Tomorrow, Sunday, 10.45 pm @ RTP2, you can watch the recording of the WP of my "Accordion Concerto" wonderfully performed by João Barradas and the Orquestra Metropolitana, cond. Pedro Neves.
The broadcast (together with Beethoven's 3rd Symphony) also features a brilliant work by Pedro Lima 👈Top!👌 #rtp2#accordion#newmusic@composers@contemporarymusic
Here’s a cracking Jean Blanchard tune I can’t believe I don’t remember before hearing it on Mel’s #MelodeonMonday yesterday so I have to share for #TuneswapTuesday - Boite a Frissons
The most useful invention I've ever run across... Corsi-Rosenthal box.
I have used this so far for:
Wildfire smoke
COVID-19
Bacon smoke (on Saturdays, LOL)
General improvement of AQI
Pet related allergies (hay and dander)
Ragweed/pollen heavy days
Dust from Santa Ana winds
Dust from construction/remodeling
Paint fumes (only partially useful, doesn't absorb gases, but helps somewhat) -- plus it sucks all the dust from the air, so it doesn't stick to your paint
Wow.. Shared by an accordionist friend. Putting aside the exoticising tone of the newsreel, this is a fascinating glimpse of Roma life in New York at the end of the 1930s. The accordionist is recognizable as Mishka Ziganoff, a Christian Roma klezmer musician & recording artist of the 1910s and 1920s. Too bad the audio quality is so bad. #accordion#Roma#MusicHistory#OldNewYork#NYhistory#FolkMusic https://youtu.be/jpZRQvDVBY8?si=kvNTSw3bu7fn4NnM
This will be a pretty big step up from my current one, and since I've been playing for almost a year now and I know I'm going to stick with it I think it's safe to upgrade.
Five treble rows instead of three. I learned on three rows of buttons, which is a good idea because those are the main rows for fingering and you won't pick up any bad habits if you only have those main rows. But the two extra rows give additional options for tough fingerings so it's nice to have them now that I know when it's appropriate to use them
Six bass rows instead of five. My current bayan is the simpler folk instrument type, which doesn't have buttons for diminished chords. That actually limits the songs I'm able to play, so this is probably the most significant upgrade
Five treble registers instead of two. My current bayan only has clarinet and wet violin registers. The new one has clarinet and wet violin still, but adds a 4' reed bank and so can do accordion, bandoneon, and bassoon registers
Two bass registers instead of one. I'm actually not sure what the registers are, but there's only two reed banks so it's gotta be single and octave doubled
An air button! My current bayan doesn't have one, so to close the bellows without making a sound you have to hold down as many buttons as possible while closing it slowly so there's not enough airflow to sound any of the reeds. Which is doable but very tedious lol
A bellows strap. This just holds the bellows closed, which is nice because actuating the bellows when the valves are closed can damage the valves. Makes picking it up and transporting it a lot easier
And finally: the buttonboard is flush with the back plate. My current bayan has the buttonboard in the middle of the treble case, so when I play with five fingers (and I'm not using my thumb to support the buttonboard) there's a lever action that causes the edge of the treble case to dig into my sternum. Which is both painful and also tilts the buttonboard into an uncomfortable position. I've gotten good enough that playing with five fingers is common so this is actually the biggest problem I have with my current instrument. I've tried all kinds of strap positions, postures, seat heights, and even bought expensive straps to try to work around this issue but I think it's just intrinsic to the design or my body type or something because I can NOT get it to not do that 😩
Anyway, my first bayan was about $400 shipped and this one's a bit over $800 (both are used but restored, QA'd, tuned, etc.). So still very much in the "beginner instrument" tier, but hopefully a big step up from what I've been working with!
What’s that one anachronism you always pick up in movies and tv? Susan Kare’s Chicago font in 1940s small town America? A canon 5D dslr winding on film in Skyline? VT100s in a monsterverse scene in 1974?
The Golden Age of Piracy fantasized in all the swashbuckling movies ended in 1726 when pirate William Fly was hanged in Boston Harbor
Accordions and concertinas in so many of those movies weren’t invented until 1829 during the Industrial Revolution, at the same time as the typewriter, the telegraph and the steam engine
“La Roulante” by Jean Blanchard - with my usual pedantry that it is a simple and easy basic courtesy to call tunes by the name their composer gave them at least while they’re still alive.
It must be #TuneswapTuesday
Corrected the #Wikipedia entry for Louisiana French #accordion pioneer Amédè Ardoin 🪗 to say he was Black #Creole rather than Cajun
Nobody had edited that page in years. But within a few hours somebody had gone and made him an “American” musician. With no mention of race or culture or division
Which may be better than mischaracterizing him. But I’m not sure if de-racializing people is the way forward 😞
It’s not my neighborhood so maybe I’ll let others go at it on there
Wikipedia has Black Creole accordionist Amédé Ardoin listed as a “Cajun accordionist” 😖
Buckwheat Zydeco had it written into his contracts that he’d get paid in full and not have to perform if any press materials referred to him or his music as “Cajun” anything
He was militant about defending his Creole identity
I remember thinking last year that next year (1929) was the year when the public domain accordion recordings would really start getting plentiful and good
Maybe that was because of the trove of Alfred Montmarquette recordings from Quebec made it easier to find Canadian content
Last year we got to play the 1928 Amédé Ardoin session though, so that’s hard to beat
I'l got this for my dad, who plays button accordion. But I wouldn't have known of it except the author was on the Fediverse at one point. Anyone know if Bruce Triggs is still around? #books#history#music#MusicHistory#accordions@bookstodon