Don Taylor

(deleted)

I did contact the OP by PM to ask his location and he did respond. It is nowhere within driving disance for me so I let it go by otherwise I might have been tempted to visit. I feel that it is up to the OP to provide his location and more information about this instrument.

I find that a long, thin bamboo kebab skewer often helps to re-orient an errant button while the concertina end is over the other buttons.

According to the web-site, the Eiru has "Brass Plate Clamped Concertina Reeds" in "Dovetailed reed slot". It sounds to me that the changes you describe can be attributed to changes in humidity. In dry air (in the hold of an aircraft and then in the mid-west in winter) the reed pan wood will gradually dry out and shrink. When the humidity rises (in the spring and summer in the mid-west) the wood will swell again. It was made in Ireland where the humidity is always high, air-freighted to the US and then experienced a mid-west winter. The wood drying out and shrinking probably caused the reed to be loose in its slot. This problem will likely re-occur next winter unless you can find a way to keep it in a stable environment - ideally between 45% and 55% humidity. You can either use an instrument case humifier or you can use room humidifiers - which are better for humans.

You missed the bit where I said: The sensitivity of the Striso board allows for an impressive variety of sounds, even from a single key. The tone responds to finger pressure, and subtle left-right and back-forth movement as variations in loudness, pitch and timbre. The keys of the Striso are carefully designed and have a unique feel. The horizontal ridge helps you keep orientation to play in tune, while their flexibility gives you exactly the right amount of haptic feedback. There is also a motion sensor in the Striso that can be used to get dynamic effects.

I am very impressed by the work that Didi is doing on his double Striso prototype configured as a very large Hayden duet. It does not have bellows but each button has the ability to both change volume and to bend its note. A single Striso costs about 500 euros/US dollars so the double at about US$1,000 would cost a lot less than a mid-range hybrid concertina and I imagine could be mass produced for considerably less than that. See: https://youtube.com/channel/UCgZQA0NWrSlhziyANH9zzSw and https://www.striso.org/

You could try phoning him: By telephone – from 10.00am – 6.00pm – 01650511888 (Sat and Sun I may be out – do leave a message) I think that would be 011 44 650511888 from North America. There is also a huge timezone difference between Washington state and the UK, e.g. 8 hours between Seattle and London so 6:00pm UK time is 10:00 am in Seattle so you need to call him before 10:00am your time. Erm... I don't think that he is trying to compete with Amazon...

I guess that we are all "infra dignitatem" then ...

Thank you for this video, I have looked at many videos on accordion and melodeon tuning but this is the first that I have seen that clearly demonstrates the reed lifting tools and the process involved. I will try to make myself some lifting tools. I think that the the German style ones could be made out of some sacrificial feeler guage 'tongues' and I have some old dental picks that might be usable for the Italian style lifter. I am still not clear on how to tune concertina reeds in their 'natural environment' unless I reassemble the concertina at every step of the filing process. The author of this video was asked about that in a comment, this was the reply: rather than a tuning bellows I normally use the instrument itself: bass with bellows attached, standing on its feet and strapped to the table to prevent it from moving around. I look forward to any more information that you can provide, especially on how to do the filing and test the tuning in place. Do you have to reassemble the concertina frequently? I suspect that all of us who own a Morse concertina will find this information useful one day.

True, but in an accordion they are in removeable reed blocks and you can get at the inside reed tongue from inside the block. And you can put the entire reed block on the tuning table while you are filing or scratching the reed. I don't understand how you can do that in a concertina where the reeds are waxed down to the back of the action board.

I recently complained that my Beaumont has waxed in accordion reeds that I was reluctant to service because of the difficulty of removal and reinstallation. While researching for that post I stumbled across a photo essay on this very topic buried deep inside the Concertina Connection web-site: http://www.concertinaconnection.com/reed exchange instructions.htm#

The first concertina that I bought was a Jack, I traded that for an Elise then I bought a Peacock and then sold that to buy a Beaumont. I still have the Elise and the Beaumont. I remember liking the sound of the Jack and I sometimes think that maybe I should have kept it, but I really only have the time and ability to work on one system at a time. There is a huge difference between the Jack/Elise models and the Peacock/Beaumont. The latter are much smoother, easier and faster to play. I pull out the Elise from time to time and while it is OK it is harder work to play. The Peacock and the Beaumont are quite similar in many respects and if I had not had the opportunity to buy a used Beaumont locally for a good price then I expect that I would still be happily playing the Peacock. I prefer the Beaumont because it has a bigger range, larger buttons and a better finish to the wood. OTOH a Peacock is much easier to maintain than a Beaumont, the reeds are all screwed down flat on the back of the action board while the reeds on the Beaumont are waxed in place and some of them are in accordion style reed blocks. I need to fine tune a couple of the reeds on my Beaumont and reset a couple more and I keep putting off doing the job as it is not that simple to get at the reeds. If I were buying a new Peacock then I might try to afford the version with the french polished wood rather than the oiled wood finish on the standard version. Over time I found that the oiled wood picked up dirt from my hands and it seemed to get into the oiled finish. Wim Wakker has mused about making a larger Peacock but I do not know if this is still a possibility, might be worth checking with him. Just re-reading your post. The Peacock does not feel 'cheap', it has nice metal-capped buttons and good quality leather bellows. The reeds are quality hand made Italian reeds. It comes in a solid hard-case. I just do not like the 'natural' finish and feel that the upgrade cost to the french polished finish is a bit steep. You really have no other choice in a new Hayden at this time, hopefully this will change soon.

Alan made a series of recordings on how he teaches folks to play by ear, you can download a copy of these recordings from here. David Barnert has transcribed these recordings to standard notation and these scores are included in the download.

If you go the "The Session" and open the tab on Sessions then you can put in a day of the week and a town and it will tell you what sessions are on that night. https://thesession.org/sessions

I have a 1950's era Crabb with (I assume) Nickel Silver ends. It is not tarnished at all but it does have some fairly deep scratches around the end bolt holes where someone has been very clumsy with their screwdriver. Can these scratches be polished out? If so, what should I use? (I hate slotted screws, they are the work of the devil!)