Midi English Concertina

[Riggy]

Are there any makers of MIDI English Concertinas ?  Not in development.

Ready for or IN production.  RIggy

[Don Taylor]

Try Roy Whiteley at:

 

http://www.accordionmagic.com/index.html

[David Barnert]

John Nixon died quite a few years ago. It might be worth tracking down what became of his instrument.

 

 

[Paul_Hardy]

I also can suggest Roy Whiteley - he made my midi tina - see https://pghardy.net/concertina/lachenal_30566_midi/lachenal_30566_midi.html. 

I was playing it yesterday, so it is surviving OK. I have recently changed to using CME WIDI Jack (https://www.cme-pro.com/widi-jack/) to reduce the cables by using MIDI over Bluetooth - works well.

[Owen Anderson]

Interesting. Does it have any sensing for bellows pressure, or is that entirely controlled out of band?

[Paul_Hardy]

Yes, it has a bellows pressure sensor - I'd prefer it a bit more sensitive, but it's good enough to play Captain Pugwash with the repeated notes being a bellows shake. I might post a couple of tunes on it later.

[Paul_Hardy]

I recorded https://pghardy.net/concertina/recordings/midi_concertina_cello.mp3 on World Concertina Day 2022. It's Planxty Irwin using a Cello voice synthesized using ThumbJamb on an iPad, driven by midi from Lachenal 30566 described up the thread. There are more midi recordings at https://pghardy.net/concertina/recordings/#midi. 

[Owen Anderson]

That's really interesting. Do you know how the pressure sensing works? I've thought about trying to build a MIDI anglo, but was never sure how the pressure sensing would work.

[Richard Mellish]

I'm still sorting out the ergonomics of my MIDI Anglo, hence not being ready to post either a description or a performance on here for a while yet. I'm achieving the equivalent of pressure sensing by a load cell, so no bellows and no running out of air.

[Paul_Hardy]

On 2/13/2022 at 1:03 AM, resistor said:

That's really interesting. Do you know how the pressure sensing works? I've thought about trying to build a MIDI anglo, but was never sure how the pressure sensing would work.

I assume it's some standard barometric sensor - either resistive (strain) or capacitive (parallel plate). Google search for "miniature barometric pressure sensor" for examples. I will note that it is important to power up the concertina (which sets the zero point) before picking it up, or else you end up in a mode where notes are louder on the push than the pull or vice versa!