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I'm selling the concertina I started on, a C/G "Swan" concertina (Wheatstone layout) from McNeela music. I purchased it about 18 months ago, and played it for several months before upgrading. Since then, it's been resting safely in its hard case in a non-smoking household. It plays well, and has a nice sound-- a great instrument to learn on. I'm asking $500 (just under half what I paid for it new). I'll cover shipping costs (only continental US offers please) and throw in an introductory concertina book by Gary Coover too! High resolution pictures available here: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/fji22lrhy05x7cl6ly80m/AIJWrQTXjA-JV_VRA8c_2kg?rlkey=yy8dt9guggn3t82sxdhgw7ebc&st=lzl076s5&dl=0

I don't have a Clare, but I have a Vintage from ICC and it's been great (and I expect the Clare is too). I started on a Swan from McNeela and played it for about 6 months, but it quickly became a limiting factor (one of the keys was damaged on arrival and I had to manually repair it, the action was generally "sticky", and the bellows was restrictive). My plan was to start on a Swan and take advantage of McNeela's trade-in policy, but when I contacted them about it they told me that they'd only give me about 30% of the Swan's MSRP as trade-in value toward an upgrade (which surprised me, since concertinaconnection promises 100% of the MSRP when trading-in to an upgrade). So, that was kind of an unpleasant experience and it soured me on McNeela ever since. In contrast, the Vintage from ICC is really responsive and has an incredible bellows (and I believe the Clare and Vintage are similar in those respects). My one nit with the Vintage is that the very lowest reed tends to go a few cents flat when played loudly, but that seems like more of a property of the choice of reed material rather than the concertina construction itself. In fact, the Clare may not have this problem, since it uses accordion reeds instead.

I bought a "Swan" concertina from McNeela several months ago, and they charged me the price listed on the website plus a 19 euro shipping fee (shipped to California), no tax or import duty fees. A word of caution though: I recently contacted McNeela about their trade-in policy for upgrading to a nicer concertina, and they informed me that my several-months-old Swan concertina I just bought from them would only be worth about 35% of its original value as a trade-in toward a nicer instrument. I believe other makers (concertina connection, handmade models from irish concertina company, etc) offer a 100% trade-in toward higher end models. Out of curiosity, which instrument are you interested in?

It reminds me of a famous "experiment" where Joshua Bell busked for passers-by in D.C. and virtually every single person ignored him, despite being arguably one of the most talented musicians on the planet: There's also beautifully written article on this here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/pearls-before-breakfast-can-one-of-the-nations-great-musicians-cut-through-the-fog-of-a-dc-rush-hour-lets-find-out/2014/09/23/8a6d46da-4331-11e4-b47c-f5889e061e5f_story.html So, (sadly) most people do not really listen at all!

You've got a lovely collection of instruments here, Mike! Thanks for the information. The number of keys in your descriptions don't seem to agree with the 4 concertinas in the center of the first picture, is it possible you were describing the instruments in this picture instead?

Hi Mike, Could you tell us more about the 4 English concertinas in the center of the first picture and the associated prices? Thank you

from the ebay description (from Feb 2022) of this concertina: Joey: can you comment on whether this instrument was repaired, and by whom?