Culture: Irish music performed on the English adaptation of a German instrument
Instrumentation: Solo Anglo-German concertina
The Anglo-German concertina is a diatonic, bisonoric bellows-driven free-reed instrument. The best explanation of it can be found here. I really recommend watching it. Geoff Kaufman's concertina is in the keys of Bb and F, which was used for playing with brass instruments while Mary McNamara's is pitched in the keys of C and G, which is preferable for playing with fiddle and other sharp-keyed instruments.
This instrument is sometimes referred to as the Anglo concertina since the reference to Germany was dropped in Europe during WWI for obvious reasons.
This is the type of concertina used on our listening example (and the same instrument, too).
Title: Dallas Rag
Performer: Brian Peters
Culture: Ragtime originated in the United States. Brian Peters is from England.
Instrumentation: Solo Anglo-German Concertina
Brian Peters has been one of my free-reed idols ever since I heard him play at the Mystic Sea Music Festival many years ago. He is an incredible musician on concertina, button accordion, guitar, and also a great vocalist.
If you have ever heard a squeezebox played in the show Spongebob Squarepants, that is Brian Peters as well.
An interesting thing about Brian Peters' instrument is that it features a third row of keys pitched in diatonic C#, which makes it a chromatic instrument capable of even ragtime.
From Brian Peters' website:
"The Anglo-concertina is the kind where each button produces a different note depending on whether you're pushing or pulling the bellows. None of the other sorts does that, so at least we've put clear blue water between us and them. This push-pull system is often held to imbue the music with intrinsic rhythm, since successive notes of a melody are generally punctuated by changes in bellows direction, but of course it's perfectly possible to play Anglo with all the rhythm of a drunkard falling downstairs, or to produce crisp and driving music on any of the other types. Nevertheless, the common conception is that the Anglo is good for bouncy dance music, the English for smoothly-phrased melodies and subtle song accompaniments, and duets for really clever stuff. The Anglo is also notoriously limited as to its range of keys, and its ability to play tunes containing accidentals."
The Anglo-German concertina is most closely associated with dance music, and can be occasionally used to accompany singing, such as here.
"A barbed rivalry exists between factions of the concertina fraternity: English players look down on Anglo exponents as musical illiterates who can't play outside the key of C; Anglo afficionados, on the other hand, regard players of the English as effete snobs who wouldn't attempt Three Blind Mice without setting up a music stand first. Both views are a little unfair, but it's certainly easier to knock a basic tune out of an Anglo without prior musical knowledge - it's only a glorified mouth-organ, after all. This, and its low price compared with the other types during the late Victorian period, made the Anglo the instrument of choice for traditional musicians." -Brian Peters (emphasis mine)
However, this rivalry certainly doesn't prevent the different systems from playing together in a jam session.
No comments:
Post a Comment