Stephen Mills

Sorry to miss Palestine for the first time. Can you remember what tunes Kurt and Gary played at the dinner? I'm always curious about the repertoire of other duet players.

Will Fly! I've been visiting your youtube videos and playing some of your arrangements for a while now, on guitar or duet concertina. I never realized you were in the UK and was much surprised to see you linked with Alan Day (the Angel of Death not so much). Welcome to this forum.

I find it ironic that a half a dozen guys who, if they wandered into a pub at the same time would doubtlessly produce a cracking good session together, always end up bashing each other over the head when discussing on a forum the mechanics of what makes a good session.

I never met Richard Morse, but I feel today as if a little piece of concertina-me is gone. Certainly one of my goals as a Hayden player was to attend one of the Northeast events and swap tunes and technique with Rich. His contributions to our community can hardly be overstated, including his always knowledgeable and courteous contributions to this forum.

In C, you could start c, c, descending triplet[ b g e], bflat. The next phrase, similar, but not identical, starts on a.

Available from Amazon.

2 comments, 2 questions, Bob. Comment: I enjoy playing my Tedrow Hayden #7±2 more every day. There's a lot to grow into there. Q1: What led you to put less fretwork in the 2009 model? Q2: This looks like the RH side. Is there a possibility one could trade $ for an E reed above the high D, or is it maxed out? Comment 2: Those lower right 2 buttons (C#/Db, D#/Eb) are enormously useful, especially on the RH side. When choosing from a limited set of buttons, I'd take them over enharmonic equivalents that extend the basic chord shapes a couple of extra key signatures any day.

This large Hayden duet was advertised for $15,500 by the Button Box and sold, although I don't know for what amount.

Knowing what a scholar you are, Dan, I figured you needed the words to Dreamy Fish Waltz, taken from a Chemnitzer site: Dreamy Fish Waltz I had a dream last night That you were there with me That we were two small fish Down in the deep blue sea But things are just the same We never are alone The other fish were there No place to call our own We're two fish down in the sea Way down where the water is cold Oh I wish oh golly gee That we'd be alone you and me I would steal a little kiss And you'd be my sweet blushing bride We'd go swimming through the water In Dear and out with the tide

Stephen, did you just make that up? I'm so gullible! I saw it on thesession.org, so it must be true. But actually I first read it here, which states: The town, for out-of-towners, is notable for the song written by Cotton Collins, a fiddler with Lone Star Playboys, who are perhaps best known as an early backup band for Hank Thompson. Collins heard the song while he was stationed with the Army in Germany during World War II. He committed the melody to memory and then to the fiddle after the war. What he did not do was name the tune. After a dance at Westphalia Hall in 1946, the band met with hall manager B.J. Lignau to divvy up the evening's proceeds. Collins mentioned the crowd sure like his 'No Name Waltz.' Lignau said that since the song had no name, he might as well call it 'Westphalia Waltz.' Collins agreed, and the 'Westphalia Waltz' became a number one hit when it was released on Herb Rippa's fledgling Dallas label, Bluebonnet Records. Fiddle master Johnny Gimble played with the band in 1948, and it is Gimble's version of 'Westphalia Waltz' that is included on most compilations of Texas dance hall music.

Well, Dan, Westphalia may not look like much from the aerial view, but as it's only 111 miles from Palestine, practically a waltz, it might be a natural. A widespread story is that the Westphalia waltz was picked up in Europe and played around the Southwest as a "no-name" waltz, until one night in Westphalia, TX, the dancers suggested it might as well be named after Westphalia.

That's a great lineup, Dan. I hope I can make it at least part of the time. Bertram Levy has had an interesting background - he seems to reinvent himself more often than Madonna. He helped kickstart the old timey music revival with Alan Jabbour and others in the Hollow Rock String Band, where he played mandolin and banjo. Somewhere along the line, he got interested in Irish music and learned first the English concertina, then anglo. He started out playing a chordal style on anglo, but then he subsequently moved to Ireland, living with a member of Planxty for a year and developing a more linear style. Somewhere along the line, he wrote one of the definitive instruction books for anglo concertina, but a subsequent interview in Concertina and Squeezebox Magazine reported that he had continued to evolve his style of playing since that time. He later investigated Jewish music extensively and now, bandoneon and the tango. Somehow he managed to have a medical practice during this time.

And a Merry Christmas from Texas also.

No clue, Dirge. I did find a different performance involving George Young. Empire Palace vaudeville season, Edinburgh, June 1911, with Fred Kitchen, the Eight Germania Girls, Fatmah Diard, and Pip Powell and Katie Vesey et al Fatmah Diard (fl. early 20th Century), American contralto 'EMPIRE SEASON AT THE THEATRE-ROYAL. 'Both performances at the Theatre-Royal were well attended last night when the second week of the Empire Palace vaudeville season was entered upon. The principal item on the programme was a ketch entitled ''Persevering Potts,'' presented by Mr Henry Darnley's company. The piece has been written to amuse, and with Mr Fred Kitchen, the well-known comedian, in the principal part, that quality is not lacking. He had the assistance of a large company, all of whom did their best to make the production a success, and the comedy was beautifully staged. The Eight Germania Girls gave an interesting performance. It was chiefly military in character. The company had been well drilled, and their evolutions, which were extremely graceful, were smartly executed. In addition they sang nicely. Miss Fatmah Diard, an American soprano, charmed the audience with her singing, her rendering of ''Scenes that are brightest,'' being exceptionally good. A musical comedy by Mr Pip Powell and Miss Katie Vesey was greatly enjoyed. Both are smart dancers, and the lady sings well. Mr Adam Tomlinson, a Tyneside comedian, proved himself a first-class entertainer. His stories were excellent, and the audience thoroughly endorsed his statement that he was ''not a bad turn.'' A blind musician, Mr George Young, is a master of the concertina. Miss Felo Curran, a good singer and clever dander; and Mr Torbay gave an amusing silhouette exhibition.' (The Scotsman, Edinburgh, Scotland, Tuesday, 6 June 1911, p. 10e) Oddly enough, there's another sighting of a younger, sighted George Young, who plays the concertina as a wartime signal. This view from Room 217 in the Senior British Officers' Quarters in the theatre block was painted by Major W.F. Anderson in the winter of 1941- 2. It shows roughly the view that Douglas Bader, would have had of the sentry patrolling the outer courtyard during the the escape by Reid, Stephens, Littledale and Wardle on October 14th 1942 which Pat Reid describes in the Colditz Story. Music was used for signalling to the escape party - who could not see the sentry themselves - and the sentry had to become accustomed to it beforehand. For several days prior to the escape, music practices were arranged in the evenings. Anderson describes these as follows: "The oboe reeds are also just in time - the other ones had really practically breathed their last and the new ones produce at least twice the noise with half the effort. George Young and I do some combined operations with him on the piano, which is quite fun - also now and then in our room with him on the harmonica (sic) - this clears the room in a very short while.” On the evening in question Bader watched the sentry and acted as conductor, Anderson played the oboe and Colonel George Young played the concertina. When the players were silent it meant that the sentry was in a suitable position for the escapers to cross his path without being seen. The escape was successful. italics mine. Jody, the website in my original post very much encourages you to share the images. They even provide mechanisms for linking or copying at different resolutions.

Interesting, Alan. He looks a lot like George Young, the last image I posted up above, also seen here in another image. In fact, looking at the collection I referenced, here’s the same picture, with a different name! When I first found these, I searched for George Young and found a post on Richard Carlin’s blog complaining that there were lots of extant postcards of George Young, but no record of any performance by him. However, in that same search, there was a review of a performance by him where the audience persuaded him to do an encore. source Monday 21 August 1911. Mark Sheridan. One of the B'hoys. Lily Burnard. Burlesque Actress. Frank Couch. Comedian. The Eight Empire Girls. Vocalists and Dancers. The Arthur Lloyd Trio. Little Charlie. Ouida Macdermott. Vocalist. The Martialo Trio. Jugglers. George Young. The Blind Musician. Hull Daily News 22/08/1911. Although not a big-letter turn, George Young blind musician and concertina soloist was rewarded last night by an outburst of applause that would gratify any star and although the scene was changed for the succeeding turn, the audience insisted upon a recall which was eventually given.

This site is a collection of 387 musically-themed postcards, many of which contain squeezeboxes. Here are 2 and links to 4 more. There are several more scattered throughout the collection. Not a concertina, perhaps, but strange and wonderful nonetheless. boy with instruments little girl band kittens George Young

Right now, the first tune I play when I sit down is almost always Nuages, by Django Reinhardt, followed by the strathspey Waukin’ o’ the Fauld, which has captivated me since I first heard it 25 years ago by fiddler Johnny Cunningham. After that? Gaelic Waltz from harpist Alan Stivell, same time period for me. I’m working hardest on Cocaine Blues from the Rev. Gary Davis, and on adding good accompaniments to 3 Breton Gavottes, from a transcription on the web by our own lildogturpy and Miss the Mississippi (and you) from Jimmie Rodgers, though I’m copying the guitar version by Eric Schoenberg. It’s hard to stop… Northumberland Air - Kathryn Tickell... but I will now.

Thanks, Dan. Good luck to you and Mary as well. Keep the concertinas high and dry. Yes, we will be riding it out. I won't be playing Southwind this week.

My copy was waiting for me when I got home today. Bravo and bravo again, Alan and Graham. Skipping around rapidly, I've sampled about 1/3 of it: I already knew about Mark Gilston, John Nixon is wonderful, Danny Chapman's playing always moves me, Sarah Graves is always delightful, Obi's Boys are lots of fun, and wasn't that a Carolan tune (Carolan's Welcome?) on Disc 3 #22 (lovely track), called in the booklet "Old White Cockade"? Question re: the cover art on AI and EI. Which of the 4 major duet systems gets the cover art on Duet International? (A 2X2 may be in order.) Not to scare them off, but the comparatively few extant accomplished duet players are on notice - the standard for these sets is high.

For the record, my Hayden is not a Stagi, but was made by Bob Tedrow. It is a very nice instrument that I am very happy with. Bob’s support is always great – indeed, he contacted me off board today to suggest he reset the reeds to enable a stronger attack. I would have contacted him first, but I wanted to see what experiences players here have had in a similar vein in hopes of learning a little something, as I have from Dana’s comment. My observation is that the good makers will set up their concertinas to facilitate the type of playing favored by the buyer. It’s taken me 3 years playing Bob’s Hayden across many styles of music to attempt a playing style its initial setup faltered on. added in edit: BTW, Dana, I had already begun discovering that using the air button much as you describe helps ameliorate the problem. Having not established good control yet, it's good to know that this may be a realizable option and not a dead end.

I'm trying to add a two chord vamp as a brief intro and accompaniment to a tune. My instrument is an accordion-reeded Hayden duet. I am trying to use a louder, sharper attack than anything I have played to date. The problem is that, with this forceful attack, often some notes don't sound at first, or even at all. The lowest notes in each chord are the most problematic; sometimes the 3 notes chime in at irregular delays, sometimes the lowest note doesn't sound at all. The same chords on the right side sound without problems. A less forceful attack sounds all notes appropriately, but takes a lot of life out of the performance. This problem occurs much, much more on the draw than push, although the push does occasionally fail to sound a note or two. While it might be true that I could play the intervening melody notes on the draw and the vamp on the push and keep air, hey, there's too much other stuff to concern yourself with in playing well to have extra things dictated to you unnecessarily. I don't know much beyond the basics of the internal workings, but I suspect the pads have something to do with the problem. Any ideas?

I’m looking for the dots or abc to the tune “Miss Mills Strathspey”, more for Miss Mills, my daughter, to play on harp than for myself. I am unfamiliar with the tune, so learning by ear is not an option. I’ve checked the usual sources: JC (Trillian), The Session and Mudcat, extensive googling – all without success. I do know it is in the 2nd Barnes English Country Dance Collection. I have the 1st volume of that set, which I enjoy playing through regularly quite a lot, but I’m not really ready for another 500+ tunes just yet. If any of you have this tune in some form you can post or email (I expect that it is in the public domain), I would be thankful, else I’ll probably end up ordering another massive collection I have insufficient time to appreciate (not the worst possible outcome, to be sure).

This discussion made me curious enough to email the only person I could think of (based on this interview): who actually played a concertina aboard ship for some extended time – Stormy Hyde. Here is his reply. Thanks, Stormy. G'day Stephen I carried my C Jeffries around with me at sea for around 15 years and spent a lot of time each day being played, most days I would try and get 2 hours practice a day if I could. After all that time when I took it apart to tune there was hardly any rust on the reeds at all. The most ridiculous picture I did ever see was in the Concertina and Squeeze box magazine (2nd edition I think!) that showed seaman around the helm of a sailing ship with a following sea, wearing oilskins, singing, and playing the concertina. "all a little silly"

As I read it, this guy has bought a Hayden and is not unnaturally looking for whatever form of help might be available. He contacts the only person who knows who plays a concertina. This person, not a duet player, contacts the best resource available, www.concertina.net, to see what might be done. Certainly no harm there, but the truth is indeed that a duet player today must almost necessarily be self-taught. Call it rule (0) of the advice that follows. Nonetheless, Alan, he should present himself here. To get the best advice, we need to know what kinds of tunes he wants to play and what level of musical background he has, even what kind of Hayden he has. As Rich and Jim noted, Hayden-specific workshops are available in MA in April, and the Southwest Concertina Workshop only a few hundred miles from you in late March has always had 2 Hayden players in attendance to date. So, given that self-instruction is the thing, here are some first steps for your friend. (1) Learn where the notes are. Congratulations, choosing the Hayden probably gets you more quickly to this point than any other concertina, possibly excluding English. Some resources for Haydens can be found at http://www.concertina.com/hayden-duet/index.htm. (2) Decide how you are going to finger the scales. Different Hayden players use different schemes. This has been debated at least 3 times on this forum: here’s one instance http://www.concertina.net/forums/index.php...yden++fingering. An opinion I hold not necessarily shared by all is that the #1 drawback of the Hayden system is that it disfavors usage of the index finger and favors more usage of the little finger than most, if not all, other systems. You should not be too discouraged, but settle on a fingering system as soon as possible and stick with it. After you’ve played scales enough to get comfortable with them, but not locked in, I suggest that you try this etude by Carcassi (written for guitar). If you play only tunes, you will only slowly encounter the difficulties that come from your choice of fingerings. A piece like this forces you to confront the consequences of your choices immediately and also trains you to switch your positional frame of reference on the fly. This frequent readjusting of position is more like real tunes (but even more so, which is great for practice) than scales per se. This etude also forces you to explore the whole keyboard, rather than allowing you to learn the G#’s etc. at some “later” date and will also get you started playing some notes on the LH side. (3) Our system’s “Inventor”, Brian Hayden himself, consistently recommends not deferring learning accompaniment until later, but tackling some sort of left hand accompaniment to the right hand from the beginning. I couldn’t agree more. Don’t neglect the left hand. Add the chord root or 5th while playing the RH melody. Practice tunes transposed to the LH as well as the right. (4) Practice some chromatic playing from the beginning. This could be chromatic tunes or exercises that might incorporate a 3 or 4 note chromatic run, or adding chromatic neighboring notes, like putting a Bb grace note before a C. (5) One great thing about the Hayden is that many chord forms have the same shape in the keys E, A, D, G, C and F. In fact, the closed forms of the I, IV, and V chord, have the same shape across these key signatures, while the IIm and VIm chords are the same shape as each other. In other words, for every chord you would use for a folk tune, two chord shapes will get you by. (There are reasons why you might not want to play these closely spaced forms regularly as simultaneously-voiced chords, but that's another story.) For different voicings, some will be transposable to other keys using the same form, some will not. A lot of detail up front, probably too much. Alan, encourage him to contact us for better tailored information. CarcassiEtude1.pdf

Here’s one I don’t believe has been reported previously on this forum or the squeezeboxes on the silver screen (http://www.mediarare.com/MRFilmSq.html) database. That is probably because if you multiply the small number of people who saw this film with the probability of an interest in concertinas, the result would be…me. The movie is All the Pretty Horses, directed by Billy Bob Thornton and based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy, better known for No Country for Old Men, currently in theaters, and the relentlessly depressing Pulitzer novel The Road. In the movie, set in 1949, a 16 year old boy, played by Matt Damon, leaves his Texas ranch to go work in Mexico. He finds work at a ranch based on his skill with horses. He tells his bosses he will break 16 wild horses in 48 hours, a wager of Cool Hand Luke proportions. As he proceeds, the number of interested onlookers gradually increases from a half dozen to the point families are arriving with picnic baskets and eventually a party breaks out, complete with musicians (see below), all while he’s breaking horses. The scene with the musicians lasts only a few seconds, but the concertina is clearly revealed as a 20 button Anglo in the brief sequence. There are no references to this snippet of music or these musicians in the credits.