RAc

Thanks for the correction, Dana, of course you are right. Will edit the misleading posting asap. @All: I stand defeated. corrected.* One does not need tension to coil springs which I had a chance to see in practice when I visited David Robertson last summer. He uses a low tech jig like the ones depicted in this thread and makes perfect springs with just a pair of pliers, the jig and wire, nothing else... * as well as meta-corrected...

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Very idiosyncratic music in either case, thanks for posting, and I noticed that the video was recorded at my alma mater's location. Way to go, Hoosiers! SCNR

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Howard - just for completeness's sake, let's untangle the issues - are you taking offense by the mere fact that the number of posts is being made public, or by the arbitrary names attributed to the categories? Your argument about the loose relationship between the number of posts and the credibility of a member (which I basically agree with, but see below) seems to imply the former; if the names were removed and the numbers retained, your argument would still hold. Nevertheless, even though either information may not be useful, I don't see a lot of harm in keeping it either; it is up to every user to look at the information or not. Whether it's the signup date, the activity, the circle of friends and (in some forums) a karma system of some sort - all of this information is an offer to the reader to make up his or her mind whether a given post may or may not be worth reading, but it's just that - an offer that can (and normally is) accepted or declined at the reader's discretion, so I vote for keeping it. If, on the other hand, it's not the bare information about the activity but the putting in in terms (or more specific, the particular term's it's put into) that you take offense in - well ok. Some of the titles appear goofy to me, but their choice gives me as a person interested in language and its use a hint about the personality of those running the forum, which is also a piece of additional information as well as a personalization and de-digitalization of the forum. Both I personally consider valuable.

If you are refering to my comment Rudiger, then I am suggesting that the Hayden keyboard is the easiest to get started on. When my first Hayden arrived it had hardly come out of the packaging before my wife took hold of it, asked how the button layout was and imediately began playing tunes. For the next half an hour I did not get to try my new instrument for the first time... must add that my wife had never played a button instrument before. I'm sorry for being unclear, Geoff. I was referring to the last sentence in Steve's initial posting. Unfortunately my browser swallowed the quote, otherwise it would have been obvious. No disagreement here, I guess. I once had a stab at a Hayden and found it fairly easy to crank out a melody as well. I think I'll stick to the Crane though.

Define "easier." I have a similar biography, and I found that a duet provides the most natural transition from the guitarist's point of view; the left hand side of the duet concertina corresponds to the guitarist's right hand thumb, whereas the duet concertinist's right hand is the counterpart of the guitarist's right hand fingers. That's about as close as one gets to the guitar. Then again, the instrument is in itself dramatically different from a guitar to begin with; I have no trouble at all separating the right hand thumb from the fingers on the guitar, but learning to play both left and right hand on the concertina felt like learning to walk again, and bellows control (the musical counter part of string attack) is a science in itself. So you are looking at some work in the first place and thus might as well take up the additional challenges inherent in anglo (I am one of those who can't make heads or tails of bisonoric instruments) or English playing. Just my 0,02. Whatever you choose, enjoy and take every note seriously (just like one should do on any instrument).

very lovely, Alan (I am always tempted to add "as was to be expected.") I especially like the rhythmic variation in measure 7 in the B part. Hope to be able to write the piece down at some point! May I ask who Ro is?

Phrygian (aside from Locrian for which I couldn't name a single example) is the one mode for which I do have seriuos trouble coming up with an example. The only one I think *may* be Phrygian would be Joan Baez's Diamonds and Rust. Am I correct? Does anyone have other ("better") examples? Thanks!

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Interesting, thanks for sharing - sort of made me recall a book I'd read about lumbering in the NE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Night_in_Twisted_River Many things in this world have been and will be gone, gone forever. Stories about those is all that'll remain. Good they persevere...

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Hi John, thanks again for your (dare I write "as was to be exptected" ?) insightful response. The thing that strikes me about your elaborations though is your implication that it's a matter of have or have not (and the corollary "don't bother if you don't"). While it is trivially true that some individuals have a better natural predisposition for music than others, it doesn't mean (in my humble opinion) that those who don't aren't able to "get there" (certainly not as far but with appropriate guidance quite a long way). Here is a case in point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsD6uEZsIsU This is one of the classics of modern fingerstyle guitar. Andy is an incredibly gifted player with a very unique right hand technique that employs extremly subtle attack variations. Just by trying to recreate the piece from tablature means you'd never get anywhere close to the authentic sound. Now there's a series of tutorials that dissect this very piece down to the atomic level. One might wish to have a look at part two at around 5:40 : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5qp3Pp8L4o Here the author shares his analysis of some right hand techniques employed by the artist. Although the tutorial is kind of lengthy, there are true gems in it that'll present even the seasoned guitarist with novel techniques, allowing him/her to incorporate the techniques into his/her own playing (just to make sure, I'm not the person who put up the tutorials nor do I know him nor do I have a personal interest in advertising his videos, I just think he does a great job). I'm fairly certain that a good number of the better covers of the piece on Youtube benefitted directly from the insights provided here. I guess I'm looking for advice on that level (well, already on less elaborate levels would serve my current demands) in terms of how to employ bellows. There were some great ideas and pointers (thanks to Jody - whose lessons I do remember and value of course just like Kurt's - as well everybody else who contributed to the discussion) in this thread. And yes, Jody is both a master of bellows control and an advocate of its value and importance as I had the honor to find out while working with him. In any case, the resonance generated by my initial quest to me seems to be an indicator that indeed there seems to be an interest for more coverage on the issue among at least concertina players. Thanks everybody for this delightful conversation, and keep sharing your knowledge!

Hi there, thanks for the response, very much appreciated! I'm very aware of the issue, being myself an owner of both a 6 fold 48 button Lachenal and a 55 button 8 fold Aeola Crane. You are absolutely right - it makes a tremenous difference, but I also tend to think of a higher volume box as some kind of cheat, knowing in the bottom of my heart that the accordeonist I referred to initially would without any question be able to make something decent of the small box as well. Sometimes I feel that the smaller box forces me to be more diciplined due to its limitations; if I learned to play that one properly, I'd most likely have a better overall control also for the large one. Do you agree?

ok, so I take it that one possible exercise would be to take a piece one already knows really well (so the focus on bellows work is not distracted by concurrent memorizing effort) and deliberately attempt several variations of, example given, "thrust force" (in lack of a better term) or direction changes (of course the latter one wouldn't work well with bisonoric instruments)? As for the topic of cutting off notes, this has been depicted as bad playing practice by the aforementioned protege... I take it that (since there is no rule without an exception) this would qualify as one of the things that you can do when you know exactly what you are doing?... Could you elaborate a little more on the envelope curve and how it translates onto concertina playing (if need be via PM)? Thanks so much!

This is very interesting and intriguing, Wolf, thanks a lot! However, it is still fairly vague. When you write "The key issue will then be mastering bellows control hand in hand with holding a steady beat" you still assume that the term "Bellows Control" already HAS a defined meaning, which means you take the answer to my question for granted and stack a new question on top of it... that still doesn't give me a good grip on bellows control, I'm ashamed to confess...

Well, there is no point in debating the importance of listening for music. Music IS listening; the better one trains one's ear, the better a musician he or she becomes. This is almost too trivial to state... Still I don't see how this answers my question. Certainly the most talented violinists (as well as masters of other instruments of course) have learned their trade by ear and deducted the technique from what they heard (or in extremly rare cases developed new techniques), but that doesn't change anything about the fact that the relationship between the technique and the resulting sound can (after having been listened to of course) be analyzed and re-conveyed, and exactly that should be one of the tasks of instruction, and I do see a huge discrepancy between what instruction does in this respect and what it could do...

Hi all, I had a chance to talk to an extremly talented and proficient (while yet still rather young) accordeon player on the issue of bellows control. As it turns out, he is able to control the tone of his instrument masterfully via bellows control, getting the full tone and volume spectrum out of the instrument with virtually invisible differences in bellows action (ie for the outside observer, there is no visible difference in bellows attack and pressure even though the sounds produced are radically different). No surprise that he had a go on my Crane and within a few minutes was able to play a rundimentary tune with the same superior bellows control; eg while I frequently run out of air when playing louder passages, he hadn't even worked the bellows half way in and produced a far clearer and (for the louder passages) even louder note. It appears to me that the effect of bellows control is similar to the effect of the right hand in (right-handed) guitar playing. Those of you who play the guitar will know what I refer to; a good guitarist will use the right hand very subtly to control the tone, introduce grooves, percussive effects, volume and 95% of everything else. There is a very true saying in guitarist's circles that says "your left hand is what you know and your right hand is what you are." Or conversely, there are a number of guitarists who have a super fast and extremly dexterious (is it spelled that way?) left hand yet their music sounds somewhat meaningless, whereas some guitarists get away with only three and a half chords but make amazing and truly beautiful music by emplyoing their right hand masterfully. As someone who has attended a lot of workshops held by world class guitarists, I understand that the effect of the right hand is amazingly underrated and understated. Many guitarists will go at length explaining their left hand chord positions, changes and fingering techniques while handwaving the right hand away (when questioned they'll frequently say things like "oh well, I just pluck this," disregarding the fact that they choose one of a great number of possible plucking techniques for any given note they "pluck"). The issue of bellows control with pneumatic free reed instruments appears to be treated similarly. Virtually everyone I've talked to so far will handwave questions about bellows control away, giving some kind of generic answer like "oh well, no big deal, it'll come over time." The adverse interpretation would be that a lot of folks know about it but are unwilling to give away secrets of their trade; a more benevolent interpretation would be that they aren't themselves aware of the issue and therefore seriously don't consider it a big deal. Most tutors I have browsed give the issue peripheral attention at best. Nevertheless, I am now certain that bellows control neccessarily is the secret to good concertina playing (for obvious reasons that holds true especially for bisonoric concertinas but also applies to for unisonoric ones) as well as a topic of almost infinite depth. Is anyone aware of sources such as YT videos, Skype teachers, books or tutorials that address the issue of bellows control beyond obvious superficial beginners hints such as "schedule direction changes such that long notes or phrases fit into one draw or push?" I'm happy to also receive responses via PM. Thanks!

I like this a lot, chas! You're really taking this piece places, probably will blow a few fuses along the way, but it's seriously something different in the best sense of the word! Thumbs up!

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That was lovely, thanks for posting. Which player is you? Don. no, sorry for the misunderstanding - that was not me nor anybody I know playing (I wished but that won't help...) I just found the tune when searching for Sonderhoninger (the name under which the set was made known to us) on Youtube. But thanks anyways for even considering the possibility that I was involved in that video - already compliment enough... :-)