New anglo concertina video lessons using my own tablature system

[Daddy Long Les]

Since last year I have been developing my own version of tablature in order to give anglo concertina lessons to players of all tunings.

I am now happy to say that I have several of these lessons available on my website http://www.daddylongles.com

Some lessons are aimed at beginners whilst others will suit improvers.

Of course this won't appeal to folk who prefer dots (musical notation) for everything and I still have my original lessons available.

Initially, I developed this tablature to save me some time.  Before this, every time I came up with a new tutorial for the anglo, I had to record separate videos for each main tuning (CG and GD) plus I had to create two scores in my chosen music software (Notion).  With this tablature I have developed a way of recording one video (usually using the CG) and re-tuning just the concertina playing down to the GD pitch but leaving my voice untouched.  The actual tablature works for every tuning - even BbF.

Having said this, I can honestly say that I actually prefer my tablature to using traditional music notation. 

Many of my customers are now using this new method and it seems to be pretty successful.

If you want to try it out without paying anything, there are two free tutorials for beginners  (Danny Boy and What Shall We Do With The Drunken Sailor) which you can find below.

I have attached the tabs for these two tunes below plus some instructions on how to read them.

Here are the links to the video lessons:-

 

 

 

Thanks for looking!

Les

Danny Boy Anglo Concertina Tablature.pdf What Shall We Do With The Drunken Sailor Anglo Concertina Tablature.pdf Explanation Of Generic Anglo Concertina Tablature.pdf

Edited July 12, 2021 by Daddy Long Les
Changed some text

[Guest]

Hi Daddy Long Les,

 

My respect to you for developing a beginner-friendly tablature system. Although myself prefer the ordinary musical notation, I think it is a great idea to help people get started on playing the instrument and I would love to see it succeed.

 

Just would like to share my feelings about the system and some suggestions. (And quite nervous being the first one to send a reply...)

 

To begin with, the numbers in the cells are a bit distracting to me. I could understand that there are some tricky fingerings in some tunes, but most of the time the finger to use to play a note is pretty "standard"? I think taking that element out and just remind at certain difficult parts would be enough?

 

Another thing is, I found it requires a bit of thinking to figure out which row to play on.

 

The last one is just a suggestion. Since at any point of time the bellows can only travel in one direction, any chance we can put the information into the "Bellows" column so that we can share some responsibility to it and let the cells focus on delivering other instructions.

 

I thought about how to "fix" the 3 things above, so I experimented it in Excel.

• Using triangles to denote which row to play on may be more intuitive?
• Remove those finger numbers and add them only for difficult phrases?
• Move the direction to bellows column?

The first 3 bars are pretty much a direct translation of yours, while the last bar is different just to show the concept:

 

 

 

 

Lastly, just want you to know that what you have done is wonderful! Please keep going!

 

Cheers,

Ted

[Daddy Long Les]

7 minutes ago, Ted. said:

Hi Daddy Long Les,

 

My respect to you for developing a beginner-friendly tablature system. Although myself prefer the ordinary musical notation, I think it is a great idea to help people get started on playing the instrument and I would love to see it succeed.

 

Just would like to share my feelings about the system and some suggestions. (And quite nervous being the first one to send a reply...)

 

To begin with, the numbers in the cells are a bit distracting to me. I could understand that there are some tricky fingerings in some tunes, but most of the time the finger to use to play a note is pretty "standard"? I think taking that element out and just remind at certain difficult parts would be enough?

 

Another thing is, I found it requires a bit of thinking to figure out which row to play on.

 

The last one is just a suggestion. Since at any point of time the bellows can only travel in one direction, any chance we can put the information into the "Bellows" column so that we can share some responsibility to it and let the cells focus on delivering other instructions.

 

I thought about how to "fix" the 3 things above, so I experimented it in Excel.

• Using triangles to denote which row to play on may be more intuitive?
• Remove those finger numbers and add them only for difficult phrases?
• Move the direction to bellows column?

The first 3 bars are pretty much a direct translation of yours, while the last bar is different just to show the concept:

 

 

 

 

Lastly, just want you to know that what you have done is wonderful! Please keep going!

 

Cheers,

Ted

Hi Ted,

 

Thank you for your interest. I will look at your suggestions closely - it looks fascinating!  I never mind any criticism of what I do as long as it's politely given (which this is).  My customers are very torn about this tablature system.  I think it's fair to say that most prefer musical notation, some like my tablature and others prefer the more straightforward tab like Gary Coover's.  I'm probably going to go back to using standard musical notation but it's definitely been interesting to see the reaction to my tablature system. As I said in my post - I came up with this system to cover all tunings which it did. I'm constantly trying different things and I'm always happy to put my hands up and say that perhaps I wasn't right about something!!!  Of course this will mean two lots of sheet music for CG and GD anglos plus two video lessons to say nothing of the different layouts (Jeffries/Wheatstone)!!! Perhaps I'll go back to just teaching the guitar!

 

Best Wishes

 

Les

[Steve Schulteis]

Thanks for sharing a bit about your results. It's always interesting to hear how things work out in practice.

[Daddy Long Les]

1 minute ago, Steve Schulteis said:

Thanks for sharing a bit about your results. It's always interesting to hear how things work out in practice.

My pleasure Steve.  I love that Herrington btw!!  Wish I lived in the US!