I’d be grateful for some info.
I have actually done some searching. Apologies
if I’m asking about searchable stuff I missed.
It appears that the rt hand plays melody on button boxes.
Right?
What does it take to play ITM in sessions on a button box.
How many rows of buttons? Which keys?
What does it cost to get something adequate?
Thanks, Jim
Correct. Unless you are left-handed and either have a box converted or play it upside down.
What does it take to play ITM in sessions on a button box.
Between two and eight years of practising at least an hour a day depending on the system and your aptitude. (And the type of session you are thinking of, I suppose.) And a brain that can deal with the push-pull factor. Although they might seem very intutive at first they take a lot of concentrated work to master.
How many rows of buttons? Which keys?
One row in D will allow you to play a good chunk of the repertoire (tunes in D major, B minor, E dorian and A mixolydian, plus a good many pentatonic tunes, and tunes in G and A dorian that have no C natural)
Two rows in D and G will give you anything you can play on a whistle without half-holing
To tackle pretty much anything, you need two rows a semitone apart - usually B/C or C#/D. Possibly D/C# if you want to play like Joe Derrane. (I advise you not to consider older systems such as C/C# or D/D# except as “Eb” boxes.)
What does it cost to get something adequate?
Close to $1000 for an Irish Dancemaster, Weltmeister or a tweaked Hohner Double-Ray.
$2000+ for an Italian-made box.
You may find something decent secondhand for less. I have just sold a Saltarelle Irish Bouebe to a member of this forum for $1500, for example. Rick C has a tweaked Hohner for sale on here at the moment.
Cheers
Steve
And/or a great deal of chutzpah and very forgiving friends. 
Another thing that might surprise some people coming from winds or fiddle is the amount of planned fingering (and air button and bellows movement) you sometimes need to work out in advance. It’s not unlike piano or other keyboard instruments, and somewhat intuitive after a while.
Thank you. You’all are the greatest.
It’s really helpful to have a place where questions
like these get good answers.
It’s too bad it takes so long to get up to speed. I already know
the tunes, or lots of them. I tried concertina a few years ago
and had a tough time with it. I thought the fingering
on the button accordion might be more rational.
Anyhow it seems I’m looking at a solid investment of
labor if I go this path.
Now you’re talking, picking up the box because concertinas are too hard to play! 
What Guru said is also so true, “planned fingering” is such a big dimension of concertina playing (and I’m sure accordion too). You need to approach and work each tune differently because they have different patterns. On the whistle, I could learn a tune in a few minutes if it was in my head. On the concertina, even if the tune is solidly in my head, I need to work on the tune to find the right buttons to phrase things right. It’s an interesting challenge, but can be such a pain sometimes!
Yes, very perceptive comments by MTG. In addition to my having the requisite barrowloads of chutzpah (or sheer neck) to inflict my box playing on others at an early stage, all my musical friends were very forgiving.
Well, all except Azalin 
It’s really impossible to answer a question like “how long before I could play in sessions” because so much depends on the individual and on the session. Most people who have the tunes in their head already ought to be able to manage some polkas and waltzes in a halfway decent fashion within a few weeks, or months anyway. Reels are really another matter entirely.
The point is I think that, like jigs, button boxes are trickier than you think. Don’t take up the box thinking it will be a relatively undemanding second instrument. The secondhand market is awash with quality instruments being sold by people who fancied having a go at the accordion on the side only to realize, I suspect, that getting up to speed on the thing was a lot more work than they bargained for. Take up the box if you really want to play it and are prepared to put the time in. My 2¢…
As for the fingering being rational… mwahahahaha. Possibly less confusing than on a concertina though since (unless you play D/G or A/D/G) most of the time you have no choice as to which button to press (only two “spare” or doubled notes on B/C and C#/D and none on a one-row). But on a concertina, your hand stays in the same place. The confusing choices on the button box are to do with how you move your hand around and make sure you don’t run out of fingers!
OK I went to our local folk music store,
Music Folk. They had one on consignment,
three rows, I think C, G and F. I know this isn’t
ITM tuning. I’m not going to buy it. Just
to see…
Anyhow I could play O’carolan tunes within ten minutes.
I guess the concertina stayed with me. I appreciate this
isn’t an easy instrument but I do think I can do this
within a year or two.
Is a properly tuned box going to be much harder for
some reason?
Assuming you were playing up and down one row - a C#/D will be just as intuitive. At that rate you’ll be cranking out the Sally Gardens reel within half an hour. B/C will be more confusing at first. Could take you 90 minutes I guess
PS Don’t forget to press the carriage return after every four bars.
that carriage return…it is on a thumb button, innit?
Well, in fairness, I’m not forgiving with myself, so can’t do better with others Everytime it gets easier and easier though!
It’s possible. I don’t even know what kind of player you are. But if you’re into ‘authentic’ phrasing, the way very traditional players play the instrument, the challenge is to play the notes with the right ‘swing’ and phrasing… it’s very easy to play the notes if you don’t care about this, the difficulty is to play it right. I’m saying this with concertina in mind, but I’m sure it’s the same with the accordion.
Stevie spends lot of time working on his technique, and I can see how hard it seems to be, but the results are really showing after a few years. I think Stevie started right away working on playing the ‘right’ way on the box, and I took a different path, wanted to play as many tunes as I could, without really trying (with lessons, for example) to play the tunes the right way. I had a my first real lesson last july and since then I’ve been working hard on concertina technique, and it makes a big difference.
Anyhow, my point is, you will be able to play tunes in 1-2 years I’m sure. But do you want to play them nicely, with a nice swing and interesting phrasing? That’s the catch.
I want to play them well. I do have some idea of how to do
that on woodwinds, anyhow it’s growing. Been six or more years,
you see. I know how to make a jig sound like a jig, anyhow.
Or beginning to…
I see on youtube that people have lots of interesting right hand techniques
on button accordion. They are playing rolls, it seems and neat phrasing.
How does one learn that. Is it possible online? Especially rolls, cuts,
how to finger the buttons swiftly, articulate, etc.
Thanks again you all. This is a very helpful conversation for me
and practical too.
Maybe we’re being too discouraging here. If we really knew how much we didn’t know about a new instrument before starting, we never would. So if you fancy it, Jim, just go for it!
There are a few tutor books and DVDs available for the B/C box but nothing for C#/D. The most detailed tutorial I have seen for the B/C is Damien Connolly’s book/DVD set. He provides complete fingering for 29 tunes and discusses quite a few ornaments in some detail.
There is nothing online that I know of. Han Speek’s discussion of the subject of ornamentation is rudimentary to say the least. Many good box players seem to be uninterested in discussing the finer technical points of fingering and so on. (Unlike concertina players, who can’t be shut up.) I think it’s because the more you stick at it, the more you realize there are many different approaches. You just have to develop the style that works best for you. For the first few years you will probably be constantly reevaluating what you do and discovering new tricks that you can’t believe you hadn’t found out about years before.
If you know the music you want to play, the best thing is just to get stuck in. If you need help, ask for it on here, or better still, find a good box player near you and buy them a few pints.
To encourage you, here are a some things about the box you will love: taking it out of the case, playing it, and putting it away. You don’t have to tune it, warm it up, swab it out afterwards, rub rosin on anything.
Things you’ll hate: well, other people will tell you what they hate about it…
Thanks, appreciate this info. There are no button accordion players here, not
any who play ITM, anyhow. Still… We’ll see.
.
Hello,
I got a birthday card a couple of months back with “get yourself an accordeon” as the message from the family.
I expect the c#d hohner that Martin Quinn is tweeking for me to be ready in the next couple of weeks. In the meantine I’ve been playing around with a cc# that I friend has allowed me to borrow.
So take my opinion with a big pinch of salt. That said…
If you’ve been playing trad on another instrument for any length of time then play what you are used to, what you are comfortable with. If that is polkas then start with them.
OTOH if you usually play jigs and reels or hornpipes. Then play the stuff you normally play, you’ll have a much better feel for how you want it to sound.
I really don’t see the point in starting off with polkas if they aren’t your usual repertiore. Not because I look down on polkas, but because I don’t. I’m much more at home playing jigs and reels on the banjo than I am polkas, so it makes sense to have a go at them on the box.
IMHO Polkas are only “easier” than jigs and reels if you are happy with playing polkas poorly.
Cheers - Chris
Chris - are you saying it’s easier to play polkas poorly than to play reels poorly? Or that it’s easier to play reels well than to play polkas well? Or both? Or something else entirely?
Steve
All of the Above, Steve
“It is easier to play the type of tune you are more familiar with”.
rather than
“this class of tune (polka) is easier (than reels or jigs).”
Sure, if you are an absolute beginer with no experience on any instrument and new to trad then some polkas probably are easier than reels or jigs (well than reels anyway). But whichever you play it is going to be a while before it sounds any good.
Edit And only easier because many non-SL musicians set the bar lower for polkas than for other forms of tunes (IMHO)
OTOH if you have been playing trad for a long time on another instrument and mostly playing jigs and reels then it makes sense to start with those tunes on the new instrument rather than a type of tune that you don’t normally play much. You’ll have a much better feel for how your normal repertiore of tune should sound, and where you are falling short. it’ll still be a while before you are any good, hopefully not as long as in the case above though, and partly because your perception of where “good” begins will be somewhat different from a total beginer.
I only play a handful of polkas and slides myself, and I bet an SL style player would laugh at how I played them. I don’t see the point in starting off with those types of tune which I’m less comfortable with because they are percieved as somehow easier.
I don’t have a good feel for polkas (not saying I’m all that great at reels mind, but I’m more comfortable with them), why would I start playing them before reels?
i’ve just read over this, and I think I’m even less clear than before
Cheers - chris
Fair enough Chris, though as someone who plays both polkas and reels for set dancing (and therefore takes polkas seriously), I know which I would call easier for beginners. I mentioned polkas to Jim because he was asking for a realistic timeframe. After I’d been playing box a few months I started playing polkas and waltzes with my dance band, then jigs a bit later, and lastly - quite a bit later - reels.
I remember the effort of getting through the first set of reels on stage at full tilt. Afterwards I felt as if I’d run a marathon. I suppose I was still fighting the bellows… While I agree that if Jim or anyone else doesn’t play polkas, there’s not much point in learning them on the box. But I wouldn’t recommend that anyone start with reels. There’s too much preliminary stuff you need to figure out before you can tackle them - and that’s true of reels on any instrument imo.
Hi Steve,
Yes I only play polkas with any regularity at ceili.
I think I’ve started a set of polkas precisely once at a session over the last year or so. The only other time I’ve played polkas at a session in that time interval was when Eddie Marley (an older glasgwegian fiddler) popped in. He doesn’t play many polkas either but has a particularly nie set comprised of the Girl with the Blue Dress on/ the Sword of St Columba/ the Knocknabour. I’ve always called this set “the Girl that St Columba Knocked up”, which never goes down well 
(edit: my name never goes down well. The set of tunes is great)
I used to play this set of tunes regularly with Eddie years back, but I have nowadays trouble reaclling the first 2 tunes until I hear the opening notes, need to sit down and try to recall them. The last one is in one of the ceili sets but with the long high notes in the last part rearranged.
Very few people play many polkas at sessions around here, although they are typically the tunes taught to beginers. The sets that do turn up regularly at some sessions are very predictable and whilst fine tunes in themselves never strike me as being done with much conviction.
Away from sessions, polkas are always a hit at ceilis, particularly with non-musicians, maybe you are probably right about them being easier to get a handle on if you are new to trad music. I can’t play without smiling when “the Britches Full of Stitches” turns up in the middle of one of the ceili sets. In itself it is such a non-tune, but it does give a great lift ina ceili. Plus loads of the dancers are usually musicains, and I’m sure they are all thinking “WTF, they’re playing ‘the britches’”
Cheers - chris
ha ha ha “oh my goodness” yeah right. That is what I types
I can remember the shock on the faces of some older, very Catholic members of an audience (Melbourne, early 1980s) when one of my bandmates (who had himself trained as a priest but didn’t take holy orders) announced a tune as “The Ashtray on the Altar”.
Back to the present day: when did I say anything about polkas in connection with people being new to trad music? You are reading things that aren’t there… Jim isn’t new to trad and I had been at this Irish music caper for almost 30 years when I took up the box.
Cheers
Steve
Sorry Steve, didn’t mean to imply that you had said something that you hadn’t. (And more specifically I didn’t intend to imply waht you took out of my message, that wasn’t how I had understood you). I just got sucked into tangential issues.
Actually I think the simpler examples of polkas do make quite good choices for people that are completely new to trad, although I think jigs acn be fine too.
What I tend to disagree with is polkas as first choice for someone taking up a second intrument within trad.
Good idea if polkas are a big part of their normal repertiore. But I don’t think they are necessarily a better choice than jigs or reels in this case e.g. if you rarely play polkas on your established instrument, but do play jigs and reals then it makes more sense to go with these latter tunes on the 2nd intrument. (In my impossible to undervalue opinion that is).
Looks like I’ve managed to make myself less clear with every post. Not the first time this has happened either
Best wishes - Chris