Monster Wheatstone

[Paul Read]

I mentioned a while back in another thread that I was retuning a double-octave Wheatstone. I was doing the work for the Canadian folk singer Ian Robb who is part of the 'Finest Kind' trio and, to my mind, one of the finest exponents of English traditional song. Also he is a fine English concertina player.

 

Anyway, I have Ian's permission to show a few pictures of the beastie so I'll put a few on over the next few days/weeks. Ian was told by Steve Dickinson that about twelve of these were made. Unfortunately, this one has suffered the indignity of having some extra fretwork added in a very amateur fashion.

 

Here are the first pics:

Edited June 6, 2005 by Paul Read

[Paul Read]

And here are a couple more

[Stephen Chambers]

Paul,

 

That's quite some "beastie" alright, and probably a nightmare to tune !

 

Can you tell us the serial number ?

[Animaterra]

I got to admire the beastie at the Marlborogh Morris Ale last weekend- it's a big honker! Very impressive, wonderful low bass notes. Made me drool for one, in fact!

[JimLucas]

...I was retuning a double-octave Wheatstone ... for the Canadadian folk singer Ian Robb....

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Three questions (so far) and two observations:

... What is the range?

... How are the octave-paired reeds/chambers connected?

... What happened to the second set of photos? (I can't see any links.)

 

... It appears to have hand (wrist?) rails, in addition to the thumb loops and pinkie plates.

... If that's Ian playing the thing, then plastic surgery has made major advances in the last few years.

[Paul Read]

Hi Jim,

 

The high notes are the same as a normal tenor treble. the low notes are, I believe, an octave below.

 

One of the missing photos shows how the paired chambers are connected. Basically, the adjacent high/lows are paired and the openings are shaped accordingly (I'll post a pic when I get home).

 

For the bottom notes, the reeds are all in the boxes behind the reed pans (photos to come). When I got the instrument, the high reed in each box had been sealed off so that only the low note sounded on the eight lowest buttons. Also, the higher note reeds were brass framed and glued in place. I suspect that originally there was only one reed for the low notes. Ideed, some of the added reeds had been removed again.

 

I forgot to add the photos initially and then added them as an edit. It didn't work!

 

Stephen,

 

It did take some effort to retune over 200 reeds! I'll post the serial number with the next photos. I do remember that there didn't seem to be any special reference in the ledgers which surprised me. May be a 3/8 issue.

[JimLucas]

The high notes are the same as a normal tenor treble.  the low notes are, I believe, an octave below.

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That's what I was guessing from your photos. The octave lower would be equivalent to a "bass". String equivalents would be a viola (tenor) and cello (bass) playing in octaves.

 

Wow!

[Paul Read]

Try again!

 

I can't seem to get the Dave Leese bellows to fit though! Need more stretch in the leather.

[JimLucas]

I'm sure there's a word for that reed "pan" layout.

Ah, here it is: Bizarre!

[Stephen Chambers]

I'll post the serial number with the next photos.  I do remember that there didn't seem to be any special reference in the ledgers which surprised me.

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I can now make out the serial number, 32157, on the reed pan, and you're right, there is nothing to suggest that it is a "Special", or anything unusual, except the size. The entry is from 1929, and simply reads :

 

May 17 Octo Black 57 keys 10 3/4" 83[batch no.] 32157

 

So you wouldn't even suspect it existed, from the ledgers.

[malcolm clapp]

I'll post the serial number with the next photos.  I do remember that there didn't seem to be any special reference in the ledgers which surprised me.

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I can now make out the serial number, 32157, on the reed pan, and you're right, there is nothing to suggest that it is a "Special", or anything unusual, except the size. The entry is from 1929, and simply reads :

 

May 17 Octo Black 57 keys 10 3/4" 83[batch no.] 32157

 

So you wouldn't even suspect it existed, from the ledgers.

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Surely the size would have been the give away, and warranting further investigation? Only 57 buttons in a 10+ inch body...

 

M

Edited June 7, 2005 by malcolm clapp

[Stephen Chambers]

Surely the size would have been the give away, and warranting  further investigation? Only 57 buttons in a 10+ inch body...

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Malcolm,

 

The size, as I said, certainly suggests something unusual, but there is no model number or any other clue in the ledger to say what type of concertina it is. The most obvious conclusion might be that it was probably a contra-bass, but it would need a pretty wild imagination to dream this one up, without the instrument in front of you.

 

Usually they would at least record such a model as a "Special", even if they didn't indicate what was different about it.

[Paul Read]

Hi Stephen,

 

Sorry I didn't get back with the number. At least you found a way to get it from the pics. I have it somewhere on the tuning template. I'll put a couple more pics later

[Paul Read]

Stephen, I can confirm the number you took from the reed pan. The challenge with tuning was to stop off each octave while the other was tuned, Here are some more pics: