New to concertina

[Rwcarrbluegrass]

Hey all! I’m sure this has been covered before so sorry if this is redundant but I just picked up a Jackie English concertina… are there specific musicians that are known for English concertina that I should be listening to? Also are there any resources for English folk tunes?

 

 Thanks!

[JimR]

This page at concertina.com, http://www.concertina.com/english/#butler-the-concertina-tutor has lots of good info, including Frank Butler's good English tutor.

Search youtube for English concertina. You will find several good players there.

[Don Taylor]

I really enjoy listening to David Hansen on EC, he has many videos on Youtube and posts a new one every week or so. Not the fastest player nor does he try to play multi-part tunes but I like his sound.

 

The following might be a tad contoversial as many EC players play from the sheet music (the 'dots'), but here goes:

 

For a beginner book on EC, take a look at 'The English Concertina, Absolute Beginner' by Alex Wade and Dave Mallinson but here is the trick:  buy both the book and the accompanying CD, rip the CD into a set of MP3 files and then use a slowdowner programme (I use Transcribe! but there are lots of others) to play back the tracks while you (slowly at first) learn to play them by ear.  Loop very short sections at a time played back slowed down and find the notes on your concertina by trial and error.  Once  you have found the notes then play along while you gradually speed up that looped section.  Once you have that section down then do the next, then try to glue the two sections together.  Repeat with the rest of the tune.  Do not worry too much at this time if you cannot get upto full speed.

 

The book contain the dots but try not to look at the dots in detail until you have tried to wire your ears to your fingers first.  Do read the book for advice on fingering, bellows control, etc... but try to ignore the dots at the beginning.  You can 'cheat' a bit by looking at the dots to get the very first note of the tune so that you have a known start point, but soon you will not need to do that (very often).

 

Most (all?) tutorials begin by teaching you to read music and then building up from that.  I think that learning to just play some music first, how ever slowly and haltingly, is much more satisfying and motivating than getting bogged down in music theory and exercises.  I am not saying to neglect the theory, just to defer it for a while.  I did not do this and I now think that was a mistake  -  at least for me.

 

If you are already fluent in reading music and can play other instruments from sheet music than you can ignore this advice - unless you want to learn how to play without using the dots.

[Roger Hare]

12 hours ago, Rwcarrbluegrass said:

...Also are there any resources for English folk tunes?

Alistair Anderson's English Tutorial here.

Salvation Army English Tutorial here.

Selection of 600+ tunes (largely but not exclusively 'English') here - in various formats (free PDF,

free ABC (see below), paid-for print-on-demand). There are a million selections of tunes on the

internet. Paul Hardy's tune collections are among the very best there are...

 

Taking this a little further...

 

If you aren't familiar with ABC, this link leads to a set of high-quality tutorials for this easy-to-use

text based system for writing down music, and then generating printed scores and simple sound

files. This is great for writing down the tunes you want to learn, rather than the tunes in a printed

tutor (always an incentive when learning, I think?). You do need a computer with an ABC system

installed though (I use EasyABC).

[SIMON GABRIELOW]

Although I play Anglo system; years ago I referred also to a book on English concertina by a Richard Carlin. Don't know if still available.

Another thought to add; I think that you  need look no further for examples  of some marvellous English concertina players, and music, than on here (concertina.net).. there's a wealth of good examples ( although many will be too modest to admit to their general brilliance, I am sure).

Edited May 23, 2022 by SIMON GABRIELOW

[hjcjones]

In my opinion Rob Harbron is one of the finest exponents of the English concertina.  You should also listen to:

 

Alistair Anderson

Steve Turner

Dave Townsend

Dick Miles

Simon Thoumire

 

These are just a few, there are many more fine players.  No doubt others will have their own suggestions.

 

This discussion on Mudcat lists many more players on all systems. 

https://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=130152#2926845