English or Anglo

[shaunw]

Shaun, the initial poster also stated he might want to go to ITM summer schools, so your answer also have to take that into account. With the anglo probably better for ITM (until you prove me otherwise, and not only with words) and the english probably better for 'full access' to jazz, the answer isn't as clear as you seem intent on making us believe. A tradeoff will be required by Hyp, no matter what he chooses, and it's for him to decide based on different views in this thread. I also feel your views are based a lot on theory Shaun, and theory doesn't always represent reality.

 

What I'd be curious to know from someone who actually plays ITM on anglo AND english... doesn't the fact that the buttons are more spread out on the english make it a bit harder to play at speed and avoid unwanted button changes? You don't have to cover mush space on the anglo, and often the same button can be used to play two different notes in a row.

 

I have already admitted in previous posts that someone who wants to go to ITM summer schools will need an Anglo. However when people

say things like an Anglo with 30 buttons is chromatic and can play all chords then I just wonder what planet they are on. As to ITM

being easier on an Anglo none of the ITM EC session players I know think that this is true, but what do they know since they don't

own an Anglo. I don't have to prove that an EC is as good as an Anglo when playing ITM any more than you have to prove that an Anglo

is as good as an EC. We already know from experience and from recordings that both can equally be used for ITM.

 

So theory doesn't represent reality. Tell that to all the professors of Quantum physics and remember that the next time you use a

computer that a computer is your reality and that it came from their theory.

 

Wheatstone, a professor of physics, who was well used to theory, made and sold both Anglos and English Concertinas. He invented the

English concertina because he wanted to make an instrument that was fully chromatic and suitable for playing all sorts of music in

any key. He knew that Anglos are diatonic instruments no matter how many buttons they have. When someone advertises an Anglo for sale

they often tell you which two keys it is tuned to. Nobody selling an English mentions which keys it is tuned to because it can play

it in any key. I prefer to go with Wheatstone on this. I think he and his former partner Louis Lachenal really knew about concertinas

and what they were suitable for.

 

The only point I have ever tried to make in my posts is that if the original questioner wants to play jazz standards then he needs

an English Concertina. If he is prepared to give up the idea of playing jazz and just concentrate on ITM then any sort of concertina

will do. I own both sorts of concertina and I don't care what he buys but I don't want him to be misled.

 

With regard to speed, ITM is not a speed contest although you wouldn't know that from many of the amateur musicians who play it.

They play it as though they can't wait to get to the end of the tune. They play at the same relentless volume all the way through.

They play like culchies digging a ditch.

[Azalin]

We already know from experience and from recordings that both can equally be used for ITM.

 

Actually, I don't. Coul you point me out to such ITM recordings on the english concertina?

[Larry Stout]

Wheatstone, a professor of physics, who was well used to theory, made and sold both Anglos and English Concertinas.

 

Lachenal and Jones made anglos early on, but, if I remember correctly, Wheatstone didn't. In particular, I don't believe that they made any anglos in Charles Wheatstone's lifetime.

[JimLucas]

So theory doesn't represent reality. Tell that to all the professors of Quantum physics and remember that the next time you use a computer that a computer is your reality and that it came from their theory.

Theory can be used to describe reality. Sometimes it can even be used to predict and design new "reality" (as in computer technology). But that doesn't guarantee that all theories represent reality. (It was once well accepted that the earth was the center of the universe and that a heavy ball would fall faster than a light one, but those theories were eventually proved false.)

 

Wheatstone... invented the English concertina because he wanted to make an instrument that was fully chromatic and suitable for playing all sorts of music in any key.

Did he, really? I know of no historical record that he stated that as his purpose. Meanwhile, the "keyboard" layout he designed -- what we concertina players usually call either the "English system" or the "Wheatstone system" -- was initially diatonic (see figures 1 and 2 of his 1929 patent), to which he then added the accidentals, resulting in a fully chromatic instrument. (Side note: "Diatonic" here is the musical meaning of a diatonic scale, not the more recent free-reeder confusion with bisonoric.)

 

He knew that Anglos are diatonic instruments no matter how many buttons they have.

How could he possibly have known that? The earliest example of what we now call an "anglo" concertina didn't yet exist when Wheatstone sold the first of what we now call "English concertina".

 

When someone advertises an Anglo for sale they often tell you which two keys it is tuned to. Nobody selling an English mentions which keys it is tuned to because it can play it in any key.

Not nobody. While it is rare to mention the key when describing an English, there are transposing instruments where the central key (that occupying the two central columns of buttons) is something other than C. Bb, Eb, and F are occasionally reported (usually assumed for use with music written for transposing marching band instruments), and I've known of one tuned to A.

 

I prefer to go with Wheatstone on this. I think he and his former partner Louis Lachenal really knew about concertinas and what they were suitable for.

You prefer to go with your fantasy about Wheatstone, which contains several elements that I've just noted are not true. And I suspect it's even more of a fantasy with regard to Lachenal, who was a technician and (as far as I know) never designed a keyboard layout, but manufactured all the major layouts. In fact, the Lachenal company (both the Wheatstone and Lachenal companies continued long after the deaths of their founders) produced more than three times as many anglos as Englishes.

 

Shaun, some of the things you say in your posts may be true, but you do yourself and your arguments no service by throwing in numerous claims that are demonstrably false. That renders everything you say suspect, until it can be independently verified.

 

As for either Wheatstone or Lachenal knowing what the different concertinas "were suitable for", that cannot possibly have included knowing which might be suitable for jazz, since that musical genre didn't exist within their lifetimes.

 

The only point I have ever tried to make in my posts is that if the original questioner wants to play jazz standards then he needs an English Concertina.

And though the English is my own "main squeeze", I maintain that that claim is not true. I would say that recordings of South African players in the Boer tradition nicely disprove that claim. There's some fine anglo playing in a jazz-based style, complete with jazzy harmonies and chords. They may not be the same "jazz standards" that you have in mind, but they do show that such a style is possible. (They most commonly play 40-button anglos, not 30-buttons, but they're still anglos.)

 

As others have mentioned, there are also English players of the anglo -- including but not limited to John Kirkpatrick and Harry Scurfield -- whose chording and harmonizing go far beyond what you seem to think is possible. I've told the story before of the lunchtime session one year at Witney when Harry started playing (and singing) something (I think it was "Frankie and Johnnie", but I no longer remember for certain). I and a Maccann player started playing along, and we were fairly successful, but our faces said we weren't happy... because he was playing in the key of C# ! Harry noticed our faces, and so on the next verse he seamlessly modulated to the key of D.

 

Yes, those things can be done on an anglo, even though most people don't do them. But then, most people don't even try. I hope it's not because they've been discouraged from doing so by arguments like your own.

[David Levine]

I don't have to prove that an EC is as good as an Anglo when playing ITM any more than you have to prove that an Anglo

is as good as an EC.

 

Sorry- you do have to prove that an EC is as good as an Anglo for playing traditional Irish music. That's what this thread is about, or what it has come to. The suitability of the Anglo has been established, though you might not admit that.

 

We already know from experience and from recordings that both can equally be used for ITM.

 

Who plays ITM as well on an EC as on an Anglo? Name just one person who can play, on an English concertina, ITM to the level of Edel Fox, Tim Collins, or Michael O'Raghaillaigh? You can play an Irish tune on a zither but that doesn't make the instrument suitable for the music anymore that playing a Bach cello sonata on the concertina proves that the concertina is better than the cello for that music.

[TomB-R]

Simon Thoumire has already been mentioned, Scottish player of course,

 

 

Wot say, Anglo players all?

 

(Replies that include a link to your own playing will be particularly honoured, of course.)

Edited July 7, 2010 by TomB-R

[Azalin]

Simon Thoumire has already been mentioned, Scottish player of course,

 

 

Wot say, Anglo players all?

 

(Replies that include a link to your own playing will be particularly honoured, of course.)

 

Ah, great stuff. But it's nothing like ITM. Is there a few ITM albums that's been recorded on an english?

[TomB-R]

Simon Thoumire has already been mentioned, Scottish player of course,

 

 

Wot say, Anglo players all?

 

(Replies that include a link to your own playing will be particularly honoured, of course.)

 

Ah, great stuff. But it's nothing like ITM. Is there a few ITM albums that's been recorded on an english?

 

"..nothing like.." ? However pure the one may prefer the drop to be, I feel I hear the thunderous roar of hairs splitting here!

[Jonathan Taylor]

 

Ah, great stuff. But it's nothing like ITM.

 

Why not?

[Azalin]

 

Ah, great stuff. But it's nothing like ITM.

 

Why not?

 

Listen to Tim Collins, Edel Fox, Michael O'Raghallaigh, Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin, Claire Keville, Mary McNamara, Kate McNamara (to name only a fraction of them) for a long while, study their styles, their playing, hang around them, dedicate yourself to their music, and you might understand. It's not something you can explain with words.

 

EDIT: I listed only concertina players, but there's also people like Paddy Fahy, Ed Reavy, Michael Coleman, Vincent Broderick, Patrick Kelly, Wille Clancy, Bobby Casey, Junior Crehan etc etc who had great influence on ITM and who you might want to listen to to get a better idea.

Edited July 7, 2010 by Azalin

[Dave Weinstein]

EDIT: I listed only concertina players, but there's also people like Paddy Fahy, Ed Reavy, Michael Coleman, Vincent Broderick, Patrick Kelly, Wille Clancy, Bobby Casey, Junior Crehan etc etc who had great influence on ITM and who you might want to listen to to get a better idea.

 

You just completely undermined your own case.

 

If the English Concertina is unsuitable for Irish music, there must therefore be something about the instrument that renders it unsuitable. Note that you haven't ever stated what that was. We now know it cannot be the lack of a required "push/pull" bounce, because you are listing musicians who play other instruments which likewise don't have that mechanic.

 

Your argument, as near as I can tell, boils down to two things. One, that there are no "world class" ITM musicians playing on the English Concertina. The other is that the true cognoscenti know the difference.

 

The problem is that that the first argument, if you go back a century and a half, would be the argument against ever playing a Concertina for Irish Music. Not only were there no top tier performers, but the simple fact is that traditional Fiddle music included notes that *no* concertina can play, because the Fiddlers were taking advantage of the fact that their instrument has room to shade notes, and free reed instruments do not. Try playing a C between C# and C on your Concertina, even though that note is played in field recordings we have of traditional fiddlers.

 

Moreover, the odds of any adult learner, on any instrument, becoming a world class musician are extraordinarily slim. I certainly could not see making a decision as to whether or not to pick up an instrument on that basis.

 

The only argument of any weight is that if you are playing on a non-traditional instrument, you have fewer opportunities for instruction. On the other hand, given that the original poster was talking about playing Jazz on the Concertina, it doesn't seem that a need for formal instruction was paramount.

 

The biggest problem is that you are defining things based on the instrument, and not the music.

[Azalin]

EDIT: I listed only concertina players, but there's also people like Paddy Fahy, Ed Reavy, Michael Coleman, Vincent Broderick, Patrick Kelly, Wille Clancy, Bobby Casey, Junior Crehan etc etc who had great influence on ITM and who you might want to listen to to get a better idea.

 

You just completely undermined your own case.

 

If the English Concertina is unsuitable for Irish music, there must therefore be something about the instrument that renders it unsuitable. Note that you haven't ever stated what that was. We now know it cannot be the lack of a required "push/pull" bounce, because you are listing musicians who play other instruments which likewise don't have that mechanic.

 

Well, my last comment was based on the posted clip, and had nothing to do with the current discussion. I simply said the music in the posted clip wasn't even ITM, and people were asking why. I'm just asking for an example of something you can consider ITM, on an english.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by "world class". The musicians I listed might be that, but there are dozens I could list that are not well known, and as valid for my example. When the initial poster said he wanted to play ITM on his concertina, I assume he wants to sound like most ITM musicians that learned their music from some of the players I listed in my last post.

 

Now, if taking a sheet music of an ITM tune and play in on a duet or english (or anglo!) in a garden is considered ITM, then OK... but I think the initial poster should be aware that many wouldn't consider this ITM. As to why? I don't know how to explain. It's like learning a language from a CD, as opposed to learning by spending years in the actual country.

 

But this is diverging to an entire different subject.

 

What I'd really like is for people who say ITM can be played on an english as well as anglo, to give concrete examples of this, not just throw theory around. There are people, like Geoff Wooff, who spent lot of time in Ireland and have a deeper understanding of irish music than I'll ever have, but some others just *think* it can be done, because it seems logical to them. I don't think logic is a proof of anything. My life as a programmer would be much easier if it were the case.

 

EDIT: I realize (about friggin' time!) this discussion can't go anywhere, and that some people on english ask for proof ITM can't be played on it, and some people on anglo ask for proof ITM can be played on english... We can all agree that playing anglo for ITM is a good choice because it's a common instrument and makes workshops, material etc more accessible, the rest is a useless debate.

Edited July 7, 2010 by Azalin

[TomB-R]

Ah, great stuff. But it's nothing like ITM.

 

Why not?

 

Listen to Tim Collins, Edel Fox, Michael O'Raghallaigh, Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin, Claire Keville, Mary McNamara, Kate McNamara (to name only a fraction of them) for a long while, study their styles, their playing, hang around them, dedicate yourself to their music, and you might understand. It's not something you can explain with words.

 

EDIT: I listed only concertina players, but there's also people like Paddy Fahy, Ed Reavy, Michael Coleman, Vincent Broderick, Patrick Kelly, Wille Clancy, Bobby Casey, Junior Crehan etc etc who had great influence on ITM and who you might want to listen to to get a better idea.

 

 

I think you'll have to do rather better than that if you want anyone to take your argument seriously.

 

[Edit] Or are you saying because "ITM" (horrible abbreviation) can only be played on Anglo, QED anyone who doesn't, isn't?

Edited July 7, 2010 by TomB-R

[hjcjones]

When the initial poster said he wanted to play ITM on his concertina, I assume he wants to sound like most ITM musicians that learned their music from some of the players I listed in my last post.

But why should you assume that? If that were indeed the case, then he wouldn't need to ask, the obvious answer would be to get an anglo. But perhaps his interest in ITM and his interest in concertinas are separate.

 

You appear to imply that all ITM should sound the same regardless of what instrument it's played on. But fiddle music is different from flute music or pipe music, for example. Every instrument has its strengths and weaknesses, and players develop styles and even alter tunes to make the best of the former and avoid the latter. Why should ITM on an EC have to sound like ITM on an anglo, any more than an anglo should sound like a flute or a fiddle like the pipes?

 

Now, if taking a sheet music of an ITM tune and play in on a duet or english (or anglo!) in a garden is considered ITM, then OK... but I think the initial poster should be aware that many wouldn't consider this ITM. As to why? I don't know how to explain. It's like learning a language from a CD, as opposed to learning by spending years in the actual country.

 

But that's about understanding the music in depth, and as you point out, applies regardless of instrument. If that understanding can be achieved, which instrument you play doesn't matter. There are plenty of average players on anglo who wouldn't reach the standards you are apparently demanding.

 

EDIT: I realize (about friggin' time!) this discussion can't go anywhere, and that some people on english ask for proof ITM can't be played on it, and some people on anglo ask for proof ITM can be played on english... We can all agree that playing anglo for ITM is a good choice because it's a common instrument and makes workshops, material etc more accessible, the rest is a useless debate.

 

Exactly.

 

So far as the OP is concerned, the answer will depend on which genre he most wants to play. If it's ITM, then anglo would be the first choice, and he will be able to play jazz standards but might have to transpose them into more anglo-friendly keys. On the other hand, if jazz is his first choice then EC or Duet would allow him greater choice of keys and chords, but would be less acceptable in some ITM circles.

[Azalin]

So far as the OP is concerned, the answer will depend on which genre he most wants to play. If it's ITM, then anglo would be the first choice, and he will be able to play jazz standards but might have to transpose them into more anglo-friendly keys. On the other hand, if jazz is his first choice then EC or Duet would allow him greater choice of keys and chords, but would be less acceptable in some ITM circles.

 

Yep, couldn't agree more with that. I also realize the anglo can be quite limited when it comes to jazz, because transposing to 'friendly' keys isn't the same as being able to play in any key you want, especially when you play with people and want to be able to blend in.

[David Levine]

We can all agree that playing anglo for ITM is a good choice because it's a common instrument and makes workshops, material etc more accessible, the rest is a useless debate.

 

Yep. Agreed. See you later. Some people get it and some people don't. Useless debate. Because if you can't hear the difference, nothing said will matter. And if you can hear the difference then that's all that matters. It will be obvious. So I'll grant you the debate on points. But, as I am sure you know, winning the debate isn't worth a corn hole in a cow turd.

 

Have fun. End of thread for me.

[Dave Weinstein]

Some people get it and some people don't. Useless debate. Because if you can't hear the difference, nothing said will matter. And if you can hear the difference then that's all that matters.

 

Someone had best tell the fiddlers then. It's a shame to let them keep working at the impossible.

[Dirge]

Some people get it and some people don't. Useless debate. Because if you can't hear the difference, nothing said will matter. And if you can hear the difference then that's all that matters.

 

Someone had best tell the fiddlers then. It's a shame to let them keep working at the impossible.

 

 

I thought your original points were well made, Dave.