Chiff and Fipple Forums

[Thread revival. - Mod]

I forgot about this post.

Here's a clip of a more recent session featuring a One Row G Melodeon , plus plus Nyckelharpa, Viola, Fiddle & Bodhran!

Jigs

Cheers,
Dick

This is how you do it.........

http://youtu.be/XOAIrPXh_Hc

[THREAD REVIVAL - MOD]

I live in Hawaii and have my sights set on a restored single row 1930s Hohner... I'm a complete beginner on the melodeon though, and very likely the only aspiring player on my side of the island, so I'm hoping youtube and some good books can lend a strong hand... anyone else here own an old Hohner single row?

We've got two Hohner one row, four stop boxes, an older G (1950s, maybe?) and a new D purchased when Hohner announced they weren't going to make them any more last year. Though the last two years I've been mostly playing on my C#/D.

(I will admit that my understanding of the names of the instruments was severely damaged when I learned that the Fleadh rules now contain the following bit: "Note 5: Comp 13. Mileoideon/Melodeon: The single row accordion is not a melodeon and is not acceptable in the melodeon competition." I'd always believed the Irish definition of melodeon was "a single row accordion", and now I have no idea whatsoever what they are talking about!)

colomon wrote: (I will admit that my understanding of the names of the instruments was severely damaged when I learned that the Fleadh rules now contain the following bit: "Note 5: Comp 13. Mileoideon/Melodeon: The single row accordion is not a melodeon and is not acceptable in the melodeon competition." I'd always believed the Irish definition of melodeon was "a single row accordion", and now I have no idea whatsoever what they are talking about!)

Blimey! I hope they told Johnny Connolly

JimmyManley wrote:

colomon wrote: (I will admit that my understanding of the names of the instruments was severely damaged when I learned that the Fleadh rules now contain the following bit: "Note 5: Comp 13. Mileoideon/Melodeon: The single row accordion is not a melodeon and is not acceptable in the melodeon competition." I'd always believed the Irish definition of melodeon was "a single row accordion", and now I have no idea whatsoever what they are talking about!)

Blimey! I hope they told Johnny Connolly

Actually, that really has me confused as well. I don't understand that at all. Anybody?

Beats me.

As I understand it, a "melodeon" for the purposes of Fleadh competitions is a single-row, diatonic accordion tuned like a Richter harmonica with multiple stops and with two bass/chord buttons on the other side. There are other conceivable layouts for a single-row accordion, so the rule is in place to specify that not every single-row accordion counts as a melodeon.

bigsciota wrote:As I understand it, a "melodeon" for the purposes of Fleadh competitions is a single-row, diatonic accordion tuned like a Richter harmonica with multiple stops and with two bass/chord buttons on the other side. There are other conceivable layouts for a single-row accordion, so the rule is in place to specify that not every single-row accordion counts as a melodeon.

This may be it? I certainly cannot tell you you're wrong, as I remain completely confused. Some points:

1. "The single row accordion is not a melodeon" is a very different statement from "not {i]every[/i] single-row accordion counts as a melodeon."

2. According to the Wikipedia article for Richter harmonica, the notes (in C) for the row would be C/D E/G G/B C/D E/F G/A C/B E/D G/F C/A. This tuning has the G repeated at the bottom so that you can get a G major (V) chord. (Unlike the "standard" (?) B/C C row, which I believe skips the C/D and then goes E/A G/B C/D etc (and adds another button on top.)

Do you mean specifically that? I have one 4-stop which follows that Richter pattern with the duplicated bottom fifth of the scale on the first button draw, and another 4-stop which has the bottom sixth there so it matches the scale on my C#/D. It would be really weird if one instrument was a melodeon and the other a one-row accordion. The extra fifth chord may make a big difference to accompanying songs -- I'm still trying to figure that out -- but I cannot see why they'd worry about forbidding you to have the extra sixth at the bottom? (Or did you just mean the familiar push-pull push-pull push-pull pull-push middle scale pattern?)

3. Even if that is the logic behind their reasoning, as far as I can see they say absolutely nothing about the key layout on a two-row. Even though conventional wisdom says it is only possible to win playing B/C (or at least that style), the rules themselves don't seem to rule out something like a D/G box, much less some exotic tuning. It seems really odd to worry about the details on the one-row but not the much more common two-row.

Also, this now has me wondering about optimizing the notes on your box to make a specific set of fleadh tunes just a bit easier to play. Sounds nuts....

What I meant by comparing it to the Richter-tuned harmonica is the layout of push-pull-push-pull-push-pull-pull-push to get the major scale in the most-used 1st octave; I don't think that a one-row melodeon and a harmonica are normally exactly the same.