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Twizzle

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Everything posted by Twizzle

  1. I'm planning on being there Friday. Unfortunately have plans Saturday night. Been a while since I've been to the coffeehouse even though I live in SP like Tom, as it turns out. I could bring my Carroll if anyone wants to check it out. Howard
  2. Malcolm, I'm playing mostly Morris and English tunes mostly on the right side of the Anglo. My melodeon is an A/D and my concertinas are G/D and Bb/F. But I play everything as if it's in the same key pretty much.
  3. I played button accordion off and on (mostly off) for three decades and a couple of years ago started playing Anglo. Now I'm having trouble with melodeon because the pull notes are higher than the push notes, which is opposite of what it is on the Anglo. To make playing melodeon easy again I'm afraid I'd have to abandon the Anglo for a while and then I'd have to relearn Anglo at some point. Is it just that my aged, hard-wired synapses just can't be flexible enough to deal with both systems at the same time? Anyone else have this problem and can offer suggestions? Noticed typo in title - should be "ruined".
  4. Singing throughout public school, college and with symphony choruses. Also in bars on Morris tours. Clarinet, which in high school turned into Eb contrabass clarinet. Even played bari sax parts on it nad the trombone part in The Three Penny Opera. D/A button accordion, anglo concertina, tin whistle. Smatterings of piano, fiddle. I do a pretty good Dylan imitation, which doesn't count as singing.
  5. But I play an A/D. (Picked up in Oxford in '78 while Morris dancing across the pond.) And I have an Android phone. Boy, I feel left out.
  6. Jim, I'd like to make it if only to make fun of the baldricks (although I do like the Metro patches). It's a really busy weekend but if I make it I'll bring a box.
  7. When are you Foggies going to grow up and wear full length pants? Matt tried to recruit me as I'm semi-local but I told him the breeches are a deal-breaker. I heard at G'Ville that the Newts had a good time at the Cherry Festival.
  8. Michael, I have a G/D and a Bb/F. Melodeon is an A/D. (I was told it was D/G when I bought it in Oxford.) AS I play by myself, I don't usually think of what key the instrument is. In other words, I play almost everything as though I'm playing a G tune on a G/D instrument and transpose the key in my head.
  9. I've been reading this thread with interest, amusement and frustration. I am a big supporter of intellectual property rights for some things (books, music, art) but not other things (e.g. cancer cells) but an open source part of me says, "fingering for an instrument"? Anyways, I'm not here to get involved in the issue. I'm picking up the Anglo at what my sons would say is an advanced age. Things don't come as easily or as quickly as they used to. Having played melodeon off and on for 30 years (Morris tunes) I didn't need to cross rows very much. I'm finding with the Anglo that I will need to cross rows for some of the non-Morris tunes I'm learning. I know there is no substitute for a lot of practicing but I'm wondering what are the best resources (books, DVDs, etc.) available for someone who isn't going to get to a workshop to help jump start the process? I don't want to pick up bad habits that will be hard to unlearn. I did that with piano when I was a teenager. I taught myself to play because I wanted to compose music, but when I started to take lessons so I could play and compose better I had a lot of bad habits to unlearn.
  10. Michael, Any thoughts to making this an Android app for us Droid users?
  11. This isn't exactly ITM vs. ETM but... I got my new (and only) Anglo from a forum member yesterday. I hadn't picked one up in 30 years but have been playing melodeon sporadically for that long. I took the instrument out last night to give it a try and found it pretty easy to play a couple of Morris tunes on the right hand, although the pull notes are a button off compared to the melodeon. I tried playing two button chords on the left hand and was all over the place seeing what things sounded like (a mixed metaphor I know) without thinking about what notes I was playing. On the melodeon it was pretty much 1-4-5-1 with the occasional extra chord thrown in where needed. But improvising on the Anglo some of the chords sounded "normal" (G-C-D-A), some sounded awful but some although not traditional harmonically, totally sounded "right" and gave the tune a whole other feel. I got really excited about the possibilities for playing "outside the box" (sorry).
  12. IMO G/D is the way to go for all fiddle and dance tunes regardless of origin... if you fancy: * the greatest range of play (high/low), * you want to play with self accompaniment, * you want to play in the keys that most are playing in. I'm pretty sure W. Kimber played many tunes in C that we now are used to playing in other keys. The problem is not playing in D. D is a fine key on the C/G for some tunes. The problem with the C/G for "melody on the RHS and chords on the LHS" play is mostly one of range. In the keys that most folks play fiddle or dance tunes, the melody gets too high on the C/G to be taken seriously or too low to fit on the right hand. Also, to play in those keys on the C/G requires some crafty tricks like cheating the melody to a harmony note at need or jumping octaves for whole sections. The G/D does not need to do that as often because its range fits the "melody on the RHS and chords on the LHS" model of play. BTW, a better name for this style I think is HARMONIC STYLE for reasons we could discuss. G/D Anglos can be a tad slower to respond than C/Gs, but with a decent instrument that delay is just a few scant milliseconds and I have never had a problem with it. As for "you might as well play a D/G melodeon as play a G/D concertina. Is a G/D just a more portable box?" They are very different beasts both in timbre and in how they handle accompaniment. The melodeon with its standard 8 button bass is a clever system but crude when compared to the subtle accompaniment possibilities of the 30 button Anglo. I like the 38 button variety because it goes even further in that direction but 30 is quite enough and even 20 will do for many tunes. As for on the row/cross row issues, I think you will find that regardless of style or key, cross row playing will quickly become required if you want to play the whole instrument and get the best music out of it. Good luck with your new G/D. When do you get it? What make? Jody, it's a 32 key metal-ended Lachenal that sounds very nice from what I've heard played on it. I should hopefully have it before the end of the year. I've been playing a D/A melodeon off an on for quite a while. My question concerning comparison between boxes and concertinas was in response to what others had written. Because of the box background, I'll probably start off playing melody RHS and chords LHS.
  13. Not trying to be cute here. I'm new and trying to sort this all out, especially as I'm getting a G/D (not for ITM session playing). I'm talking about playing in G and D. Is there an English (or American) style that makes sticking more to a single row than the Irish C/G method preferable? Some have said that you might as well play a D/G melodeon as play a G/D concertina. Is a G/D just a more portable box?
  14. Æ: Alt-146 æ: Alt-145 Interesting! It's always been my understanding that Windows required 4-digit codes (though the first digit seems always to be 0) to get characters using the Alt key. And Leonard, your codes don't work for me. In fact, my browser seems to be interpreting them as commands of some sort, shifting me to previously opened pages. In Old English AE was a separate letter. Some of the pre-Norman Conquest kings had names beginning with it such as Aethelred the Unready and Aethelstan.
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