Azalin

I would have thought that the frequency in which the MP3 should be played is encoded in the MP3 itself... but maybe that's the bug, maybe the info isn't correctly inserted in the MP3 and the player plays it at standard frequency...

There might be a 'bug' in the Zoom's encoding firmware. You should contact Zoom's tech support or post on one of their forum about this. I doubt this is a problem with your device only.

In Montreal, we have an english player who picked up the C#/D accordion... and a C#/D accordion player who will pick the english... I think I'll start playing the big piano accordion and avenge myself ;-)

Well, I'll try to contact the Guinness Book of Record and see if I can get in their 2011 edition EDIT: Seriously though, as a friend of mine pointed out, I find the best post about the subject is from Geoff Wooff at the beginning of the thread. It's full of wisdom, and written by someone who definitely lived and breathed the tradition for quite a while. I would love to hear him play english, something's telling me I'd be quite awestruck :-)

It's not exactly what I'm implying. I just think these opinions should be backed with some actual material, audio clips or else. Interesting. I guess I'll have to take your word for it. I personally never been convinced of this, from the clips I heard before, but there's a few exceptions, and have been quite surprised now and then... but from all the ITM english concertina music I heard in the past few years, there was always a little 'something' missing in the music to make it punchy enough to blend in. I always suspected the layout of the instrument, and the fact that the buttons are more spread out, were the cause, but I can't say for sure and it's only a wild guess. But there are many other reasons I think someone who wants to play ITM should use the anglo, and it's not only because of the actual instrument's capacity. You also have to think about classes, workshops, the ITM community, etc and take this into account when deciding. It depends if you're really intense about it, and willing to go to festivals and travel around the world to learn the music. If all you want is to pick up a few irish, english, scottish tunes and play for fun now and then, any type of concertina will do, otherwise I'd say it would be an advantage to pick the anglo.

Yes, you meant to reply to me about this, not Tom. I'm sorry to say so, but when you start going around saying that it's totally possible to play 'x' type of music on 'y' instrument, I would expect you to know 'x' type of music very well, and be a good player of 'x' music yourself, or at least long time listener, before making such a bold statement, that's all. As for myself, I don't go around talking about stuff I don't know, that's why I keep my stuff only about ITM, which I can say I know decently well, but you certainly won't "hear" me comment about english music or other styles.

Well, this is a personnal opinion of course. It's not because you can play a sequential bunch of notes at great speed that it's ITM. But people who are not immersed in irish music usually don't realise this. I guess it can be applied to any other genres.

In Canada, they tax on the value of the insurance. They don't care what 'reason' is written on the package, I think there was lot of abuse before (fake gifts, fake repairs) so now they tax first, and it's up to you to prove they were wrong afterward. I'm not sure if that's how it works in the EU though.

Hehe I abused these tunes when I started playing ITM, haven't played them for couple of years now, but they're great tunes!

Well, as a seller, if you *wait* until you get the money to ship the instrument (which is common sense) I don't think there's much risk involved. The worse scenario is that the buyer decides not to honour the purchase, but then, the buyer will get in trouble with eBay. I think eBay is a bit more risky for a buyer, because you pay for an item you haven't received yet. That's where Paypal can be useful, even if it's a bit of a ripoff...

Meg, I agree with you 100%. Buyer should pay for shipping, and all related expenses. Buyer has to make the US amount available to you, conversion is their problem, not yours. Quite honnestly, I think you should sell it on eBay. You could have a minimum bid of $6300, and a BUY IT NOW of $10000 (or a bit less if you want to be realistic...). Putting it on Ebay will help you not to have to deal with sneaky people, for one thing.

Ceemonster, bring me a chainsaw and a hammer and I'll have a go at your concertina at the Catskills

Interesting, mine is more recent and has a lower serial number. Maybe Colin uses random numbers

Beautiful indeed! A few years ago I visited a friend in Exeter, and also visited the Dippers... seems like there's a bunch of you in south west England!

Thanks Bruce, very interesting. I wonder if the anglos Colin (and Rosalie) make have changed throughout the years. Are the reeds a bit different, or other properties of the instruments? I would love to compare my County Clare with an older model.

Ah, mine is #447, so Colin and Rosalie has made an average of 12 anglos (or County Clare) concertinas a year... do you think they use the same serial for normal anglos and County Clare models, or this serial is specifically for County Clare models? Personally I don't like the idea of someone getting an instrument from a maker and then selling it a few months afterward for a hefty profit... but after 14 years??? You well deserve the profit, when you take inflation, etc into account, it's not that much profit. If you had invested that money in Microsoft instead, you'd be pretty rich ;-) EDIT: Now that I think of it, 12 concertinas a year seems like a lot! Maybe it's a serial for ALL instruments they're making?

Well, as much as we can say $10 000 is a lot, I would say $6300 is definitely underpriced. A few years ago I paid almost as much for a 'vintage' concertina with punctured bellows (although I wasn't aware of the state of the bellows). But yeah, we all have our own version of what's fair or not.

Interesting, with the current exchange rates, this instrument is much more expensive for an european than it used to be. I'm guessing that if a $10 000 offer is made, it will probably come from the US (or Canada), but who knows? I think a Dipper went for $9000 on this site last year?

The thing is, this thread is about irish style music played in cross row, chords are just an option and not something you need at all. We're talking about melody. This is what I found daunting when I started playing, most of the threads about cross row end up being so confusing, you end up having less direction and more confusion than before. That's why I tried to keep in very simple, and stick to what the initial poster said: "Irish traditional music, playing tunes and Noel Hill-style cross row". As we say here (in french), "sometimes 'too much' is like 'not enough'".

Yep, I posted about him last year: http://www.concertina.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=9768 He's making great concertinas!

There is definitely a correct way for me, and moving to cross row "saved my life" :-) Just a few days ago I learned three new reels and after only a few hours practicing them I couldn't believe how "easy" it was to play them the way I wanted to play them, and I realized that the exercize of learning cross row and be able to use the whole keyboard layout was really "life changing" for me. I think the real important thing for me wasn't to learn to play such or such button by default, it was to train myself to be able to play any of the alternate buttons whenever I needed them. It's very important, when you sit down and try to learn a new tune, and try to find the "right ways" into the maze of notes so that you don't end up jumping buttons... having all the buttons accessible to you makes a hella difference. But, again, what works for one person might not work for another.

Ahhh the old famous question. There are many threads about this, but they all end up being confusing because people are very "emotional" about the subject. I used to play mostly on the C row, on the left side and both on the right side, and switching to "cross row" opened new horizons to me. Tunes I thought were unplayable before became very easy to play, and made the mechanics of the instruments a bit less daunting. I think you'd ask five different cross-row concertinists, you'd get five different answers. All I can do now is tell you what I've learned from my workshops, and from my own interpretation of it: 1) Never use the same finger to play two different buttons in a row, there's always an alternative that would save you from doing that 2) Many players would tell you to use the buttons that are close to the index fingers first. So your main D/E would be on the LH G row index finger, and so on. 3) Use your first finger (index) for the first "column" of notes, second finger for the second, etc, but borrowing fingers from column to column is totally acceptable when there's no other way etc Your main A/G would be on the LH C row index finger, the high F#/G would be on the RH G row index finger, etc. When it comes down to push and pull, it's a personal choice. When you play triplets, try to do them all in the push or pull, or at least two of them in the same direction. When it comes to phrasing, you push and you pull the way you want, depending on your style. You might want to avoid too much pull/push as it can be a barrier to the flow of your music, but you might want to avoid too many passages in only one direction, as you might not get enough "swing", but this is very subjective and there's no official rule, and it depends on the tune, the phrase etc. That's it for now, it's my own basics and wouldn't work for everybody. EDIT: - Someone said (Noel Hill?) you should end up playing 80% of the notes on the left side, with this fingering... I guess it makes sense, didn't really pay attention - Edel Fox said: "If your fingers are doing too much work, then you're doing something wrong". It makes total sense to me, and always something to keep in mind in my opinion.

Thanks folks, I initially recorded this only to test the camera, that's why I managed to play at an acceptable speed/tempo, because if I would have had "recording for an online clip" in mind my speed and rhythm would have been all over the place. I love the first tune, too, it's nice to be able to play Gm and low notes with the concertina compared to the whistle.

Thanks, pretty amazing stuff!

Yes, this is where the line can be different from people to people. Those sessions I told you about are "open" on paper, because they are in a public environment but many musicians wouldn't want people *not* playing at their level to be there. Is it snobbery? Depends on which side of the fence you are :-) But maybe this type of 'hierarchy' and level is more in irish music than other genres, I couldn't say. It also depends a lot on the people who started the session. Some awesome musicians are very welcoming and are there just for the 'craic', some other awesome musicians are mostly there for the quality music and their ego is about to burst and they'll give you an angry look if you try top join their 'open' session. Well, I'll tell you exactly why some musicians would oppose it in irish music scene. I heard it from different people. When you sit down with friends, you feel like you can have a few pints, play some tunes, and then have some 'craic' between the tunes, talk about silly stuff etc. If someone were to drop a recorder on the table, or anyhow record the whole thing, then the musicians would have to mind what they say. It kills their fun. Of course, when I record tunes I *only* record the tunes anyway, as I don't want to have to edit later. But the musicians don't know that. If you were to say "I will only be recording the tunes, not the talk in between" I think they would be more open to it. Many people record the whole thing because they are too lazy to press stop/record all the time. I think 99.99% of musicians who oppose being recorded, or find it rude if you don't ask, wouln't mind if you were only recording the tunes, but recording them talking in between is like an invasion of their privacy.