An Interesting One At Ebay!

[conzertino]

There is an interesting concertina at ebay:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-C-Wheatstone-antique-concertina-w-case-superb-condition-/181124434780?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a2bdb8b5c

 

It seems to be some kind of a duet-system but held like a ES...

 

 

[Wolf Molkentin]

It seems to be some kind of a duet-system but held like a ES...

 

Funny - it seems to just have diveded the octave (including all semitones) into three parts thus arranging the (semi-) notes chromatically ascending, one following the other, resulting in ascending major thirds in the vertical order. Might work - I would really like to hold it in my hands and give it a try...

 

(and yes, it would be a Duet then)

Edited April 18, 2013 by blue eyed sailor

[spindizzy]

There is an interesting concertina at ebay:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-C-Wheatstone-antique-concertina-w-case-superb-condition-/181124434780?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a2bdb8b5c

 

It seems to be some kind of a duet-system but held like a ES...

 

 

 

Maybe someone just took it to bits and put all the coloured buttons back at random!

A serial number would be good.

[SteveS]

There is an interesting concertina at ebay:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-C-Wheatstone-antique-concertina-w-case-superb-condition-/181124434780?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a2bdb8b5c

 

It seems to be some kind of a duet-system but held like a ES...

 

 

Wheatstone Double Duet.

[Wolf Molkentin]

Maybe someone just took it to bits and put all the coloured buttons back at random!

 

But the colouring is making sense indeed,

[spindizzy]

 

Maybe someone just took it to bits and put all the coloured buttons back at random!

 

But the colouring is making sense indeed,

 

 

Ah-Ha a Double Duet it is, definitely new to me!

Were there many made?

Edited April 18, 2013 by spindizzy

[Wolf Molkentin]

Wheatstone Double Duet.

 

Thank you for that!

 

And once again, now in the words of the tutor:

 

"The scales have a regularity not possessed by any other musical instrument; for they are not only capable of being played an octave higher or lower with the same fingerings, as octaves to each other on tbe pianoforte are played, but tbe same great advantage is also extended to the major thirds above or below. It is, in fact, a self-transposing instrument to a considerable extent;"

which leads to the following result:

"four different fingerings being only required to play in all the keys."

Edited April 18, 2013 by blue eyed sailor

[Geoff Wooff]

 

Wheatstone Double Duet.

 

Thank you for that!

 

And once again, now in the words of the tutor:

 

"The scales have a regularity not possessed by any other musical instrument; for they are not only capable of being played an octave higher or lower with the same fingerings, as octaves to each other on tbe pianoforte are played, but tbe same great advantage is also extended to the major thirds above or below. It is, in fact, a self-transposing instrument to a considerable extent;"

which leads to the following result:

"four different fingerings being only required to play in all the keys."

 

Yes indeed it all sounds very lodgical.... so why did it not catch-on, we all might wonder?

 

I think of the EC as having three different fingerings; these being Normal, Octave above and Octave below. So that with slight variations, for adding sharps or flats, one can play in any key with these three fingering shapes... that is untill one gets out to the far excesses, where Db's etc are called for.

 

PS; with the double duette the four fingerings are reversed for the left /right hands making 8 different shapes, whereas my notion of the EC fingerings includes both hands , it being a single keyboard.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Geoff Wooff

[OLDNICKILBY]

No I reckon it is the "Cack Handed Repairer Syndrome"

Didn't know how to put it back together

[OLDNICKILBY]

WHOOPS. Retract that comment as it looks like a very early one. Is it really number 58?

[inventor]

This is in the Wheatstone 1844 Patent. Horniman Museum have one and a half instruments in this system, I didn't know any others existed.

Inventor.

[Ransom]

Reminds me an awful lot of the Chromatiphone system, slanted the other way and tuned a step higher.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Ransom

[danersen]

Hello Everyone,

 

As the resident - and so far as I know, only - player of the Stark/Chromatiphone layout, I can confirm that this is consistent with the Stark layout in a vertical format.

 

It is, however, "opposite" in its directional sequence of half-step diagonals much like a B-griff CBA is to a C-griff.

 

The easiest way to see it is to reference the last photo in the listing (inserted, below) which conveniently places the buttons in a horizontal orientation typical of the Stark.

 

The notation is - from the top row descending and across:

red button = C, white buttons = naturals, black buttons = accidentals

C, E, G# ... repeating
C#, F, A ... repeating
D, F#, Bb ... repeating
D#, G, B ... repeating

I tried to reflect the diagnoal spacing in the chart above, and it appears to be displaying properly.

 

On close inspection by enlarging the referenced photo, the letters stamped into the buttons confirm my chart.

 

And it is all quite logical, versatile, and fully isomorphic!

The Stark layout is truly just as easy to play in those keys in the hinterlands ("far excesses" as Geoff describes them) as playing in C or G.

 

Be Well,
Dan

 

Here is a photo of the Double

 

 

and a diagram of the Stark layout.

 

Edited April 19, 2013 by danersen

[Ivan Viehoff]

 

Yes indeed it all sounds very lodgical.... so why did it not catch-on, we all might wonder?.

 

 

If much music were based on Schoenbergian 12-note tone-rows, then it would be an ideally convenient instrument. But in the real world our popular scales have 7 distinct notes with minor seconds and augmented seconds (in the case of the harmonic minor scale) fitted into the space of 6 tones in a necessarily asymmetric fashion. This makes most uniform keyboards rather inconvenient. The main exception to this is the Hayden/GermanNameIForgot keyboard, which is actually a bit less uniform than it looks at first glance, in that it does actually have the diatonic major scale embedded into it.

 

There's another rare duet system which has a name beginning with L, Lintott or Lindon or something, which comprises columns or rows of 6 buttons at semitone interval, two cols/rows to an octave. There is an occasional poster on this forum who owns one and assures us that it is a nightmare to try and play.

[inventor]

The LINTON system is not strictly a duet system, but a split octave system (like the English concertina) A row of six buttons on the left hand side and a corresponding row of six buttons on the right hand play between them all the notes of a chromatic octave but they are not in semitone order.

Inventor.

[inventor]

P.S the "GermanNameIForgot" - I like that idear as he never seems to have produced any!

Inventor

[Ivan Viehoff]

You were kind not to correct me in another matter; the Hayden system is in fact a perfectly uniform keyboard, but very cunningly designed to incorporate the diatonic scale in convenient fashion. But you have to go against its uniformity to use it muscially - when you play a scale you play three notes from one row and four from the next. Put it another way, two fifths doesn't make an octave.

 

In the other case, perhaps my error was in thinking it was a Linton, perhaps they said it had some similarities to a Linton rather than being one. But plainly my memory lets me down these days.

[conzertino]

It sold for 1.525 $, aprox. 1.000 Pound. Not a bad price for such a rare beauty!