Concertina Futures And Options

[JimLucas]

In this thread wondering about the much-anticipated Duet International CD, Alan Day made (in this post) the passing remark, "In my opinion the Duet will outstrip the demand for the other systems once it's versatility in realised."

The resulting discussion regarding the versatility, advantages/disadvantages, and potential future of the various systems has quickly grown to the point that in this post Alan requested, "I did not really want this discussion to go off at a tangent.... ... Please start another thread if you wish to take this further.It is only my opinion and I will not be unhappy if you disagree." So that's what I'm doing.

I won't try to copy or summarize the posts from the other thread; you can follow the above links if you want to refer to them. But my own first comment here is a response to Peter Laban's comment in the other thread: "As a case in point I heard someone do a nice job on a piece of ragtime, on an anglo, last night."

 

It's not the first time. Many years ago I remember Bob Walser playing Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag on his 30-button anglo, in an arrangement that could lead one to believe Joplin had originally composed the piece for anglo concertina. Bob wasn't giving a concert; we were just sitting outside the cabin at camp. Unfortunately, when I asked Bob about it a few years later (maybe hoping to learn his arrangement?), he couldn't remember ever having played it. Sigh!

[JimLucas]

... Peter Laban's comment in the other thread: "As a case in point I heard someone do a nice job on a piece of ragtime, on an anglo, last night."

 

... Many years ago I remember Bob Walser playing Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag on his 30-button anglo, in an arrangement that could lead one to believe Joplin had originally composed the piece for anglo concertina.

 

Then there's Alistair Anderson's arrangement of Joplin's Strenuous Life on a tenor-treble English.

 

But there must be many examples -- including ones already posted in various threads here on concertina.net -- of non-stereotyped playing on every sort of concertina.

[wayman]

A different factor in whether duet concertinas will achieve parity with anglo and English concertinas is cost-of-entry. I see several components playing into that: differing costs of contruction for new instruments, differing availabilities of used instruments, and differing quantities of inspirational, teaching, and support resources. Each of these factors heavily favors the anglo and English over any duet system (though in the coming years, at least the Hayden has a chance of boosting its case in the second and third of these factors).

 

Duet International can play a Big Role in the third: There is still a relative dearth of material to inspire, teach, and support new Hayden players (... much less new Maccann players) as compared with anglo and English where huge volumes of recordings (by old and new artists) are widely available, and a wide selection of books for beginners and intermediate players as well. Even as more and more individual artists release new recordings of their own playing, Duet International would be THE recommended purchase for any brand-new duet concertina player, if they want to hear and be inspired by the full *breadth* of potential for their new instrument ... and to prove to them that despite the paucity of books and CDs on the shelf for their instrument, it *does* indeed have both a history and bevy of great current players. A smaller bevy, to be sure, than anglos and Englishes have; but Duet International, better than any other recording I'm aware of, would showcase their number and variety.

 

Increasing the number of duet concertina players will create in time a larger used market of starter and mid-range Haydens; and may also inspire other makers to do as Concertina Connection and R.Morse & Co have recently done -- create solid Hayden models for players who want to advance beyond the Elise or Stagi. Knowing a market exists encourages makers to bear the significant up-front costs of time and money that need to be devoted to research-and-design for a product very unlike the anglo or English models they may already produce.

 

And now a bit of a digression away from Duet International, to better explain the first component of the cost-of-entry issue -- the considerable cost of a good new Hayden, relative to its anglo and English peers -- which is unfortunately unlikely to go away even as the duet becomes more popular. While there's not much price difference between a Concertina Connection Rochelle (anglo) and Elise (Hayden), this is something of an apples-and-oranges comparison: the Rochelle is a full 30-key anglo, while the Elise is a very minimal Hayden which can only really play "using the Hayden logical pattern" in the keys of C, G, D, and maybe A.

 

When you compare an anglo and a Hayden of similar caliber -- identical workmanship, and each designed to give players "the full power of the instrument" (that is, a Hayden with "enough" buttons (52) to allow for playing in at least eight major keys without breaking the pattern; while 30 buttons is widely regarded as the standard for the anglo), the Hayden is considerably more expensive (the Morse Beaumont is just over 50% more expensive than the Morse Ceili, for instance). This isn't simply because the Beaumont has more than half-again as many buttons, but also because all those buttons (and levers and springs and reeds) have to fit in a physical space not much larger than the anglo necessitating far more intricate construction: it takes over twice as long to build a Beaumont as a Ceili and it's a LOT trickier (believe me, I know: I build them and assisted with the design!). That's not something that greater interest and greater production volume will change, unfortunately, if you want to keep workmanship at the same quality and don't want to reduce the capability of the instrument (for instance, the Peacock is able to achieve a lower price point because it has a lot fewer buttons than a Beaumont, but sacrifices capability to do so); and I'm sure that the difference does remain a factor in some new players' decision of which system of concertina to choose. This is a large part why I doubt the Hayden will ever achieve *parity* (much less overtake) the anglo in popularity.

Edited July 12, 2014 by wayman

[JimLucas]

...i was just looking the other day at those hayden clips made by "Boney" to illustrate the hayden's capacity to handle single-note melody music at a fast clip...he made his case. but i'm not yet convinced you could keep that up right-hand-only during an all-night sesh or dance....

Well, if two hands can manage a full night, surely one hand could manage half a night? (Half serious.)

 

But I know many players who have trouble with half an hour, yet others who can feel like they're still just comfortably rolling after many hours.

 

...anglo and EC...give right-hand relief, by different means...

 

Bluegrass banjo pickers don't rest their right hand even while they're using their left (on the fingerboard), but they seem to be able to keep going forever. Stamina depends on far more than being able to "rest" one's hand. And it can be developed through practice.

 

...perhaps if one's duet had a wide overlap of notes common to both sides, you could use overlap notes to switch off if you wanted to play a few hours of just=melody....

It's something I've tried, though not because I wanted to rest my hand. The main difficulty I found was the limited range of the overlap, even with 55 buttons. It has prompted me to consider (should I ever have the money ) having a duet specially built in which both hands have the exact same range... maybe from the low G of a fiddle up to D just over two octaves above middle C. That would be 32 buttons per side, and with that range it should still have a reasonable size and weight.

 

What advantages/disadvantages would it have? Certainly a potential for rapid melodies and ornaments, but I think also great potential for alternate-side notes to avoid awkward fingerings, especially in harmonies and chords. But I can't be sure unless/until I can try one. (Where's the "dream" emoticon? )

Edited July 12, 2014 by JimLucas

[Alan Day]

The idea of the Internationals is/was to show the versatility of the instrument.

Anglo International gives demonstrations of Morris,Ragtime,Blues,South African music,Classical music,Irish Traditional music,French Trad, American Contra Band and Country Music, Song accompaniment.Etc

English International- World Champion Band performances,jazz , tunes from 1920-1950 by various artists,Irish Trad, Classical Music Etc Etc

Both are 3CD sets and by the time you have sat through that lot you are aware of the possibilities of the instrument.

 

Playing the Anglo for over forty years, time permitting, it is not impossible to achieve to play classical music, or in Duet style, but it takes a hell of a long time to achieve your goal.Chords are not always available on either the push ,or the pull.A run of notes with chords on the push, or pull and air becomes a major factor.So much easier with the English or Duet .The English is lovely for song accompaniment ,but full chords and lovely base runs are not easy.

The Duet stands out for me as the more versatile instrument for general popular music and has the possibilities of being taken up for new popular music in the future.I am happy to be proved wrong ,but I do love to hear the sound of a Duet played properly.

If we ever get Duet out there Iris Bishop proves my point.

Al

[Wolf Molkentin]

If we ever get Duet out there Iris Bishop proves my point.

Iris would certainly prove that the Duet concertina is a great tool for making lovely music, and she would do that in her unique and splendid way...!

 

The Duet stands out for me as the more versatile instrument for general popular music and has the possibilities of being taken up for new popular music in the future.I am happy to be proved wrong ,but I do love to hear the sound of a Duet played properly.

But why not aim at just what Wayman has been saying: Let "duet concertinas ... achieve parity with anglo and English concertinas". I can't see the point in discussing what system is the best, the most versatile a.s.f. - obviously the Duet systems provides very good access to multi-part staff notation as proven by Dirge and others, and OTOH I won't be once again so imprudent pointing at possible downsides of the Duet for I can't judge from personal experience here.

 

But I can tell (even if that means repeating myself) the upsides of the English system as I'm experiencing it. I feel very much prompted to achieve an interwoven compactness thereby basically relying on open fifths (with some low thirds filling in). The sound will be stringy, at times droney, or even churchy... Bass runs fit quite naturally into this concept...

 

Quoting Jim Lucas, it's rather harmony than chords... Nothing to be claimed exlusively for the English, but (at least in my case) emerged from playing this system, which I therefore praise, and don't mean to skip!

 

I'd love Anglo and Duet players to report the analogue from their angle...

 

Best wishes - Wolf

[Łukasz Martynowicz]

 

Playing the Anglo for over forty years, time permitting, it is not impossible to achieve to play classical music, or in Duet style, but it takes a hell of a long time to achieve your goal.Chords are not always available on either the push ,or the pull.A run of notes with chords on the push, or pull and air becomes a major factor.So much easier with the English or Duet .The English is lovely for song accompaniment ,but full chords and lovely base runs are not easy.

The Duet stands out for me as the more versatile instrument for general popular music and has the possibilities of being taken up for new popular music in the future.

 

 

A different factor in whether duet concertinas will achieve parity with anglo and English concertinas is cost-of-entry. I see several components playing into that: differing costs of contruction for new instruments, differing availabilities of used instruments, and differing quantities of inspirational, teaching, and support resources. Each of these factors heavily favors the anglo and English over any duet system (though in the coming years, at least the Hayden has a chance of boosting its case in the second and third of these factors).

 

Duet International can play a Big Role in the third: There is still a relative dearth of material to inspire, teach, and support new Hayden players

 

One underestimated aspect of (large enough) Duets, especially isomorphic layout like Hayden or Chromatiphone, is that once you know basics, you dont't need concertina-specific inspirational or teaching material, you can just take accordion sheets (or accordion youtube tutorials if you're a beginner) and play them in a very straightforward manner. You just may need to strip down accompaniment or move it an octave higher. As Alan said: Duets are more versatile than Anglos or Englishes when it comes to popular music, and there is almost always a full or fake sheet available and plenty of samples of people playing virtually anything on an accordion. To be honest, hearing an anglo rendition of a tune is less helpfull for me than hearing a melodeon version or, even better, an accordion one. And I still play on the smallest Hayden available.

I think that the main problem with all those debates about supremacy of concertinas of any given type is that we try to sum them up as one instrument, when e.g. for many practical reasons Thomas Restoin's custom duet is more like a portable CBA than a classic concertina. "Anglo" and "English" are very precise terms, while "Duet" can mean anything from highly irregular Jeffries to very logical Hayden or chromatiphone. With all that modern hybrids around it isn't even "a distinctive concertina sound" that unites them. Melodeons are treated as a separate entity and not just a type of an accordion. Chemnizers are not bandoneons; bayans are usually counted as CBAs, regardless of different construction and much greater capabilities than any other CBAs; russian "harmoszka" is neither accordion nor a melodeon and there is also a "polish hamonia", a recently revived instrument, being something of a crossover between a melodeon and an accordion and so on... Some of those instruments sound differently, but large Bayans with lots of registers can sound pretty much like any other unisonoric variant. Only bandoneons and traditional concertinas sound signifficantly different in terms of basic reed sound, everything else has just a different number of differently tuned voices. Except for bi- vs unisonority, all those instruments differ mostly in terms of what can be played easily or how difficult it is to achieve any given style.

 

So to sum up - I don't think, that "the Duet will outstrip the demand for the other systems once it's versatility in realised" - I think it will just go it's separate way.