conzertino

Btw, Stefan is coming to the next German Concertina Meeting - and there will be a special concert on Sunday night ( 29th March 2015 ) featuring our teachers - and Stefan's concertina on fire...

I don't know, if this video has been featured before!? Sefan Böhmer from Germany started off on the MacCann a few years ago and tours German clubs by now with his new act: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3Asf1a7VEE

I just finished the page for the next annual German concertina meeting ( German and English ). ( Hopefully ) there you will find all the details. Check it out! http://www.concertinas.de We are normally a crowd of 30 to 40 players from Germany and the rest of Europe There are a few teachers around who will care for the needs of the various systems and skills of the participants. And there will be a lot of social playing going on - including "German session-tunes" from the newly discovered Dahlhoff-collection! 2014's happy crowd...

Chris Algar of Barlycorn Concertinas usually has quite a number of restored Jeffries-anglos in stock. At his place you can try them all out and hear and feel the differences - and find out about prices. But don't expect to find a good restored C/G Jeffries for less than 4.000 Pound anywhere... You don't say where you live - but it may be worth the trip! I wanted a special ME Aeola TT - so I drove 1000 miles from Germany to Chris and found just the right one out of a whole pile of TTs...

Single or double action? Any ideas??

Thanks, this is a great help! The F and F# on the top left side ( the side with the serial number ) should certainly be exchanged. Can you check again? It helps to read D# as Eb and A# as Bb, ( even though they sound the same ). Alltogether an unexpected layout ( I was wrong ). It looks a bit like a Stagi Mini ( lowest C on the left side ), but it should certainly be one octave up. If I am correct this time, layout and sounding notes don’t correspond to a treble, but to a piccolo! I would certainly miss a Bb on the right side. Somehow I prefer the layout of my 20-key Lachenal with the low C on the right side ( may be because I am used to it ;-)!?

After some problems with my concertinas and dry winters I use a wireless controller inside my concertina-cabinet and a remote-wall-plug to switch an humidifier - it works great for me: 50% +/- 1%....

I own a lovely ME 20 key Lachenal with exactly the same layout as Geoffrey's 20 key layout. I would suggest that the tort-mini starts at C and has the same layout, but missing the Bb on the rigt side. Unfortunately we have no picure of the left side...

Steve, so the lowest note on your 8-note miniature must be a C ( if you can play a major scale without accidentals! )?

Don't forget that a miniature starts on G two octaves above a normal 48-key treble and one octave above the normal range. You may well drive away your pets and attract bats;-) On a miniature you can just play one full octave in the key of G using an F# - and in the key of Am...

Here: http://www.horniman.info/DKNSARC/SD02/PAGES/D2P0680S.HTM you can see the little one in the Wheatstone ledgers. Lovely instrument! I have sent you a personal message;-)

Chris pulled the auction before the end!? In Germany a judge ruled today that a buyer who bids on a lot has a right to buy it at that price, even if the seller withdraws the lot!! An interesting decision! Nevertheless - the instrument could well have been a F-tenor - all the reeds are the same as a tenor ( except for the D# / Db! ) and marked the same way! If you want one, you can try here ;-) http://www.wheatstone.co.uk/wheatstone/concertinas/english.htm

Since Chris Algar is selling the instrument, I would suggest that he knows what he is offering. The position of the thumb-strap doesn't look like Tenor. I bought an unrestored Lachenal new-model off Chris a few years ago, which was in an odd tuning - neither tenor, nor treble. With a few changes David Robertson put it back into - what we suggested - an F Tenor. If played like a treble, it sounded a fifth down. These instruments were made especially for the salvation army - to make the playing with brass-bands easier. So this one might well be an F-Tenor, which was converted to Tenor ( which can easily be done! )....

In my opinion a useful approach would be to go first of all for a low-cost all-electronic Hayden-Concertina! I have been playing ES for 40 years, but - if I had children - I would make them learn Hayden Duet, as it simply has many advantages! I have lots of good ideas in the drawer, i.e. a key, which uses magnetic repulsion rather than a spring...

I had been playing all sorts of stringy things while at school. At the age of 19 I decided that it had to be Northumbrian small-pipes - so I moved to Newcaste ( and eventually ended up with a lovely competition-winning set by Mr. Green ). One day I went along to the High-Level-Bridge-Folk-Club - and experienced Alistair Anderson on stage. The next day I put an ad into the "Chronicle" and bought my first three concertinas ( two Lachenal trebles for a fiver each, the Wheatstone baritone for 50 ). I then decided to study in Edinburgh ( rather than Stuttgart ;-) and worked my way through another 50 concertinas... I used to take a night-train to London, check-out the concertina-places around Camden-Lock and buy the odd instrument at one of the auction-houses. So far no doctor has been able to heal me from that addiction...

Yes, it is gone home to Germany, but still for sale

Haha! I bet that would confuse a lot of delivery drivers. ...especially those, who play English-System...

Thanks! The shape of the flower was stolen from inspired by the air button on a Jeffries Anglo (and similar patterns on several other makes of concertina). I thought that the picture above showed the doorbell-array of an apartment-house

See below...

Any luck so far ?

That's, what I said ​ I have seen and played Dave's big TT!

I was surprised to find, that an anglo-player had a go at another one of my tricky party-pieces: Flambee Montalbanaise: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3Lw_eih7-0 This would be the original by Gus Viseur.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NLITZx3IYI

I happen to own that shell BT You can see it on my earlier post here on the left. Here some nice historical backing... I I wouldn't call it a tenor-treble down to F though, but a baritone-treble - or better a baritone-tenor, as there is not a lot left in the treble range;-)

Adrian, as far as I know, his famous instrument is a tenor-treble with baritone layout and size ( 8" ). I happen to own one of those. Here you see from right to left: 48 key baritone, 56 key baritone-sized tenor-treble, standard 56 key tenor-treble. Note the thumb-strap positions!

As far as I know there are only two piccolo-sized trebles in existence ( correct me, if I'm wrong! ), both metal ended. One is in New York in able hands. I was lucky to buy the other one on ebay off Chris Algar a couple of years ago. But unfortunately mine is a late model, and I never liked the action and the ends... But I found out that with a little twist the ends can be swapped around with a normal piccolo Aeola! However such a small instrument uses a lot of air, so the original sixfolders didn't quite do the job. Hence I asked Steve Dickinson to make me a new set of bellows to fit the reed-pans of the metal ended piccolo-treble and the ends of my Amboyna piccolo! Out came the finest concertina I ever had!! A normal treble now seems bulky to me... The original bellows and ends are in the process of being converted to MIDI...