Strange Beast On Ebay

[Jim Besser]

Anybody know what this thing is, aside from the fact it's a scholler and thereby probably unplayable? Very odd button arrangement, I don't see an air button.

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...7327898136&rd=1

[tony]

Anybody know what this thing is, aside from the fact it's a scholler and thereby probably unplayable? Very odd button arrangement, I don't see an air button.

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...7327898136&rd=1[/url]

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Yes Jim, this is the piano key arrangement. (I think)

[tony]

Have a look at http://www.concertina.net/ww_hayden_interview.html

 

It seems to be a shortened version of the Rust Piano System.

Edited June 9, 2005 by tony

[JimLucas]

Very odd button arrangement, I don't see an air button.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...7327898136&rd=1[/url]

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Yes Jim, this is the piano key arrangement. (I think)

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Have a look at http://www.concertina.net/ww_hayden_interview.html

It seems to be a shortened version of the Rust Piano System.

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Tony, I think you were right the first time. Both sides are arranged like the keys of a piano, from E up a little over an octave to G, with the upper row being the "black" keys. I suspect that the extra button on the one side -- the one at top center -- is not an extension of the piano keyboard, but the air button that Jim B. was looking for.

[Daniel Hersh]

And here's something similar, though apparently much older...and one hand looks just like one side of an Anglo: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...gory=16218&rd=1

 

Daniel

 

 

Very odd button arrangement, I don't see an air button.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...7327898136&rd=1[/url]

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Yes Jim, this is the piano key arrangement. (I think)

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Have a look at http://www.concertina.net/ww_hayden_interview.html

It seems to be a shortened version of the Rust Piano System.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tony, I think you were right the first time. Both sides are arranged like the keys of a piano, from E up a little over an octave to G, with the upper row being the "black" keys. I suspect that the extra button on the one side -- the one at top center -- is not an extension of the piano keyboard, but the air button that Jim B. was looking for.

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[Stephen Chambers]

And here's something similar, though apparently much older...and one hand looks just like one side of an Anglo:

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Daniel,

 

I've seen a few of these, which do seem to be suffering an "identity crisis", in that they are indeed "piano-system" in the treble and "German-system" (or "Anglo" if you prefer) in the bass.

 

With the name badge for Gebrüder Dix reeds, it was probably made in the 1930's, or even the 1940's (they were the only company in German-occupied Europe licensed to make reeds during WWII).

[CaryK]

This looks similar to toy concertinas that the Magnus Harmonica Co of New Jersey created in the 1950s. They too used the swirled, marbled, plastic end pieces (bakelite) for their concertinas and toy organs. The Magnus concertinas used plastic reeds as the company started during the 1940s and brass and steel were unavailable due to the war. Their toy concertina had only six buttons on the right hand side and a single "drone" or constant-chord button on the left hand side with no air button so it doesn't resemble the Scholler shown on eBay. You might want to check the the makeup of the reeds though. They could be plastic too.

[Stephen Chambers]

The Magnus concertinas used plastic reeds as the company started during the 1940s and brass and steel were unavailable due to the war. ... You might want to check the the makeup of the reeds though.  They could be plastic too.

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Several people, both in the United States and Great Britain, were working on making plastic reeds in the 1940's. It was an opportune time, the plastics industry was developing rapidly and the war had created shortages of supplies from war-ravaged continental Europe.

 

I have several all-plastic harmonicas made by British Mouthorgans Ltd., of Southport, Lancashire, and for that matter Mario Maccaferri (the designer of Django Reinhardt's guitars) patented plastic clarinet/Saxophone reeds in the United States as early as 1940.

 

But I don't imagine for one moment that the instrument on eBay has plastic reeds. This "chromatische Concertina" looks the same as one in my Meinel & Herold catalogue from c.1935. The fingering diagram there shows that the two rows of diatonic basses are laid out like concertina buttons in F/C, and that the mahogany version, with bronze reeds, cost M. 21, whilst the celluloid finish, with Dix steel reeds, cost M. 30.