I know a few people who play Irish music quite handy on the English system.
I am not sure you can easily transpose a system of ornamentations as it has develeped to the English. My son is going to Noel Hill and is starting to get into the rolling, cranning etc. haven’t heard that done on the English ever.
Thanks Peter. Aye, cranns and rolls on the EC… there’s a challenge I’ll not be accepting any time soon!
That wasn’t to say it can’t be done, a whole system has developed though for the Anglo C/G and for continuity’s sake it makes in a way sense to stand on the shoulders of those wo went before, who put their time in devoping the styles as they are now.
I agree entirely. I was remarking more on my lack of talent than on the capability of the box itself 
When it comes to Concertinas–I largely don’t have any idea what I’m talking about.
What I meant by it being English being “an issue” is that it is, well, an issue that people feel differently about and debate. I didn’t mean to suggest that English system is inferior.
Dale
Just wanted to put in a good word for both Bob Tedrow’s and Frank Edgley’s instruments. I’ve owned both having started on a Tedrow and recently acquired an Edgley. You can’t go wrong with either, both build extremely well made, comfortable, good sounding instruments.
I am also in the ‘can’t afford what I really want’ seat, and do know that starting with a cheapie is starting with handicaps. That said, I’ll look at this ebay one from a different perspective… feedback.
The seller appears to have excellent feedback, however - there are 15 negative feedbacks in the last year, and on the first page are four expressing problems with quality and refunds. 4 out of the last 20 - that’s 20% dissatisfaction - that’s not a good average at all, and is enough for me to say “No way!” even if the price seems great. The old “if it seems too good to be true, it probably is”
Hello all,
I don’t want to seem to contradict anyone who has posted in this thread, since I believe there is room for different choices and opinions about this subject.
However, I do have a lot of experience teaching adult beginners the concertina and trying to find them suitable instruments at the best possible value, here in the US where prices tend to be high and availability low. So I would like to offer some alternative points of view to those expressed above. Of course if you lived where concertinas were abundant, or had a maker down the street, my suggestions might not be as useful.
I think that the standard 20 key C/G layout has enough notes for thousands of the best, most traditional Irish concertina tunes. In all the recordings I have heard of Mrs. Crotty, John Kelly sr, Kitty Hayes, etc., I have never heard a single tune (or a single note) that could not be easily played on a good quality 20 key. True, when recorded these musicians were usually playing on a 3 row anglo, but they did not use the 3rd row. This is not widely known, but should be given consideration by the many beginners - who may never learn to make such lovely music as these masters/mistresses of traditional music - who are free to volunteer their view that “you need 30 keys right away.” On a 20 key C/G, the keys of G and C major are available, as has been mentioned, but also all of their modes (D dorian, A dorian, etc.), plus the “inflected” tunes in the tonality of G that use both F sharp and F natural. Then there are the many tunes that may sound major, but are pentatonic or hexatonic (using only 5 or 6 different notes), like “Rolling in the Ryegrass,” “The Boyne Hunt,” the “Kerry Polka,” the “Bohola jig (Cooley’s)” etc. These latter tunes can be played very comfortably in their “normal” key of D on a 20 key C/G. Then there are the many G and D mixolydian tunes - again, no problems.
If you believe as I do that an adult beginner in Irish music should have an interest in all the great players that make up the tradition, and that he or she should work on a decent quality of control of the notes and rhythm of a few tunes played slowly (rather than learning the whole O’Neill’s book in a mediocre quality), then a dozen or so good tunes practiced to perfection with the guidance of a good teacher will be plenty of work for a few months or maybe much longer! A good quality 20 key will give you this option, without any doubt.
But there’s the rub. The (hundreds of ?) thousands of cheap Lachenal 20 keys that clog ebay even today were made with short 5 fold bellows and very bad actions. Even when they have steel reeds and when restored to perfect, “as-new” condition, they are not as satisfactory as the standard rosewood 30 key Lachenals, even if (like Mrs. Crotty) you only use 2 rows, due to these inferior actions and bellows. However, the 2 rows (due to great supply and “no respect”) are so underpriced that I have often invested in hot-rodding them with riveted actions and good 6-fold bellows. Then they are actually better-playing instruments than the “stock” 3 row Lachenals! – like the great cajun or Quebecois melodeons that are “limited” (as some claim) by not having all the notes, but are much higher quality than many cheap 2 row button accordions. This contrarian approach of mine has enabled many of my students to learn on great-sounding and great-playing instruments with reliable action, good air supply, and the reed response they will later be handling when they graduate to a fine traditionally-constructed 3-row. Such 20 key hotrod Lachenals also hold their value when trading up, in my view an important consideration for a first instrument.
Of course, YMMV and dedicated students can learn on anything. But, using the approach I suggest, one of my students who in her 30s had never played an instrument before learned to play on a 20 key, and 6 months later was placed by Noel Hill in his advanced class (for one of his North American weeks), ahead of many with much more expensive instruments who had been playing much longer. Noel did look askance at her 20 key, I’m told, until he heard her deliver a couple of lovely tunes with good rhythm and phrasing.
Notably, this student had the humility and sense to suggest she would be better placed in the intermediate class, but she had to talk her way down to it!
True, there are ornaments used by many today that involve the C#, etc., even on G tunes, but again I raise the question of whether you might like to save some money, still play on a traditional-sounding instrument, and wait to use the notes Mrs. Crotty never used - until you are better than her at making great music 
Finally, Peter (with great respect to one whose views I have learned from), wouldn’t a D/A be the key to put most of Mrs. Hayes’ arrangements into concert pitch? Mind you, I know she could find the keys also on a G/D by playing along the rows, but much of her repertoire on the recording is fingered “one step low,” not a fourth high.
With best wishes to all,
Paul
could you consider something else?
well if you want to spend just a bit more..
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=16218&item=7310843969
…
Frank
Paul, Kitty used to have a D/G stagi and for that reason went looking for a D/G, as i said she also played a lachenal in D/G during a WIllie week. after she bought the Marcus (which she isn’t happy with) from Custy’s Jackie Daly suggested she may have been better off with a different set up. So yes possibly. For the moment she’s happy enough playing her own stuff a tone down on the lachenal she has. Which suits me fine 
(I just sent Mark a 90 minute tape, you may want to listen to at least some of it).
by the way, Kitty never plays a C natural in her tunes (that would B flat but we think in D even when playing a tune down) which is hard work avoiding clashes. 
About the two row: every teacher I talked to (Dympna Sullivan, Noel Hill, Brid Meaney, Edel Fox. Yvonne Griffin, Hugh Healy) was dead against starting on a two row, ‘it gives you bad habits’. That’s why I mentioned it. My son was on the two row with Edel for over a year and he survived but he’s more across the rows now than he could have been on the two row.
Ooooh… maybe my kids could eat bark… hmmmm
Thanks Paul, for taking the time to post. I enjoyed reading your take on the subject.
g
glauber,
Thank you also.
Peter,
Thanks for your response. I think for many reasons (including age, family encouragement, proximity to great players and to dealers who often have relatively inexpensive “stock” Lachenals rather than total rebuilds) your son’s options may be weighted differently than those of the adult beginners in America to whom my suggestion was directed. The rate of progress of some of the youngsters in Ireland boggles my mind, and within a few years your young one will no doubt be able to play in B major, Eb, or W on the 3 row C/G anglo, with every note cranned and full chordal accompaniment. If he wishes and if you tolerate this
So maybe just as well to go right to 30 keys.
But, to repeat myself a little, the main reason I believe the 20 keys have a bad name among professional players and teachers is because of the quality of the commonly seen “stock” examples, not the number of buttons.
That is why I think taking advantage of the cheapness of 20s and hotrodding them to better than new (and better than “stock rosewood 30” ) actions and bellows is worthwhile.
Of course there may be in Clare (as there are here) B/C accordion players who would say you can’t play Irish music on a 1 -row melodeon. But tell that to Bobby Gardiner or Johnny Connolly! And the standard 20 key C/G anglo layout (even without the C# your son’s had, that was probably a customized insert) has many more options for modes and inflection in more tonalities than does the 10-key box.
The traditional (pre WWII) concertina settings that lie so well on a 20 key C/G have a lot of charm and deserve to be preserved as well. And I also argue that they are more accessible to most adult beginners than is playing in the Noel Hill style (by this I mean no slight to Noel’s brilliant music, only that success in the Mrs. Crotty style may be closer to many of these students).
Finally, when referring to the home keys of anglos most professionals and dealers list the row that is lowest in pitch first, just like with a 2 row button accordion. So the “English style 2 row button accordion or melodeon” is a D/G (with G row a fourth higher than the D row), but the traditional concertina in those keys is a G/D (with the G row a fifth lower than the inside, D, row). A standard two row anglo in G/D will have the outside row in G, and a 3 row in G/D will have the middle row in G. I think I have heard of true (anomalous) D/G concertinas that have been made, but these would cross-finger (across the rows) in a nonstandard way.
This convention has often been misused, but mostly by Morris musicians more familiar with D/G accordions (“melodeons) than with concertinas.
Again, the G/D as traditionally construed is a fourth lower than a C/G. A D/A would be a whole tone higher than a C/G. G/Ds and D/As can be found, commissioned to be made, or (if you deal with an excellent craftsman) reworked by careful reed substitution (not just retuning) from an instrument of another pitch.
Best wishes,
Paul
Thanks to Paul Groff his thoughtful posts.
So, what the world needs is a good $8.00 concertina. If we can have the Clarke Sweetone, why can’t we have the Clarke ConcerTone?
I jest.
I’ve looked into the guts of a concertina and I boggle.
The economies of mass production. The main reason (IMHO) why folk music is played on the Anglo, is that the Anglo was sold as a cheap mass-produced instrument, as opposed to the more luxury English, which were targeted at the middle class “parlour” market. It’s ironic that the situation is reversed now, and you can get a playable English box cheaper than a playable Anglo.
g
Dale,
Thank you also and thanks for this remarkable website.
Peter,
BTW I actually love the sound of the “B natural” in F tunes (C pitch version of playing a C# in G tunes) - in Mrs. Hayes’ “Touch me if you dare,” etc.
It reminds me of Micho Russell’s very sharp C on the flute and whistle, and even more so of the great P. J. Conlon’s settings of tunes on the D melodeon:
College Groves all in D major…
The Banks of Newfoundland - jig, key of G, C# as the fourth scale degree.
But then – The Flogging Reel in G with all C#s and F#s! And brilliant, powerful music for dancing. The rhythm sells the intonation, for me at least, until then the unfamiliar intonation becomes the hops in the beer. Or the 2000 year old fingerprint (flaw?) on the pot shard…
Hello all
I have a suggestion that I don’t think has been made on this thread yet. Bob Tedrow used to resell 30b Stagis that had a substantial amount of reworking and retuning done to them. Many people, but not Bob, used to refer to them as “turbo-Stagis,” so a Google search for that might get you somewhere. I think the web pages Bob used to have on his site detailing the work he did on these might be archived on concertina.net. Bob doesn’t do these anymore, but there must be some of them floating around out there. You might consider putting out feelers for one.
That said, I have a D/A Aeola Tedrow, and love it. It is not just a step up from a C/G, but has the inner row (A) a fourth below the D row. It does require a different technique than the C/G, but it is much more appealing and falls under my fingers better.
Tim
She can get away with most C/C sharp changes on her own but playing with ehr and favouring the piper’s c is sometimes a bit of a bother eg over teh Moor to Maggie’s third part is just one step to far out.
I never liked the f nat in the Flogging, I think they are really awful, pipers have their own way with those notes
Tim,
The Tedrow idea of the “D/ low A” (and I have also seen a “G/ low D” version of his idea, by him) with the inside row an octave low is a very good one. But it does not only finger differently from a C/G, as you stated - it fingers differently from a standard D/A, or a G/D, or a Bb/F etc. - in other words, in fingers differently from what has traditionally been called an anglo.
The fingering difference could be compared to whistle vs recorder, and is marked enough that Mr. Tedrow’s invention could well be considered a different concertina "system’ rather than a key variation of the anglo chromatic concertina.
Glad you like it!
If I am not mistaken, Grey Larson whose name has been mentioned in this forum plays a D/A. I don’t know him personally, but it sounds like a “normal” one.
And I play one myself (as well as other keys of anglo). A standard D/A anglo for me. The inner row in high A is brilliant for Scottish tunes, I use the LH thumb button as a D drone at times, and all the Cooley and D melodeon tunes bounce out of it.
The Cooley tunes are also great on a G/D - or Ab/Eb - though!
Best wishes,
Paul
Peter (must learn to quote properly),
I’m with you on the F natural in the Floggin Reel, though I will play it to fit in with fiddlers if they want it. But unless I’m trying to channel PJ on the melodeon I would use a C natural of some description.
My own concertinas have a sharp C natural and a flat C# though, relative to equal, and that allows some variety.
I have heard most pipers go for a C natural that is flat of equal but I find more use for a sharp one as you would find in various mean-tone temperaments.
Paul