Playing The Concertina 20 And 30 Button But Need Music Suggestions

[darticus]

I am finally learning and playing some simple Civil War Concertina stuff. Need some suggestion of music to try. I see there is a video and the guy plays Monks March, Congo etc. This music seems nice for playing. Is there a way to download some music that shows the notes for each hand? I downloaded Congo (Alan Days tutor) and it shows two lines of music but I think thats for only one hand. Anything showing the two hand notes with numbers? Maybe a jig or reel would be nice. Thanks Ron

[MJGray]

Gary Coover's books are top-notch. I've been getting an awful lot of mileage out of his "Anglo 1-2-3", and am slowly becoming dexterous enough to attempt the early bits of his "Anglo Concertina in the Harmonic Style", which is considerably more advanced.

 

As far as free resources on the internet go, I've had a lot of fun with the Australian tunes at this link (plenty of jigs and waltzes):

 

http://www.bushtraditions.org/tutors/tunelist.htm

 

And if you want to dive straight back to the origins of the beast, check out Elias Howe's 1879 "Western German Concertina School", downloadable here:

 

https://archive.org/details/imslp-western-german-concertina-school-howe-elias

 

There are plenty of good online tutorials for Irish-style concertina playing, too, although they're often on fairly advanced topics (at least for me) and I am still flustered by the key of D (curse you, C#). The Online Academy of Irish Music (www.oaim.ie) has several series of video lessons. I haven't paid for any of them, but the free samples you can find on YouTube are solid. Good luck, and have fun!

 

Mike

[darticus]

Gary Coover's books are top-notch. I've been getting an awful lot of mileage out of his "Anglo 1-2-3", and am slowly becoming dexterous enough to attempt the early bits of his "Anglo Concertina in the Harmonic Style", which is considerably more advanced.

 

As far as free resources on the internet go, I've had a lot of fun with the Australian tunes at this link (plenty of jigs and waltzes):

 

http://www.bushtraditions.org/tutors/tunelist.htm

 

And if you want to dive straight back to the origins of the beast, check out Elias Howe's 1879 "Western German Concertina School", downloadable here:

 

https://archive.org/details/imslp-western-german-concertina-school-howe-elias

 

There are plenty of good online tutorials for Irish-style concertina playing, too, although they're often on fairly advanced topics (at least for me) and I am still flustered by the key of D (curse you, C#). The Online Academy of Irish Music (www.oaim.ie) has several series of video lessons. I haven't paid for any of them, but the free samples you can find on YouTube are solid. Good luck, and have fun!

 

Mike

Thanks Mike

I will check it out. trying to work with Alan Days site now. Do you find it better if you know how the song goes first? How do you go about hearing them? Can you suggest a song title or two that you find good to play? Thanks again Ron

Edited July 6, 2016 by darticus

[Will Moore]

 

Gary Coover's books are top-notch. I've been getting an awful lot of mileage out of his "Anglo 1-2-3", and am slowly becoming dexterous enough to attempt the early bits of his "Anglo Concertina in the Harmonic Style", which is considerably more advanced.

 

As far as free resources on the internet go, I've had a lot of fun with the Australian tunes at this link (plenty of jigs and waltzes):

 

http://www.bushtraditions.org/tutors/tunelist.htm

 

And if you want to dive straight back to the origins of the beast, check out Elias Howe's 1879 "Western German Concertina School", downloadable here:

 

https://archive.org/details/imslp-western-german-concertina-school-howe-elias

 

There are plenty of good online tutorials for Irish-style concertina playing, too, although they're often on fairly advanced topics (at least for me) and I am still flustered by the key of D (curse you, C#). The Online Academy of Irish Music (www.oaim.ie) has several series of video lessons. I haven't paid for any of them, but the free samples you can find on YouTube are solid. Good luck, and have fun!

 

Mike

Thanks Mike

I will check it out. trying to work with Alan Days site now. Do you find it better if you know how the song goes first? How do you go about hearing them? Can you suggest a song title or two that you find good to play? Thanks again Ron

 

If it helps - I downloaded all the tracks and put them in an MP3 album format for my own personal use. Happy to share with you. PM me for the link - I don't want to post it publically without permission first!

[MJGray]

Thanks Mike

 

I will check it out. trying to work with Alan Days site now. Do you find it better if you know how the song goes first? How do you go about hearing them? Can you suggest a song title or two that you find good to play? Thanks again Ron

 

I generally search YouTube or Spotify for the tunes to try to get a sense for how they go and what tempo I should be aiming for, yeah. Usually you can find different versions, especially with the folkier tunes. Gary Coover has videos of all of his arrangements online here, which is super helpful. I have downloaded Mr. Day's tutorial, but haven't done much with it. I'm a very visual/kinesthetic learner, so I'm a lot slower to pick up tunes from an audio format.

 

As far as tunes go, I'm not very good yet, so I've been playing a lot of very simple tunes and trying to add little bits of accompaniment and variation. That Australian tunebook is great for that, since a lot of the tunes are pretty straightforward. "Springtime Brings On The Shearing" or the "Mudgee Waltz" are sweet little tunes and leave a lot of space to play around with adding chords or octaves, etc. Elias Howe's book has a lot of old American standards, so it's easy for me to know, for example, how "Yankee Doodle" is supposed to sound, even if it's a little corny.

[darticus]

 

Thanks Mike

 

I will check it out. trying to work with Alan Days site now. Do you find it better if you know how the song goes first? How do you go about hearing them? Can you suggest a song title or two that you find good to play? Thanks again Ron

 

I generally search YouTube or Spotify for the tunes to try to get a sense for how they go and what tempo I should be aiming for, yeah. Usually you can find different versions, especially with the folkier tunes. Gary Coover has videos of all of his arrangements online here, which is super helpful. I have downloaded Mr. Day's tutorial, but haven't done much with it. I'm a very visual/kinesthetic learner, so I'm a lot slower to pick up tunes from an audio format.

 

As far as tunes go, I'm not very good yet, so I've been playing a lot of very simple tunes and trying to add little bits of accompaniment and variation. That Australian tunebook is great for that, since a lot of the tunes are pretty straightforward. "Springtime Brings On The Shearing" or the "Mudgee Waltz" are sweet little tunes and leave a lot of space to play around with adding chords or octaves, etc. Elias Howe's book has a lot of old American standards, so it's easy for me to know, for example, how "Yankee Doodle" is supposed to sound, even if it's a little corny.

 

You have given me some good info to follow and check out. Gary Coover's book Civil War Concertina is a great simple book and on Youtube. Good luck as we learn. Only 2 months here. Thanks Ron

[Anglo-Irishman]

 

it's easy for me to know, for example, how "Yankee Doodle" is supposed to sound, even if it's a little corny.

 

A corny tune is still a tune, and learning to play it will make the next tune - which may be a little less corny - easier to learn. You'll be surprised how many tunes use the same little melodic phrases and chord sequences, especially in a folk context.

 

Surely everybody knows lots of tunes before starting to learn an instrument. There are the nursery rhymes you heard over and over as a child, and if you're any way Christian (or at least attended church with your family), there'll be hymn tunes that you can hum or whistle. And I learnt a lot of folk tunes in music lessons at primary school - but then, that was in Scotland, where folk music is part of the national culture, because it differentiates them from England - your mileage in America may vary.

 

My approach to learning the Anglo concertina was just trying to play the tunes I already had in my head. When I was able to play a few of those, learning new tunes was much easier than if I'd started off with unfamiliar ones. I've used the same approach with the mandolin, banjo, autoharp, whistles and latterly the Crane duet. And I play all those in public!

 

And when I do music for a Burns Supper, I dig into my repertoire from my primary-school days in Scotland, and come up with somethng suitable. I do google for the complete words, but the melody is there, and the trick of harmonising the accompaniment is based on all those "corny" songs I started off with!

 

Cheers,

John

[darticus]

 

 

it's easy for me to know, for example, how "Yankee Doodle" is supposed to sound, even if it's a little corny.

 

A corny tune is still a tune, and learning to play it will make the next tune - which may be a little less corny - easier to learn. You'll be surprised how many tunes use the same little melodic phrases and chord sequences, especially in a folk context.

 

Surely everybody knows lots of tunes before starting to learn an instrument. There are the nursery rhymes you heard over and over as a child, and if you're any way Christian (or at least attended church with your family), there'll be hymn tunes that you can hum or whistle. And I learnt a lot of folk tunes in music lessons at primary school - but then, that was in Scotland, where folk music is part of the national culture, because it differentiates them from England - your mileage in America may vary.

 

My approach to learning the Anglo concertina was just trying to play the tunes I already had in my head. When I was able to play a few of those, learning new tunes was much easier than if I'd started off with unfamiliar ones. I've used the same approach with the mandolin, banjo, autoharp, whistles and latterly the Crane duet. And I play all those in public!

 

And when I do music for a Burns Supper, I dig into my repertoire from my primary-school days in Scotland, and come up with somethng suitable. I do google for the complete words, but the melody is there, and the trick of harmonising the accompaniment is based on all those "corny" songs I started off with!

 

Cheers,

John

 

I have only 2 months under my belt but enjoying. First song 2 weeks to learn. 2nd song about the same. 3rd about a week. Now 6 songs later about 2 days. Its getting better. Easy songs are for the kids. Little do they know its the best I can do. Now to get a 5000 dollar concertina to make my songs sound better. My wife said I can play them in the car for 5000 dollars. Thanks All Ron

[MJGray]

 

 

it's easy for me to know, for example, how "Yankee Doodle" is supposed to sound, even if it's a little corny.

 

A corny tune is still a tune, and learning to play it will make the next tune - which may be a little less corny - easier to learn. You'll be surprised how many tunes use the same little melodic phrases and chord sequences, especially in a folk context.

 

Surely everybody knows lots of tunes before starting to learn an instrument. There are the nursery rhymes you heard over and over as a child, and if you're any way Christian (or at least attended church with your family), there'll be hymn tunes that you can hum or whistle. And I learnt a lot of folk tunes in music lessons at primary school - but then, that was in Scotland, where folk music is part of the national culture, because it differentiates them from England - your mileage in America may vary.

Ha! Thanks, John. I guess all those variations on "Oh, Susannah" might end up serving me well after all. :-)

 

A really high proportion of the tunes in the concertina tutors from the 1800's do seem to be hymns of one sort or another, which don't do me a lot of good, but I suppose it says something about what the instruments were used for back then. Between Howe and Merrill (the American 19th century tutors I've found) it seems to break down about 1/3 hymns, 1/3 patriotic songs, and 1/3 comic dance hall numbers, with a smattering of marches and "German" waltzes for flavor. Quite a different repertoire than the "modern" English and Irish styles.

 

Regardless, lots of fun to be had all around. A little corniness never hurt anyone.

 

Mike