Dan Worrall

Great! We're hearing from a number of others so it looks to be a good year for Old Pal and concertinas.

Hardly even a decent frost here yet, but I'm drawn to images of spring leaves and flowers replacing all of our gray Texas winter landscape. It's time to start thinking about this year's concertina workshop in beautiful Palestine, east Texas: dogwoods, bluebonnets, and free reeds! This year is the 16th year of our annual workshop within the Palestine Old TIme Music and Dulcimer Festival, March 26-28 in the east Texas Pineywoods. This time, we are excited to have Benedict Gagliardi and Armand Aromin from the Rhode Island group Vox Hunters heading south to our workshops. This means we will have classes and sessions for both Anglo AND English concertina this year. Find out more about Benedict, Armand and the Vox Hunters here. Our workshops run from Friday morning through Saturday afternoon, and will include streams for both beginners and more experienced players, as needed. If interested, please send me a message via this site by February 15, saying 1) if you are coming, 2) what system you play, and 3) your experience level. With this information, hopefully by February 15, we can plan out the workshops in more detail, and will send you beforehand the workshop schedule, logistics, and any sheet music. If you have requests or suggestions for a specific type of concertina workshop, let us know and we’ll see what can be done. As in all previous years, we charge $35 for the concertina workshops, on top of the normal Old Pal admittance, which covers the concerts and other activities. Information on the larger Old Pal festival can be found here. It has concerts every day at lunchtime and in the evening, from Thursday evening until Saturday night, plus impromptu sessions at all hours inside and outside the main building. The Vox Hunters will play in the concerts along with a host of old time musicians hailing from the Appalachians westward to Texas. It is a small and very friendly festival, and very accommodating to us concertinists – come ready to play along! All the best, Dan

I'll buy Dowright a whole six pack of Theakston's Mild (whatever that is) if he would write up the notes of his amazing, decades-long Lachenal research for the Concertina Journal! Or is it still too preliminary? Best, Dan

Just saw this thread and tealeaf's query. Thanks Daniel for pointing out where tealeaf can read the most up-to-date version of that Nautical Concertina article -- in my book, The Anglo-German Concertina, a Social History, volume 1. As Daniel mentioned, it can be accessed and read for free on Google Books. The physical book (both volumes) can be purchased on Amazon and at one or two UK and US music stores. That was a fun project, and its product is now 11 years old. The research has held up pretty well. Cheers, Dan

McDouglas, A minor correction to Erica's note. Any concertina workshops are over by 3 or 3:30 latest, typically. Cheers, Dan

Hi David, I hear you, although with all those unspeakable accordions around 😉, I've never counted that as a concertina workshop or weekend per se, like the Button Box used to offer. But point well taken! Cheers, Dan

Today was a cold and frosty morning in Texas…so it must be time to start thinking of springtime in the sleepy east Texas town of Palestine, and our fifteenth annual concertina workshop, which takes place tucked within the wonderful Palestine Old Time Music and Dulcimer Festival, Thursday, March 28 through Saturday, March 30, 2019. We're not sure, but this may be the oldest continuous concertina workshop in North America! Our ‘modus operandi’ at Palestine is to engage a concertinist who can not only teach us but who can entertain as one of the general festival’s headliners and take part in old time jam sessions; in past years our workshops have been graced with such varied folks as Jody Kruskal (many times!), Bertram Levy, Dave Roberts, and Ann Kirrane. We have two full days of concertina workshops and events, along with the festival’s three evening concerts, workshops for instruments of all sorts, and plenty of old time jams. Our concertina workshops are generally oriented toward all systems, with usually some workshops that are Anglo specific. This year, we are very pleased to welcome back by popular demand Ann Kirrane, from Tuam, Co. Galway and Bellharbour, County Clare, Ireland. Ann has a very welcoming way of leading what will be a number of concertina workshops concentrating on tunes in the north Clare concertina style of her father, Chris Droney. That particular playing style lends itself well to all systems, and the emphasis is on the development of clear melody and danceable rhythm. In addition to her concertina playing, Ann is a superb singer, and she’ll be performing during some of the festival’s lunchtime and evening concerts. Here is some more information on Ann: http://www.annkirrane.com/bio.php The concertina workshops are on Friday and Saturday, starting at 9 a.m. each day. As is our usual custom, the concertina players pay $30 for attendance at the workshops, in addition to paying the normal all-weekend admittance to the larger Palestine music festival of which we are a part. The festival website, below, has information on all of the other activities, including evening and lunchtime concerts, dozens of workshops on various old time instruments as well as voice, plenty of impromptu tune sessions, shape-note singing workshops, and many other events. The festival is a small, family-friendly event that takes place in a turn-of-the-(last) century schoolhouse and auditorium. Palestine is a wonderful old lumber and railroad town, and the festival happens near the peak of dogwood season; a drive or walk through Davey Dogwood Park is a must! Lodging information is on the festival website; we recommend asking for the festival rate at the Best Western. There are also campsites and RV parks around town. We only request that you let us know if you are coming, so that we can reserve a slot for you in the workshops; please email either Erica Braverman at eabraverman@gmail.com or Dan Worrall at danworrall@msn.com . We’ll send more details on the workshops, as well as music dots for those wishing them, to those who pre-register. Thanks for supporting this concertina weekend and the Palestine old time music festival! Dan Worrall and Erica Bravermann, organizers Festival website: http://www.oldpalmusic.com/Home.html (information at time of writing is for 2018, but it should be updated soon for 2019).

Ditto thanks from me, Larry. Kimber'as style of playing was exquisite, and it is nice to see some trying to keep his memory alive.

Yes, I check in occasionally, and responded to Larry's note. I donated the Kimber book from its beginning (2005) to the English Folk Dance and Song Society (London), who publish and sell it. As someone mentioned, The Button Box carries it. The version that I uploaded on my former website included the text but only a very few tunes. For Anglo players, might I mention the House Dance CDRom, available for cheap download at The Concertina Journal website? It is without competition in being a repository of 200 recordings of the very earliest recorded Anglo players from England, Ireland, South Africa and Australia. We sell it to help fund the (free) online Concertina Journal website. The text, telling the history of the Anglo's ubiquitous use in playing for house dances in the late nineteenth century, is available free on the Journal website, but the 200 recordings require a $10 donation. I mention this because I keep meeting concertina players who are neither familiar with the new online Concertina Journal or with this tune collection. Here is The Concertina Journal: http://www.concertinajournal.org Here is the text version of House Dance, with instructions on downloading the music: http://www.concertinajournal.org/House_Dance_Text/ Cheers, Dan

Right. That note reminds me to mention that I fixed the crack, and it is playing great now. I also took that time to make a set of higher wooden hand rests for it (1.1 in instead of 0.6 in originally) and that makes all the difference in the world ergonomically. The distance from the hand rest to the buttons of the G row is 1/4 in shorter on a Jeffries than on my Dipper Clare....go figure....and it always felt a little cramped. No longer.

Well done Harry Robinson!

Very nice playing Jody! I hope you'll be bringing some copies to Palestine! For those who have missed that thread, Jody will be joining us in Palestine, Texas March 22-24.

Just an update.... For those attending, make sure to let Erica or me know, so that you'll be on the list for a pre-workshop sendout of the music (and a worskhop schedule). And don't forget to make your hotel reservations...it is a small town so that can be tricky. Recommended is the Best Western, ask for the festival rate. Looking forward to it....spring is almost here! Dan

Quote HaHa...hadn't noticed the back ground. But having just spent 8 years building ( and now completed) a cabin on the very remote west side of Vancouver Island, Marlene said she would like an outdoor shower. All the ones I could buy were stupidly expensive, so for a Christmas present I made her an outdoor steam-punk shower, complete with pressure gauge and heated soap holder. I love being retired ! There is also a Aluminium cello in the background but another story, another time ! Robin, I'd call you a Renaissance Man, but the concertina wasn't around then.............

Robin, Thanks for posting. The bass is amazing! But my question for you relates to the last video; what is all that copper piping behind you? Have you and your new bass been thrown into the garage, or perhaps a bathroom, by an unsympathetic relative??? Best, Dan