Nautical Style Playing

[mthatcher61]

What is nautical style playing on a C/G Anglo? Is it like Morris/English style or Irish style or is it something entirely different? Are there any videos or recording so I can check out what it sounds like?

Thanks

[Chris Timson]

Blowed if I know. I've been playing anglo for 15 years and I've never heard of nautical style before. There have been long, rambling discussions here about whether the concertina was ever played at all on shipboard. The genersl concensus appears to be that cheap German concertinas were so played, but other instruments like fiddle were probably a lot more common. Nobody, SFAIK, ever found anything approaching a recording or any description of style or styles.

 

I shouldn't worry about it.

 

Chris

[Paul Read]

There's a John Townley video/CD that may be the source of this term. It's a good introduction to accompaniment to singing and leans to the English style of right hand tune/harmony with left hand chords.

[mthatcher61]

Thats what I was referring to , the Townley Video. If it is only a rehash of English style accompanyment, then I'll stick with Alan Day's. Thanks.

[Dan Worrall]

Thats what I was referring to , the Townley Video. If it is only a rehash of English style accompanyment, then I'll stick with Alan Day's. Thanks.

 

It is not a rehash, really. Like everyone on this instrument, John has his own style...which in his case relies on a fair amount of (unusual) right hand chording, unlike Alan Day, for example. But John would be the first to admit that he has not learned from any predecessors, recorded or otherwise; recordings do not seem to exist.

 

Records of late 19th and early 20th sailors playing concertinas at sea are abundant, but records of what they played are scarce, just as they are for their land-based contemporaries. I have found several references of sailors doing minstrel songs, which was one of the main pop/rock genres of their time. I suspect that what they played wasn't all that different than their land-based friends. The anglo and anglo-german concertinas were very popular instruments for perhaps 60 or 70 years, and people played whatever was popular at the time. To the extent that anyone on board played a specialized 'nautical' fare, the anglo-ists would have, too. But most probably played what most non-sailor people of their time played.....jigs and hornpipes, minstrel tunes, sentimental music hall stuff, and whatever else they liked.

 

Cheers,

Dan

[Hooves]

What is nautical style playing on a C/G Anglo? Is it like Morris/English style or Irish style or is it something entirely different? Are there any videos or recording so I can check out what it sounds like?

Thanks

 

Bobb Webb would know, he's a scholar of sea-faring music, he plays a McCaan Duet, which can be heard on a few tunes on his sea music CD (I can't remember the title right now, but he has a web site).

 

Bobb is also a well known banjo player and historian, I suspect if anybody knows about concertina and the sea, it would be Bobb.

 

I have seen pictures of sailors with concertinas, will try to find some and post the links. Maybe its not really a "style" you are refferign too, but rather a body of forecastle songs played by sailors or others witha nautical interest.

 

With all the salt air, I'm not sure those steel reeds would hold up all that well on prolonged voyages. maybe the brass reeds would be more prevalent, but I'm just guessing on that so don't go flaming me again m3838 and Jim (and the rest of you unruly button pushing vagrants!)...

 

I think there is a type of music called something like Comoso, I remember it being mentioned in a documentary I saw on a re-enactment of a historic voyage which i believe ended in New Foundland.

 

There is definately a style of playing Button Accordion related to New Foundland, in fact if you search on Ebay there is a dvd you can buy to learn it, plus think of the traditional/pop-rock band "Great Big Sea".

[mthatcher61]

What started my question was an advert with Lark In The Morning for John Townley's Video Tutorial. I was wondering if there was a different 'style' for anglo other than Emglish or Irish. I'm still trying to nuke out my own style. I googled Townley and found his website. Quite a renaissance man. Astrologist, writer, seaman, musician, producer, poet, historian.

 

http://www.astrococktail.com/sailor.html

 

On the above page there are a bunch of Nautical themed tunes. 'Strike The Bell' has him singing and playing Concertina. I will assume this is the aforementioned 'style'.

[geoffwright]

Wouldn't the late Peter Bellamy's style be considered nautical?

[Tom Hall]

You folks are really missing the boat on this one. Aside from Bob (one "b") Webb, do have a listen to Louis Killen, influenced by Alf Edwards; Danny Spooner, who was apprenticed to barge master and source singer/box player, Bob Roberts; Jeff Warner, who learned from Lou Killen; and for the best of both concertina worlds, John Roberts, who for my money, does the best Anglo accompaniment for song I've ever heard. Just my opinion - Tom

Edited November 6, 2007 by Tom Hall

[Dan Worrall]

You folks are really missing the boat on this one.

 

Not really, Tom. The question was about nautical style on the anglo. Webb, Killen, Edwards, Spooner, Warner all play English or duet, not anglo (dunno about Bob Roberts). Only John Roberts on your list is an anglo player....and although he did a nautical album amongst his many folk album, he would hardly call himself a sailor. Like you, I think he is a superb anglo player, however.

 

The question was whether there was a nautical style on the anglo...meaning a tradition of playing it in a certain way for many decades, such as in Morris music or Irish concertina music. Regardless of the type of system played by the folks on your list, NONE learned in a style passed down from previous sailors that played at sea. Although Bob Roberts was a bargemen, I doubt if he learned anglo from previous sailors...happy to be proven wrong on that one, as I don't know of him...but he is the only chance on that list. The consensus opinion is that there is no nautical style today; whatever may have happened in the distant past was never recorded on vinyl, and nearly all popular playing of the anglo (previous to the current revival) died out just after the turn of the twentieth century...before living memory. Ireland, the Morris and some other English like Scan Tester, South Africa, Australia all had remnant players who recorded, but to my knowledge no sailors ever did.

 

Cheers,

Dan

[Roger Digby]

I've never heard that Bob Roberts played a concertina of any sort; just a two row melodeon. Raconteur, singer, bargeman, journalist, broadcaster.....but not, to my knowledge, a concertina player. He was one of the very few traditional singers who accompanied himself as he sang, possibly the only English one, but he was very conscious of the media and not slow in coming forward, so I suspect this may have been a part of a recreated image. Whatever the truth of that his recordings are well worth having.

I'll also add that he would never sing some of his songs in mixed company!

[Dave Prebble]

Hi All,

 

Sorry I can't cast any light on the Origins/Invention of the term Nautical Style.........

 

I am advised that my style of playing is purely 'Agricultural'

 

 

Dave

[Paul Read]

John Roberts, who for my money, does the best Anglo accompaniment for song I've ever heard. Just my opinion - Tom

 

Hi Tom,

If you like John's accompaniment, get hold of a Keith Kendrick CD............also a great player in a similat style.

[Hooves]

I am advised that my style of playing is purely 'Agricultural'

 

Dave

 

 

Does that mean you use a lot of fertilizer in your arrangements?

[Dave Prebble]

I am advised that my style of playing is purely 'Agricultural'

 

Dave

 

 

Does that mean you use a lot of fertilizer in your arrangements?

 

 

 

I prefer to thinK that I 'plough my own furrow'

 

Dave