Looking for Bass Anglo Concertina

[McCarthy]

Really been enjoying my baritone anglo and now I would like to start looking for an elusive bass anglo concertina. I reckon the standard bass anglo concertina is in G/D but maybe some are in C/G (2 octaves below a standard 30 button C/G)? As rare as they are though, I haven't a clue in reality. Any comments on that?

 

Buying 3rd party from another player would be ideal but recognize I may need to contact a maker and wait for years. Would appreciate advice on what maker's still manufacture bass anglos? I see some information on Dipper's website but obviously that is top end and a long wait time. Maybe best to get on a list now while the thought's still young and I have years to progress? Does anyone have any experience with A.C. Norman bass anglo concertina's? They have the one of the only websites that actually list a model like that other than Dipper. Maybe Wakker would take the time to make a bass anglo concertina outside of their regular catalog? Holden concertinas? I recognize this is a very particular niche and I may be on the hunt for a long time.

 

Any and all advice is welcome. Thank you!

[alex_holden]

Cohen Braithwaite-Kilcoyne has a C/G bass like you describe. I hesitate to describe it as unique because so many weird and wonderful instruments have been made in the past, but I'm not currently aware of any others like it. I'm sure Cohen would agree that it's hard work to play.

 

I will soon be starting to build my first G/D bass. Unfortunately my waiting list(s) have become very long. If you think you might ever want to order one from me, I recommend dropping me an email to get on the list of people who are interested in potentially placing an order (quite a few years) in the future without any cost or obligation at this stage.

[LesJessop]

This might not be too helpful for your query, but I have a Bass concertina made by Andrew Norman. It is an English, not an Anglo, and I would suggest you could come and hear it / play it  but for the fact you live in the US and I'm in England ! I know that some people don't like 'hybrid' concertinas (with accordion reeds), and that is what Andrew makes, but I'd already got one of his Baritone instruments and I'm perfectly happy with that, and with the Bass. The Bass has 43 buttons and, unlike a lot of older instruments it is not Single Action. There was not a very long wait between putting in an order and getting the instrument - I think it was just over a year.

 

    

[Doug Barr]

I have a C/G Lachenal Bass Anglo (sorry not for sale right now)  This one plays great.  If you ever get up to the NYC area contact me and you could give it a try.

[Peter Smith]

Andrew Norman has put a video of his G/D bass anglo on YouTube: 

 

[McCarthy]

Thank you all for the comments. I continue to wrap my head around this idea. I think I oughta reach out to A.C. Norman.

 

Alex,

thanks for responding! I knew you would likely see this. Fantastic to hear you are building a bass anglo concertina. Excited to see the results, hopefully we can see some pictures or a sound clip as you progress and complete. What would you say is the hardest part of building such a giant instrument? All the best to the wonderful recipient of said concertina. Seems we do have another C/G bass concertina as posted by Doug here, but they certainly are a rare instrument. I've heard Cohen play said C/G bass concertina in some recordings of him playing a song called The Dancing Tailor, among others on his youtube channel. It's quite fascinating. Given how common C/G concertina is, I can picture myself playing that moreso than a G/D bass although they seem more rare for an already infrequently seen type of instrument. I kinda feel like it wouldn't be too hard to go from a C/G to a G/D though. It looks like a burden to play. I will be sure to reach out if I would like to get on your waiting list, I recognize that a talented maker breeds demand for their instruments which puts a strain on the supply side of things.

 

LesJessop,

thank you so much for the comment! I have seen that Andrew Norman also makes a bass english concertina and they sound quite amazing. It's certainly right up the alley of the question I was posing. As Peter showed, A.C. Norman has a youtube channel which has a video of both their bass anglo and bass english. It's fantastic to be able even to get a sound clip of such a unique instrument before deciding to purchase one. Your comment about the fast turn around really piques my interest, I may need to reach out to Mr.Norman and see what the current situation is. I appreciate the offer to try your instrument out, would be nice to even listen to it. They really are quite a thing. Honestly, I think hybrid accordion reed concertinas sound fine, even if they are a little bit different. I have a Clover from CC and it plays quite a treat. What I'm after is responsiveness more than anything. I like playing fast, especially in low octaves and generally those two concepts don't go the best together. I get the sense that the concertinas from A.C Norman in the bass category are quite responsive, well rounded and just simply play well for what they are. Maybe accordion reeded hybrids are more suited towards lower octave concertinas due to their repeatability manufacturally speaking, the tolernaces required to make a concertina are tight enough as is and then you add on the complexity of a vintage style concertina reed pan and things get even trickier.

 

Doug,

Thank you so much for the awesome picture and your comment! I actually have a lot of family up that way in the Catskills so maybe one day in the future I will reach out to connect if up that way. I totally recognize why you wouldn't want to let go of such a unique instrument. Can you comment on it's responsiveness, overall action and how it handles fast passages? I'm talking about button/valve/pad dynamics, are buttons prone to stick/low notes can choke if moving too quickly, etc. I have a lachenal baritone 30 button c/g anglo that I bought from barleycorn and it's really a great instrument. However, the fact that it is a low cost lachenal for the time it was made; it's action and overall feel certainly can be noticed. Buttons may get stuck or shift at times, sometimes it hinders playing. Reality is; I need to tinker with it more to fix any of those issues. Though some lachenal's are great players, it's hard to tell what one gets into with any individual instrument. What's the history behind yours? Appreciate you commenting.

 

Peter,

Thanks for the video. I've seen this several times and it still blows me away. I think the hybrid concertina sounds fine here and it makes me realize how important bellow folds can be on a low octave concertina. I've only got 6 folds on my baritone and I certainly notice it while playing. Maybe I should just get my mind set on purchasing one from A.C Norman while I have the thought and ability to do so. LesJessop said the waiting time is rather shorter right now compared to other makers. 

 

Wonderful discussion everyone, appreciative of this!

Edited August 21, 2023 by McCarthy

[alex_holden]

7 hours ago, McCarthy said:

thanks for responding! I knew you would likely see this. Fantastic to hear you are building a bass anglo concertina. Excited to see the results, hopefully we can see some pictures or a sound clip as you progress and complete. What would you say is the hardest part of building such a giant instrument? All the best to the wonderful recipient of said concertina. Seems we do have another C/G bass concertina as posted by Doug here, but they certainly are a rare instrument. I've heard Cohen play said C/G bass concertina in some recordings of him playing a song called The Dancing Tailor, among others on his youtube channel. It's quite fascinating. Given how common C/G concertina is, I can picture myself playing that moreso than a G/D bass although they seem more rare for an already infrequently seen type of instrument. I kinda feel like it wouldn't be too hard to go from a C/G to a G/D though. It looks like a burden to play. I will be sure to reach out if I would like to get on your waiting list, I recognize that a talented maker breeds demand for their instruments which puts a strain on the supply side of things.

 

I certainly hope to get at least one recording of it before it leaves. As usual the build process will be documented in detail on my Instagram and later summarised on my website. I'm having to build a bigger CNC router machine first because my old one maxes out at about 6.25" wide. I don't know yet what will be the hardest part. I expect the larger bass reed assemblies will be more difficult to make, the left hand reed pan will need some special design features to extend the length of the lowest reed chambers, the bellows frames will need to be deeper than usual, the handrail attachment points will need to be extra strong because of the extra weight, the bass valves may be difficult to get working reliably, I'll probably need a larger pad size for the lowest reeds, and I'll have to pay attention to the design of the longest action levers so they don't flex too much when played quickly. Probably there will be other issues to solve that I don't know about yet.

 

BTW I would be willing to have a go at making a C/G bass, with the caveat that it couldn't possibly be as fast or easy to play as a good baritone, never mind a treble.

[Peter Smith]

I should have mentioned that I had a chance to play Andrew Norman's bass anglo, when visiting him a while back. It sounded just like it does on his video an dseemed quite responsive - though I'm no expert!

Peter

[McCarthy]

Alex,

 

Thank you for your comment. All of your points about nuiances that will make assembling a bass concertina are of total sense. This baritone that I have purchased has made me realize how difficult it can be to get low octave reeds to function properly. It's not just about the reed but the whole assembly; chamber, pad, valve, action and all. The few times I've taken it apart to tinker and improve it I'm anxious to have it back in one piece regardless of progress.

 

I did not realize you documented your process on instagram, I'll have to check it out. How wide do you think your bass G/D concertina will be? Do you have a model as to base your bass concertina off? I'm sure it would be difficult to figure out how to size everything but I suppose after years of practice it's just a natural by feel thing. How much do you think it'll weigh? How many bellow folds are anticipated? The whole idea intrigues me. 

 

Seems like C/G bass anglo concertinas are a rare breed. As you go down lower in octave it seems to get increasingly more difficult to keep it easy to play and fast. That last octave or even half an octave from a baritone/bass would be challenging. Do you think it's harder to keep the responsiveness if the reeds and reedpan are assembled as a vintage concertina vs as a hybrid?

 

Peter, 

 

Thank you for that information. I'm sure that was a wonderful experience to try one out. It can be hard to get a bass concertina like that to be so responsive. I really wonder if and how using hybrid accordion reeds makes it easier to accomplish that. As much as I'd still like to find an old unique bass concertina for sale, I do think contacting Andrew Norman is the way to go for what I'm after. Doesn't hurt to inquire and figure out what could be possible.

 

Appreciate the interest. Looking forward to any more comments on the subject.   

[alex_holden]

The details of the bass Anglo are not finalized yet (I'm still negotiating the detailed specification with the client). Once I have the final button layout nailed down I will do a rough design of the reed pan and action layout and determine the overall size from that. Sometimes I've worked the other way round, where we decide on a particular size of instrument first and then I try to fit in as many buttons as I can.

 

I don't have enough experience working with accordion reeds to comment on how they will compare in this application. Coincidentally I have been playing around with a side project (a rough prototype one-handed bass with a Hayden button layout) that will use reeds salvaged from the bass side of a Hohner accordion, so it will be interesting to see how they perform. One advantage of making your own reeds is you have full control over the scale. The reeds I make are a different length for every pitch. I was surprised to see that the Hohner reeds have one length per octave (at least for the bottom three octaves), with the pitch being set only by profile and brass tip weights. That must make them cheaper to mass-produce because they don't need a large number of different die sets for different lengths of reed.

[McCarthy]

Alex, thanks for all the information. It's amazing how much thought goes into the process. I did not realize that exact fact about accordion reeds vs concertina reeds from a length perspective but that makes sense to me. I can see why it would make it cheaper to mass produce reeds of set lengths for whole groups of notes and then modify then with profile and weights to produce the pitch necessary. Seems more streamlined but it's probably fair to argue that you lose some of the essence of the whole concept by standardizing it as such. There's something wonderful about the notion of hand crafted reeds with their own individual voices and tonal qualities. 

[Kathryn Wheeler]

This week I had the pleasure of trying a bass anglo by Andrew Norman - I was really delighted with how responsive it was and also how natural it felt to play, coming from a standard anglo of normal, higher pitch.  What luscious deep beautiful chords were possible

[Kathryn Wheeler]

On 8/22/2023 at 8:18 PM, Peter Smith said:

I should have mentioned that I had a chance to play Andrew Norman's bass anglo, when visiting him a while back. It sounded just like it does on his video an dseemed quite responsive - though I'm no expert!

Peter

Aah yes, good fun wasn’t it!

[Martin Essery]

Does anyone know what Cormac is playing here? Whatever it is, I want one!

 

 

[Takayuki YAGI]

I think it is Dipper bass.

[mandojoe]

As an aside, I have to say, Comac Begley never fails to astound!

[Martin Essery]

I am trying to work out if Cormac's 'bass' is the normal G/D, or whether it is a 'contra-bass' in C/G? I have not come to a conclusion yet, can anyone do better?

[Bassconcertina.net]

15 hours ago, Martin Essery said:

I am trying to work out if Cormac's 'bass' is the normal G/D, or whether it is a 'contra-bass' in C/G? I have not come to a conclusion yet, can anyone do better?

Hi Martin, it is a G/D, I saw a video of him on Facebook talking about it, the lowest note is G1. It'd be a much bigger instrument if it was a C/G, if it wasn't, it'd have less buttons or be slower due to short scale reeds and compromised chamber length.