History Of The Anglo In England, Pre-1920

[arti]

I got to know Eric in the early 70s when he lived in Worth Matravers (Purbeck)

He later moved to Swanage as he felt Worth to be rather isolated when he was older (Spring 1973?)

That was the last time I saw him.

About a year earlier we both attended the ICA meeting.

I was a beginner and he was the most accomplished player I ever heard. As quoted elsewhere - more like a Duet player.

He favoured what I guess you`d call light Classical and had a very harmonic style. He said he owed his skills to all night practice sessions when he was a volunteer Coastguard at 'Winspit.'

At times he would swing his concertina but in a very measured/restrainedl way that enhanced his music. He liked nothing better than to fill the village hall with sound.

I clutched my brand new Crabb and looked on in awe.

For many years I kept a recording but lost it in a house move. Perhaps wrongly, I thought the ICA would have kept theirs as his playing was so well thought of.

He definitely counts as a true English Anglo player - no links to Folk Revival as far as I know - repertoire from the early part of the 20th Century and a style that was unique.

Glenda- if your father farmed on Purbeck I also met him on one occasion. I often wondered if he kept Eric's Wheatstone.

PS: Odd that Tommy Williams doesn't get a mention - perhaps I missed him on the list

[Dan Worrall]

Wow, that's an old thread!

 

No worries, recordings of Eric Holland have survived, and are part of my "House Dance" CD Rom project from 2015 or so. There are about 200 recordings there of classic players in the early years of the last century, from all over the world. Not sure why more people don't use it as a resource, or know about it. You can get it via Musical Traditions, or download it for - I think - just 10 bucks or so at the www.concertinajournal.org site (go to Current Chronicle".

If you search on "House Dance" on this website I'm sure you can find many of the descriptive announcements from when it came out.

[alex_holden]

3 hours ago, Dan Worrall said:

No worries, recordings of Eric Holland have survived, and are part of my "House Dance" CD Rom project from 2015 or so. There are about 200 recordings there of classic players in the early years of the last century, from all over the world. Not sure why more people don't use it as a resource, or know about it. You can get it via Musical Traditions, or download it for - I think - just 10 bucks or so at the www.concertinajournal.org site (go to Current Chronicle".

 

Here's the direct link - you can read the text of the book online for free, or pay a small amount to download it with the accompanying recordings in MP3 format (funds go towards the Concertina Journal's running costs):

House Dance

[Stephen Chambers]

On 6/25/2020 at 8:51 PM, arti said:

PS: Odd that Tommy Williams doesn't get a mention - perhaps I missed him on the list

 

Not really, when you consider that it's a list of Anglo players, and Tommy played the Maccann duet...

 

[arti]

And to think I knew both those things!