Playing/holding style

[fred v]

Just a curious thing but I hold it on my rt. leg, tap my rt. foot and work the bellows with my lt. hand. I find that my foot follows what I do on the bellows and that messes up the timing and also shakes the bellows sometimes. I'm now working on moving it to my lt. leg and tap my rt. foot.

I've seen u-tubes of guys doing it every way possible so I guess it's just up to the individual player.

[David Barnert]

I play with the right end resting on my right leg and work the bellows with my left hand, but I don’t tap my foot.

 

Rather than move your playing to the other leg, ask yourself whether tapping your foot is enhancing or detracting from your playing, and if you decide the latter, find a way to avoid doing it.

[SIMON GABRIELOW]

There's as many ways of playing instruments as there are notes on a concertina!🌝

I am noted for putting my whole hands fingers through straps of my Anglo, and  hold very loosely indeed, however it works for me!😄

[John Wild]

If you need to tap, try tapping your toes, i.e. small movements of the toes inside the shoe, instead of tapping the whole foot. That might sound like a joke, but it is not. It will give you the sense of rhythm that comes from tapping, but also minimises interference with other aspects of playing. As a bonus, no one will know you are doing it.

[fred v]

Hmmm, thanks for the ideas. It bothers me to watch videos of guys pounding their foot as they play. I do find that tapping my foot or toes does help keep my timing tight.

[Anglo-Irishman]

On 11/1/2022 at 12:06 AM, John Wild said:

If you need to tap, try tapping your toes, i.e. small movements of the toes inside the shoe, instead of tapping the whole foot. That might sound like a joke, but it is not.

Indeed! I do it all the time when singing in the choir. This is usually classical music, where foot-tapping is a no-no, but "in-shoe toe-tapping" certainly does help to keep track of the bars where my voice takes a rest.

Cheers,

John

[SIMON GABRIELOW]

It is interesting in classical genre of music how the tapping of rhythm is mainly, to an extent, the job of the conductor.. with his hands or baton . Keeping the rhythm.

[David Barnert]

I might tap a toe in classical music (playing the cello or the recorder) if the rhythm looks tricky and I need to be certain where the beats are, but playing 32-bar dance tunes on the concertina, the rhythm is so ingrained that I don’t need to reinforce it anatomically.

[Stefan]

Rob Harbron rests the middle of the bellows on his leg and taps the foot. This is good for bellows control and the tap enhances his rythm. 

I learned it from him and do it ever since. 

https://robharbron.com/teaching

[Stefan]

In this interview, Mary MacNamara talks about her foot tapping (around minute 23):

https://tunesfromdoolin.buzzsprout.com/1841055/11279447-episode-05-mary-macnamara-concertina

[d.elliott]

Playing the instrument with the across the knee significantly shortens the life of the bellows. I am told that Rob Knows this but is prepared to take the hit. Afterall bellows are a consumable item. Personnally  I, being right-handed, rest the left-hand bellows frame on my left leg, I then rest my right forearm on my right leg so that some of the weight is taken off the thumbs/ little fingers. The left end is anchored, the right end is moved with maximum bellow control. both hands can manoeuvre around the keyboards finding all those bum notes with equal dexterity. Left-handed people simply reverse this, or face the other way?  

[Stefan]

I asked Rob about the wearing out of the bellows at the German concertina meeting. He said he never had a problem with that. I really suspect that the wearing out is a myth. I might be wrong.....

Of course, it depends on what you do with the concertina on the knee, how hard you play etc. 

Is anyone here who actually has worn out bellows in that way?