😄 I have found that supposedly professionally repaired instruments can still have ugly quirks, so the only way is to play for a while. Yes, I had already found I can sell them on if necessary, so not a lot of risk, but this is not really a collection, just looking for a concertina I can gel with, and that can take a few weeks of playing. I find the fun with concertinas is that they all have different purposes. I have a MacCann 81 because I wanted and needed that deep deep bass for certain music, Cello Suites for instance, but a 55/56 is going to be more convenient, say for violin concertos or Van Hoff recorder works. My excuse for needing more than one. I am a widower now, so do not have to justify my purchases, though I think I can hear faint tones of complaint from the 'other side'! 😄 Thank you again for the encouragement, I made an offer and have been accepted, should be here in a few days. Born 1914, as I already have a Big Mac, I think I shall call this one Little Mac 🙂 Do you guys (generic non-binary title 🙂 ) name your concertinas?