david fabre

Hi allAs you may notice with my ipad the line break don't work and everything is glued into a single line.Anyone else has experienced this problem ?David

Thanks to allI think i'll try something like what geoffrey suggests.I'll give news if i end up somewhereDavid

Felix : this is an interesting remark. Personally, i had already remarked that many french tunes in Aminor, usually played on the g/c diatonic accordeon, are easier on the g/d concertina than on the c/g. Now i see that the reason is the same as for playing in Dminor on a f/c accordion ! On my instruments, as i explained, i have d' instead of eb' on the next button of the outer row (for the c/g) and this extends the analogy one step further, when playing up a dminor scale. Franck : I understand better and see that this suggestion makes sense. About the utility of the upper f'/a' button : on my c/g i think i haven't used it much, but on my Edgley g/d I use the corresponding button (which is c'/e') quite regularly! David

Instead of looking for such instrument in the future, you may also try in the past...Indeed some old models of accordeons ( or melodeons ) , in particular those made in france and known elsewhere as " flutinas" had reeds more similar to concertina ones than to modern acordeon ones. Most often in brass but sometimes in steel. I would not be surprised if a model with this kind of reeds and a piano keyboard has existed. Maybe the specialists of old instruments can help.

Thanks for the coments.Geoffrey, you are obviously right about the fact that the caps should be easily removable, as those old ladies require to be opended up quite often...I measured a average 4mm height of the puttons when depressed. So the caps would be rather shortDavid

Bertram, thanks a lot for the fingering ! I see this will also be a good exercice for two-finger triplets ...I had already encountered such triplets before but only on the right hand. I'm sure this deserves to be practised also on the left.

I play both a vintage Wheatstone with small metal buttons (diameter 5mm, 3/16'') and a modern Edgley with larger plastic buttons (diameter 6.5mm, 1/4''). Although the difference in size is not so large, I do find the latter much more comfortable to play, and I am thinking of some way to enlarge the size of the buttons on the Wheatstone. I was thinking of putting some kind of transparent plastic caps on the top of the metal keys, which could do this without altering too much the appearance of the instrument. Has anybody done something similar, or has any idea about where to find such things ??? Thanks for suggestions....

(oops, triplicated post)

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Here is a concertina recording of POTK by M. Eskin using more or less "default fingerings" Bertram, I'm sure you can do without the written music, but if you need I will send you directly (I was not able to append it here) I think the difficulty is the repeated motion between E and F, which are on opposite directions on the 30b. I do have a 40b, so more options for fluidity, but have not yet found the right path for this one.

I also have a modified wheatsone with c# in both directions on the first button of the outer row, and find it very convenient.However, my wheatstone is a 40b and the eb is displaced elsewhere ( i actually have 3 of them)On my other instrument which is a 30b, i prefered to keep this d# of the upper octave , on the other hand my choice has been to modify the two otherD#, the one of the lower octave ( lh, 3rd button, outer row) being raised to E, and the one at the top ( rh, 4th button, outer row) being lowered to d'. The second solution suggested by franck : two first buttons as jeffries , the three others like wheatstone, seems to me a very bad idea, as you loseThe reversed G/a which is the main advantage of the wheatsone system (The reaseons for this are well explained in bertram levy's tutor.) Beryl, welcome to this crazy community

I think Dminor and Eminor are both great keys in the anglo, with different possibilities. Dminor is more straightforward, as it is played mainly along the C row. Eminor is less obvious at first sight, as it requires a cross- row approach, but has many interesting properties for playing in a chordal way, including a bass E which is missing in D. I've practised some tunes in both keys and find that each key yield a very different character to the same tune. This is something I enjoy on the anglo : the non- uniformiity of the layout gives to each key a different flavour, something that i think would be lost with a more "logical" note arrangement. One important point which contributes to this difference of character is that Dminor is a "pulled" key while Eminor is a "pushed" one. Maybe this is the explanation for your feeling with the rochelle, as the pushed notes may not sound as good as the pulled ones ?

(the porthole of the kelp)http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/1533

Interesting discussion !Bertram, Thanks for posting the fingering ! I will try this one in your way. I'm now becoming familiar with your " shiftings of positions" and i have to say that this concept really opened me new horizons !The discussion reminds me of the workshop i had in Tocane last summer with Aogan Lynch. One of the participants suggested that we work on " the porthole of the kelp" , another of these D minor tunes which explores the low register. Aogan explained that he did not like much to play these kind of tunes, because the fingerings requires lot of bellows change, and that the phrases can't be played smoothly enough. He concluded "it's a nice tune, but not a nice concertina tune". One of the participants, who played EC, corrected : " not a nice anglo concertina tune!" He indeed played the tune in a very nice way.I tend to agree that the lack of smoothness produces a worst effect in the low range than in the higher one, and as for me, I prefer to play this tune on my G whistle.Bertram, i would love to see what would be your approach to this tune...

Thanks for fulfilling the promise ! Does that mean it is one octave higher than regular "tenor" Ab/Eb ? must be incredibly piercing....

I see again one inconsistency here (still in the fourth page on the society of arts) "Ellis reconverts A445.7, using Equal Temperament, to get C534.5" I beleive he actually used just intonation for the conversion. I did the calculation : using ET I find C529.7 using just intonation I find 534.6. In any case it is sure that Ellis was aware of the temperament issue : he was the translator of Helmholtz' book which deeply discusses the issue. I beleive Ellis was also the inventor of the measure of intervals into "cents". I may indicate this to the author of the page.

OOPS ! After reading more the site found by Adrian I discovered that C528 is precisely the society of arts pitch, and that depending on the temperament it can imply either A440 or A444 ! Everything becomes clear at the fourth page : http://www.mcgee-flutes.com/Society%20of%20Arts%20Pitch%20Outcome.htm On the other hand I don't understand why, on the first page, it is first introduced as A448.4...

very interesting finding ! But regarding my previous post in the other thread, I'm pretty sure that mine was A=444 or 445, not 448.4. It was rather in tune with itself, and according to my tuner, the temperament seemed equal. On the other hand I've discovered that it could have been C=528Hz, which is THE FREQUENCY OF LOVE

I won't bed about the brands but some seem to have unusual button arrangements. In the anglo tree : The bottom left one with a shifted outer row (?) The central one with 11 buttons (total 22?) The little one at the top also looks unusual. Coud you show the other side of the tree ?

Interesting... However the manoeuvre seems to have failed : Just listen to the "Knocknagree" CD featuring Noël Hill & Tonny McMahon playing concertina & accordeon in Eb ! Coming back to the topic, the original tuning for my linota was A=444 or 445Hz. Any clues about this one ?

Just ordered ! As the website allows to specify "special instructions for shipping", I requested the following : "please use candles of premium quality for the procession to post office"

I've hardly ever met another concertina player here in France, whatever the system and number of keys. Maybe the use of the instrument in circus by clowns, you could call that a "niche", but a tiny one ! (and even in this context, I don't think there is a prevalence for 20 keys or any other system)

Hello Juan I'd love to learn a little more about the history of concertina in Bolivia and in south America ! You may know that Dan Whorrall, a regular contributor to this forum, has published a huge study relating the history of concertina (mostly anglo) in the 19th century. His survey mostly focussed on english-speaking countries (UK, ireland, australia, NZ, South Africa), and I beleive there remains some work to be done on the history of concertina in the rest of the world. If you have any elements, I'm sure you will get strong interest from the "historians" of this forum ! As for me, I'm presently doing some research about free-reed instruments in France in the 19th century, but concertina sightings are quite rare here

for those interested, a very nice collection of early french accordéons. http://collectionneuraccordeon.blogspot.com/

Thanks Geoff for your interest and your earlier post. I don't remember well about Waterloo but I surely learned that Napoleon defeated THE WHOLE EUROPE in Austerlitz ! Other interesting findings : -> In the harmonica world, the 'diatonic' note arrangement is called "Richter System" and is thought to have been invented in.. 1883, despite the fact that accordeons had this arrangement much earlier ! http://www.patmissin.com/ffaq/q37.html -> a great site in french on the history of acordeon (as far as I understand, adapted from the book of Monichon) http://www.perigord....on/acclivre.htm Alas, almost nothing on concertinas but they are nearly unknown in France....