Ken_Coles
-
Posts
2,134 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Posts posted by Ken_Coles
-
-
Well, if it is any help, the idea sounds good to me. We have a Learning page in the original part of C.net, so it has seniority as a major topic. I could do it, but will wait to hear from the Boss!
-
Take a short length of neoprene hose and slit it down one side so that you can pull it open to "clamp" over the bar. You may need to experiment with different internal and external diameters of hose, but the pieces you need will be so short that you should be able to get scraps if you can find somebody who uses it in their work. You could also experiment with placing some at each end vs. the same total length at either end. The great thing about this is that to return the instrument to its original state (e.g., if you later want to sell it), you just pull off the pieces of hose.
For everyone else Jim is describing something similar to an ancient article of mine here on C.net (aren't you Jim? Or have I goofed?):
The material is urethane water pipe insulation. About 89c U.S. for a piece 2m long. I still use these but have turned them upside down to get them thicker near my smallest finger. BTW my photo is in this article, so I never bothered posting another one here on the new bbs! This might still help with handles too wide, try fooling around with it.
The two custom boxes I have on order will be made with taller (farther from the endplate) handles.
-
Ken: (Surprised that my last post actually appeared, as the school internet connection crashed as I was posting it!)
I've always suspected that getting a Squeeze-In started would take either a business with a bankroll or a very flexible venue. The NESI may have economies of scale. You might email Rich Morse and ask him what their experience is. I'm sure he'll tell you.
-
Presumably the copyright to the tapes is still owned by the operators of C&S magazine. There is a potential solution that might satisfy the folks who would like a new copy while being rather more legal than the old "hey, send me a copy." The third editor of C&S, Geo Salley, is among us, and perhaps some of you can interest him in this idea, as he could probably get it properly authorized. We have already talked to him about digging into the C&S archive to share some of the old stuff with you.
Ken (still w/o regular I-net access, but working on it)
-
Two thoughts.
Scheduling in the winter is a gamble. If it snowed and half the reserved people couldn't make it, and you got no walk-ins, would you take a bath financially? Something like April or May might be nice in that you may be able to meet outside as well as inside, certainly one nice feature at some years of the NESI.
To be truly Midwestern, you might consider how to pull in the accordionists. A lot of them (in my experience) live in the Chicago-Milwaukee area up to the Twin Cities. Eventually, if not at first, a true Squeeze-In might aspire to encourage their participation. Not that I'm sure how to do this, mind you.
Another note. Whether you approve or not, liquid libation is a big factor at NESI. In my experience many camps (especially church camps) want nothing to do with such activity. Nevertheless, many people avail themselves of the bar at Bucksteep during the NESI. That, the scenic isolation, and the range of accomodation from camping to decent hotel rooms, is part of the appeal. Again, more of a long-term factor than for your first time, but you need to consider how this will be handled (complete ban? BYO? No-host? etc.)
Ken (still without my own I-net connection)
-
In the next 24 hours I will pack my car and begin the 1000 mile/1600 km drive to a new job teaching in Massachusetts. I have not made arrangements for internet access yet, so it could be a matter of weeks before I can attend to email, significant edits, submissions, etc. If something needs urgent attention check with Paul. I will let you know when I'm back to speed (unless I enjoy the time off from editing too much!). Thanks for your support.
-
One year when I was at Noel Hill School (Pam was there that year, were we in the same class group Pam?) someone came with a concertina having a new bellows. It squeaked mightily. Noel said ordinary (solid) shoe polish would help. The owner used some (neutral color, I think) and overnight the bellows became nearly silent. Sorry, I don't recall if it was applied only to the gussets (though I would think so) or elsewhere. And of course this doesn't tell you anything about (or necessarily apply to) treating old bellows.
-
Helen,
How did you know I wrote ronf offline? very good!
I just suggested a post with a separate topic, rather than in the middle of an unrelated thread. Jim should get credit for the more productive idea of finding a fiddle player.
-
This is not unusual in Irish music: two tunes with the same name, or two names for the same tune. I once started looking and found six names for the jig I know as Ship in Full Sail (after which I got tired of looking).
The Egan's I know is something like (key of D, in abc notation)
fABA fABA d2e>f edBA
etc.
I'd just learn the tunes and titles used by folks you play with, if any. There is no institute of tune names the way there is for the French language. Enjoy.
-
This is easy:
The Atkinson (so-called "French") horn that I already have.
The anglo that I have on order from a major maker.
The other anglo that I have on order from another, newer maker.
That's as far as my amibition goes right now. And I may actually get my wishes!
You must be new to this magical stuff. OF COURSE you can have your bitters at whatever temperature you want. We'll just have to get another new responder to tell the genie that he or she always wanted to play an unlimited amount of bitters.Heard recently at a concert or jam (I now forget where. Edited for a family audience):
Two Irishmen are on a sinking ship in the middle of the ocean. Now shipwrecked, they float along in a small boat, with no food or water. After a couple of days they are getting pretty loopy. Along floats a crate. One of the men grabs it and opens it up. Inside is nothing but a teapot. "Useless!" cries the second man. But the first stares at it a while and, figuring he has nothing to lose, rubs it. To their surprise out comes a genie.
"You may have one wish. Now make it a good one boys, think about it first."
The man holding the teapot says, "You know what I really wish for is that this whole ocean would turn into Guinness."
POOF! It is done and the genie vanishes.
"You Eejit!" shouts the second man. "Now where are we going to relieve ourselves???"
-
Where I am it cleared off suddenly around 11:30 PM local time. I watched the sky for a little over an hour. There was a very slight auroral glow, so slight I wasn't sure of it. No substorms, let alone curtains, etc. This was 9 or more hours after the strongest part of the flare got to the Earth, so that is not a surprise.
I did see a shooting star.
-
FYI the First Martin D-28 was not made in 1928
Oh I know, I was just making up an analogy. (Never ever make a fictional allegory on line, someone always points it out.) Folks who were around then tell me that in the 1950s and early 1960s everyone was nuts to find a classic old Martin or other classic flat top. Prices skyrocketed. (Sound familiar?). This eventually brought a lot of new makers out of the woodwork. I am floored by the excellent sound of fine new guitars my friends have (Martin, Santa Cruz, Taylor, Collings), friends who could never consider buying the old now-heirloom Pre-WWII instruments. While the guitar market is admittedly a hundred times bigger than the concertina market and guitars may be simpler to build, I still think we can look forward to this situation too, if we live long enough.
I guess my perspective on repitching is colored by the reality that even after six years of study, no one is interested in playing with me. The sole exceptions are the folk society and the Irish session I go to, and in those large gatherings I need to play loud enough to hear myself and subtleties of tone are lost, at least to me. I use my Morse for that. I have a funny-pitch/funny-key Lachenal concertina I play at home or for my rare public solo work. This arrangement works for me. Your mileage may (or does) vary.
-
Hi folks,
As a recovering Earth scientist, I have to pass along that a huge solar event has sent a surge of charged particles toward Earth that will arrive during the 29th and into the 30th (date and time depending where you are on Earth). This should cause a large and widespread aurora. See the
University of Alaska Aurora forecast page
for details. They haven't done tomorrow's forecast as I write -- very unusual for them, but it is because the magnitude and timing of the event is not clear yet. Note that, because the Earth's magnetic field is symmetrical, the Aurora Australis should be just as strong as the Aurora Borealis.
I just had to share this. I completely missed the last spectacular Aurora over my part of the world on a clear night in the winter of 1989 because I was working 80 hours a week teaching college (I don't miss that!) and hadn't heard about it. Me, I'll be out in the dark on our farm tonight with a bottle of good hooch! (Forecast is for broken clouds)
We now return to our regularly scheduled music.
-
Greg J. wrote
And please consider Paul Groff's advice about preserving the original tuning. I think he's got a very valid point about the beauty and distictive sound of these tunings and temperments. After the current phase and craze of group session playing has passed, the surviving unretuned instruments may be the most valuable and treasured of all! (I think Paul said that; but he didn't tell me to repeat it!)Years ago, in a private email to someone who had found an odd pitch Jeffries, I made this same argument. [i got a mixed reception] I said I thought Paul Groff would agree (though we have never met) and am gratified to learn I was correct. Yes, some day there will be enough makers of great C/G boxes to meet the session demand (look at the guitar market in the 1950s vs. now - a new golden age. Easier now to buy a new Santa Cruz guitar than a 1928 Martin D-28), and you'll be blessed if you helped keep a few original concertinas around.
And frankly, it would be easier to learn to play it than deal with the piranha feeding frenzy that erupts when you offer to sell an instrument like this!
-
Daniel,
Why don't you send Paul a private email, and the next blue moon when he sends an email newsletter out he can suggest everyone do this. Be sure to detail this whole discussion; like me I suspect Paul does not have time to read everything that gets posted here. Cheers,
Ken (revising my signature right away)
-
David,
Move to Indiana! We are so behind here (about 200 years behind most folks socially) that we never change clocks. Whatever the merits of the system (I don't wish to open that debate here, go to anti-daylight dot net and put your posts there), it puts us out of step with 46 other states. Folks driving over from Illinois to use the Indy airport are always missing their planes because 1/2 the year we are on NY time, and 1/2 the year we are on Chicago time. In other words, you use a calendar to figure what time it is in Indiana.
Arizona also never changes time. But one of the few kinds of sovereignty the American Indians have is on this issue, so the Navajos (with whom I lived for 6 months) in the middle of Arizona DO change their clocks. But the Hopi Indians DON'T change their clocks. And so on. Driving across Arizona in the summer can lead to half a dozen time changes in one day.
Seriously, I don't know about the set up here on the forum, but it is worth looking into.
Ken
-
Clive, your profile doesn't say where you live. In the U.S. the term "Old-time music" generally refers to the fiddle/banjo-based music centered (until the 20th-century revivals) in the southern Appalachian mountains. It has clear antecedents in the music of the British Isles a couple of centuries back, and in turn is one of the most important ancestors of bluegrass style and some of the Nashville fiddling. (Note to picayune experts: I know I'm generalizing here
)Alan, I have been playing those tunes, and many others, out of that book, with the local Folk Music Society in my part of the U.S. for 11 years now, ever since I had a red 20-button Italian clowncertina. (Try Capri Waltz to work on your low G and arpeggios). I have not had trouble with low notes that I can think of (I play anglo). The fiddle bottoms out on the G below middle C, and the top note in fiddle first position (and therefore in most old-time fiddle tunes) is B almost two octaves above middle C. You'll get it with enough repetition. Have fun; many here will envy you having an accomplished partner to jam with!
Ken
-
Andy,
Geo Salley is a frequent visitor here, and he certainly has a full run of C&S, as he was one of the editors for the first part of its history. It is not online, nor I believe can you buy them except the odd issue at auction, etc. But Geo could check for you.
Your user profile doesn't say where you live, though I presume a Civil War reenactor is in the U.S. somewhere (or is it some other civil war that you reenact? Remember, we have a world wide community here). The Chicago Public Library has a nearly full set of C&S (downtown at the Harold Washington branch).
Ken
-
Frank,
Even though I'm behind on everything,
send me a scan of the cover and we'll add it to the learning page at some point!Ken
-
I have to admit I have noted this also. I need to update my own entry! Thanks for reminding us.
Ken
-
Well, I'm reporting back. Not dispair, but I miss having three fingers to play simple tunes in the key of G, so I'm back to that imperfect way of doing it.
But an interesting observation. My English is a Lachenal with two different numbers between 31,000 and 35,000 (swapped reed pans, but circa 1890s, maybe?). The nickel plating is partly worn off the slides-rests-grips, and the wear pattern makes it clear that whoever played this instrument most of its history was resting two fingers there! I don't know who played this box before Ed Delaney, who owned it from 1992 to 2001 and sold it to me.
Do the rest of you see anything like this on your English?
Ken
-
My impression is that only Admins (and maybe Moderators) can delete posts. But as you noticed, you can edit them. Rather than making you old ad completely blank, you could just edit it to say "sold."
BTW, We are going to leave the old Buy/Sell page up, and I'd suggest for now that you cross-post in both places. Maybe we can automate that in the future so you only need to type it once. Meanwhile, you could try putting the whole ad on Buy and Sell and just a note here pointing to it. Then when the ad expires, all you have left here is the pointer. I suppose we could clean out the new Buy&Sell forum periodically, but I'm not going to without explicit directions from sellers, and that could quickly turn into alot of extra work!
Part of the plan will be to copy what Paul calls the "Beg-O-Gram" over to the new forum area (the notice requesting a 1% donation if a sale is made). As I write there are a half-dozen current ads on the original Buy and Sell page.Squeeze-On
Ken
-
Richard,
My guess (and it's only a guess) is that most folks here won't try building their own until they see your photos of the entire process, so you could certainly wait until you have it documented all the way through. Mailing me or Paul a CD might be a good way to go (allowing for transit time in the post) as you could send big images and we can easily edit them down. One caveat: write us before posting, as my life right now means my address could be changing on short notice (per new employment). We should also talk about formats etc. before you make the CD.
Ken
-
Richard,
As (an admittedly rather slower...insert far-behind editor face here
) alternative, you could send me and/or Paul the images and we can put them up on a dedicated page. Or post them here and then we'll repost them on another page - best of both worlds?My impression is that there is a lot of interest in this topic. Bob Snope did a bellows-making demo at the Northeast (U.S.) Squeeze-In last month, and there were many interested observers (including me). I am just foolish enough, like many others, that I (tell myself I) would love to try it someday. Bellows making is yet another thing I admire about the old-timers. I have several Lachenals up to 130 years old with very good original bellows. That amazes me.
Ken
Reed "feet"... I Mean "tongues"
in Instrument Construction & Repair
Posted
The cryogenic treatment does have some current faddishness among trumpet and horn players I know of. Sort of like the fad for very heavy trumpet mouthpieces. It may make a tiny difference, but the accomplished players I respect the most consider this sort of thing a detail and put more value on practice, etc. That hasn't prevented a small industry from appearing.
Squeeze, and blow, on.