CesarPim

Thanks a lot mutt. Your experience and info will be very valuable for my decision.

Yes, geography is a problem for me. But I have a cheap C/G at home and I can practice both systems in it alone to help with my decision. Thanks for all the info!

Thanks for your input Daniel. My decision is becoming difficult This "strong fingers" thing might be an issue... but on the other hand we have our fingers in a fixed place (almost) all the time. True about that high A. But instead we would have the low E on the pull... which we don't have in the C/G, do we?

Thanks David. It's exactly this kind of info that I wanted to know.

That statement assumes a lot. For example nobody ever had a go on a G/D. (What about the old German concertinas?). That once a system was established everybody put the blinkers on and resisted change (the fact the German concertinas were dumped en masse in favour of the three row Anglo would suggest a different attitude). Yes, I see your point Peter. But there's also no evidence saying that the G/D would NOT have achieved a similar success... Is there any concrete advantage for playing cross row C/G instead of D row G/D, for ITM tunes? I've seen your videos on YouTube where you play with Kitty Hayes; Is she playing on the D row of a D/G? If yes, did you find anything "bad" in her music that could be attributed to her method of playing? Do you think her choice of method made it more difficult for her to evolve? Or perhaps more easy?

Thanks. Though I'm still not decided... it's a big endeavor That's a good point... I guess I would be on my own Nobody would help me My main concern with keys is to be able to play the tunes in the keys they are played at the sessions... F is not very common (at least as far as I am aware...) Thanks.

But was he playing the G/D in the 1st row (D row)? Or he playing it in the usual way as if it was a transposed C/G (meaning that tunes in D become tunes in A and tunes in G become tunes in D)?

That's exactly what I think. If the available instrument at the time would have been a G/D instead of C/G, likewise, Irish players would have adopted D/G and developed techniques that they would now call ITM. My point being that there doesn't seem to be any particular advantage of C/G for ITM, it's just "the chosen one" for historical reasons and habit. If I would now start using a G/D to play ITM, using only the bottom row, the most advanced players (perhaps not so many) would eventually notice that it doesn't sound as they expected. It doesn't sound like what they got used to call ITM. But: a) It doesn't mean it sounds worse; It doesn't mean i will not be able to evolve as quickly (perhaps i'll evolve even more quickly). Do you also think like this?

Boxer. The question you suggest is also very relevant. But before deciding upon that, first I would like to find an answer to my original question.

Hi everybody. I am new to these forums so first let me introduce myself. I am a whistler for almost 4 years (as a hobby), I love and play ITM as often as I can here in Portugal. Recently I have also grown an interest for the anglo concertina and have been gathering a lot of info and studying the potential of this amazing instrument. I have posted the following text on thesession.org but I guess here is where I may find a bigger quantity of experts MY POST IS: I know that it is not new to ask whether I can use G/D for Irish music, instead of C/G. But what if we don't use "the system"? Consider the following situation: - A begginer in anglo concertina (so not yet used to "the system" which means there is no difficulty in changing to another fingering) - Wanting to play mostly Irish tunes in the keys of D and G In what way playing a C/G according to "the system" is better than playing a G/D using a more "single row" fingering? I have seen people saying that with G/D I have one of the following problems: a) either i am playing lower notes and may not be heard during a session or to play in the same octave as others I am playing almost everything with my right hand. But this is not true if I don't use "the system" way of fingering! Consider this diagram that is useful to reference which octave I am talking about: http://www.concertina.net/ms_finger_layouts.html The majority of irish tunes I know are in D and G, and range from note D2 up to B3 (see diagram). With a C/G concertina we typically use "the system" by playing cross row. We play D2,E2,F#2,G2,A2 on the left side and B2,C3/C#3,D3,E3,F#3,G3,A3,B3 on the right side. That's 5 notes on the left and 8 notes on the right. Now with a D/G concertina I can simply use the bottom (D) row (and one button from middle (G) row if I need the Cnat for the key of G). I play D2,E2,F#2,G2,A2,B2 on the left side and C3/C#3,D3,E3,F#3,G3,A3,B3 on the right side. That's 6 notes on the left and 7 notes on the right. So this means that I can play the most common keys and notes in irish music in the same octave as usual (not lower notes) and I don't play more with my right hand (on the contrary, there is one more note on the left). Moreover, if I want to sometimes play ALL notes on the draw (pull), I notice that all the notes I mentioned above (from D2 to B3) are available on the draw (pull) except for one: A3. I think in a C/G I dont even have so many notes available in that direction. Given this situation, in what is a C/G system better if I want to play just in the keys of D and G? Can someone tell me? I searched all threads here and in concertina.net and I cannot find a reason for prefering C/G system either than historical reasons or habit. Please tell me what am I not seeing right. Thanks. Cesar