Peter Laban

That look goes back a long way in kwa-zulu concertinas

I was just listening to Séamus Ennis' 'Ceol, Scéalta Agus Amhrain', it had been a long time, too long, since I last heard it. He gets badly lost in some of the tunes but, being the musician he was, he always finds his way back. It doesn't detract from the magnificence of the playing but I am not sure many others could get away with that sort of thing.

If you want to know what 'people do' the only way is to listen to as many players as you can and compare what way they take through a tune. You haven't specified at all which music, style etc you want advice about so don't be surprised you receive a wide range of replies. As far as Irish music goes, there are lots of ways to get through a tune. But it depends on the tune, the type of tune, style etc how you go about avoiding certain notes. Pretty much as I indicated earlier. There"s no one size fits all solution. It depends on the function the notes have in the tune. It's much easier to avoid passing notes that have a less important function in the tune. The transposing suggestion was in response to the specific question on how to approach The road to Lisdoonvarna. In that tune there was an important melodic function for some of the C#s. So if you have a specific tune you want to know about, ask. But don't expect a detailed answer to such a wide ranging unspecified general question. There are more ways to skin this particular cat.

http://www.wheatstone.co.uk/wheatstone/spares-repairs/fittings.htm

I don't think there should be any qualms about playing a tune in a key that suits your instrument or your playing best, or one that brings out a side of the tune, a mood or whatever, other than the 'usual'. People do it all the time. Especially when talking about something as simple 'The Road to Lisdoonvarna', which is easy to transpose on the fly.

Avoiding the C# completely isn't always viable. There is no single, one size fits all solution to the issue. Best to find the solution best suited to a particular situation. The single jig The Road to Lisdoonvarna was clearly taken from the reel of the same name (or All the way to Galway, which was the name given to the tune in older collections). The reel is set a tone lower and the single jig sits well in that key. Perhaps that would be the way to go if you want to play the tune at all and are stuck without the C#.

While it's a good example of old style players making do with the notes they had, it's not quite the same problem. Kitty never used (the equivalent of) a C natural, (the Bb in this key). So she did use the C# all the time. There's an example of how to avoid the issue: Kitty had heard 'Garrett Barry's version of Miss McLeod' (I believe it was Edel Fox who played it on television) and wanted to learn it. When I 'd call to the house, as I did once or twice a week, she always had some tunes she heard on Clare FM, on telvision or somewhere else that she suggested we'd practise. I had 'Garrett Barry's reel' as Willie Clancy played it, a version depending on very prominent C naturals that just wouldn't work in her playing. I got around the problem by making up a version of the tune on the spot, avoiding the note altogether and Kitty was quite happy with that. That version made it onto the CD we recorded. The version almost took on a life of it's own when the late Howard Marshall, who wrote the book on Garrett Barry, wanted to use the recording for his presentation of the book. In his thinking it must have been how Garrett played it as Kitty had grown up hearing her father play with Gilbert Clancy, Willie's father, who had a lot of Garrett's tunes, so she must have learned it there. I had tell him we made the version up ourselves, much to his disappointment.

I am sure there's a joke in there somewhere around learning by ear or from reading. But never mind. Bringing up Coleman's music when making a case for non 'fancy' , relatively unadorned playing strikes me as a fool's errand but what do I know.

The Northumbrian Pipers' society's 'The fiddling music of James Hill' says :

You could try their website's video page.

This is an academic doing fieldwork, not a performance. The collectio existed for years before the name change, that is why it puzzles me. But I suppose he decided at one point he wanted to be known by a different first name. Delaney, Chris or otherwise, visited his informants at home and mostly recorded them playing on their own. Willie played solo, at least on the tapes that were available during the nineties. I have most of the typed index sheets that used to accompany the tapes at the time, although I am not sure at this stage where some of them are. I remember someone remarking Delaney didn't get the best from his subjects and I think I agree with that. There's enough to enjoy though. While I haven't listened to the tapes for more than 20 years, I remember them as having some enjoyable moments. The very young James Kelly showed he already had his sense of melodic variation,for example, or at least I remember that was one of the things that struck me at the time.

Miltown Malbay, Co Clare 9-11 February 2024 Programme 2024

There's something odd about that. I got copies of the collection during the later 1990s from the Uni of NC ($2.50 for a cassette copy). It was always Chris Delaney and only recently he became 'Kevin' for reasons that are beyond me. Anyhow, it's worth checking the ITMA catalogues for recordings. There are some Dwyer recordings floating around. I have a rake of Nell Galvin recordings but have yet to hear her play the concertina. Ritchie Piggott has built a great collection around his project documenting the Chicago players of the previous century. His book is a milestone. Not a great deal of concertina playing though. Also, Doireann ní Ghlacaín and Sara Flynn did a project around several female players, resulting in their recording 'The Housekeepers'. I have been at a presentation they did, very interesting stuff. I there was a recording of Nora Hurley, a life long frifnd of EMO'D, included in the talk, nice tunes she had too. That may lead you to some of the players you were asking about, or at least to more information about them. Only just now noticed the OP was from 2011. Ah well.

Just as a reminder, University College Cork (UCC) has a site for Connie O'Connell which has all his compositions, recordings of the tunes etc etc Worth going over, he has made many good tunes.

The V&A has the matching outfit:

Musical tea/coffee pots seem to have been a clown thing at some point in time. Here's a thread on Chiffandfipple dealing with a whistling pot : Whistling pot

There are more ways to skin this particular cat, ie to play the concertina. Ask yourself who your favourite concertinaplayers are, who's style of playing you would like to emulate and then find resources that will set you on a path towards that goal. That would be a good place to start, I believe.

I didn't suggest there aren't any circumstances where the use of these is justifiable. If you want to summit Everest or Kilimanjaro and play your concertina there (someone recently played the Irish harp on Kilimanjaro to get herself into the record books, for example), in other words: if you plan on getting yourself into extreme environments, they may have a use. But, to my mind, there are more elegant solutions available to the average concertinaplayer to keep their instrument safe when at home and going out to play a session or gig(s). I remember someone telling me at some point about their case 'you could drive a tank over it'. I replied that if you ever find yourself in a situation where an issue like that arises, you have more pressing issues to worry about. Overkill for most uses, I'll stick with that. But YMMV ofcourse.

They always seem, to me anyway, tremendous overkill for almost all situations the average concertinaplayer will find themselves in. And they are ugly too.

Perhaps a confusing question on a concertina forum. Are you planning on playing just the regulators or do you intend to play just chords on a concertina? Both would be, well, unusual approaches. Perhaps, as suggested above, ask the people you intend to play with first and see what they think.

The tune doesn't ring any bells with me. If I have heard it before it hasn't left an impression. It's a simple one though easy to pick up if you fancy it but for the time being I think it will have to join the ranks of the gan ainms (the fact that it isn't named on the comhaltas site suggests that as well).

There are several videos marked #662 https://comhaltas.ie/search/results/9cf6616e978361ba22606ad434daf07a/ Indicating which one you are looking at would be helpful I assume it is this one (their's is the only unnamed jig in the selection) : https://comhaltas.ie/music/detail/comhaltaslive_662_11edel_conway_nell_kettle_and_fionn_connolly/

It wouldn't harm to find out. I have heard him explain it at some point but as I said I don't fully remember the details. I don't think it's a matter of extra notes but there were levers that could instantly switch the thing from bisonoric to uni sonoric, things for note bending etc. Some serious customisation anyway.

Have you looked at what Cormac Begley uses? I remember he had some nifty customisation although I can't remember exactly what it was.

IMDb lists all musicians involved here. I don't recognise the name of any concertina player I know, but YMMV. I do see the name of someone, an uilleann piper, I do know. Hm, I wonder, will have to ask her about that.