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Author Topic: Older v new  (Read 13761 times)

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Martin P

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #40 on: April 21, 2017, 07:35:24 AM »

After learning on Pokerworks and other old boxes, I went mad and bought a brand new Salterelle Connemarra II. To my ear and fingers is was  wonderful and remains my box of choice. Appeared to be set up correctly fron new (as it should be). If I have to play a Hohner now if feels so awkward.
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george garside

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #41 on: April 21, 2017, 09:46:30 AM »

I think that the law of diminishing returns the higher the price can apply.  eg a Chinese hohner pokerwork is dearer but noticably better than a cheapest Chinese box,  s serenellini or salterelle is (for example) better than a pokerword and a castagnari is 'better ' than a salterelle but by a less amount than the difference( betterness!)  in the lower reaches of the price scale  - or something like that! 
A bit like cars eg is a Bentley that much better than say a higher end Mercedes  whilst the Merc is definitely a lot better than a ford focus etc - or something like that!

george
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JimmyM

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #42 on: April 21, 2017, 12:29:36 PM »

Get the best box you can possibly afford. The sound of it is the thing that ultimately sways my decision (s) :-)
Everything else can be Fettled.
In the new v old discussion, I think that some fantastic second hand boxes can be had with plenty of life left in them for a small part of the price of a quality new one.
I love the idea that my box was being played before I was born and hopefully will still be giving pleasure after I'm  gone BUT, for me, it's still all about the sound
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Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #43 on: April 21, 2017, 01:54:23 PM »

jimmy M,

"Everything else can be fettled"

that is what I am planning to do!

michael
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AirTime

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #44 on: April 21, 2017, 02:21:02 PM »

Quote
Get the best box you can possibly afford. The sound of it is the thing that ultimately sways my decision

That's the point - the price of the box may reflect the care that has gone into the manufacture & therefore the "playability", but it has very little to do with the quality of the sound. Vintage, "cheap" boxes, properly tuned, can sound (IMO) amazing - not in any way inferior to modern, expensive boxes.
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1920's BbEb Hohner; 1920's  AD Koch; 1910 (?) One-row Hohner in D,  1910's GCB Maga Ercole; ; AD 1950's Pistelli, CF Sandpiper, CF Preciosa, BbEb Preciosa.

Thrupenny Bit

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #45 on: April 21, 2017, 02:54:14 PM »

Airtime: I am now soundly of the opinion that you're right!

arty of this parish once answered a personal pm from me, discussing the merits of his new Castagnari Hascy and an old Hohner that has been properly set up. He described it very well in my opinion.
The old Hohner is the Morris Thousand. Great vintage, good fun to drive and a certain great aura and charm about it, including the roar of the engine. Not sure I'd want to drive it all the time.
The Hascy is the Ford Mondeo, easy to drive, all modern bells and whistles and very comfortable, economical and luxurious. Very good and comfortable on long journeys.
though essentially you pays yer money and takes yer chance.......
Q
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Thrupenny Bit

I think I'm starting to get most of the notes in roughly the right order...... sometimes!

Dazbo

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #46 on: April 21, 2017, 04:52:04 PM »

There are/were loads and loads of old boxes that are absolutely terrible to play, and were probably just as bad when new. Thankfully most of them have been disposed of over the years. So on average the old boxes that survive are the better ones.

The same reason the Romans have such a good reputation as builders - the good ones are the only ones left  ;D
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Darren

AirTime

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #47 on: April 21, 2017, 05:33:30 PM »

Quote
arty of this parish once answered a personal pm from me, discussing the merits of his new Castagnari Hascy and an old Hohner that has been properly set up. He described it very well in my opinion.
The old Hohner is the Morris Thousand. Great vintage, good fun to drive and a certain great aura and charm about it, including the roar of the engine. Not sure I'd want to drive it all the time.
The Hascy is the Ford Mondeo, easy to drive, all modern bells and whistles and very comfortable, economical and luxurious. Very good and comfortable on long journeys.
though essentially you pays yer money and takes yer chance.......

I'd go further than that though. Each box has it's own unique sound. However "good" the sound of one box is, it's always refreshing to play & hear the sound of a different box - it makes the same tunes sound new & different.  Add in the variety of possible tunings & ... you've got all the ingredients for MAD.    :||:
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1920's BbEb Hohner; 1920's  AD Koch; 1910 (?) One-row Hohner in D,  1910's GCB Maga Ercole; ; AD 1950's Pistelli, CF Sandpiper, CF Preciosa, BbEb Preciosa.

Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #48 on: April 21, 2017, 05:57:56 PM »

well, I have the merc. (convertible) and the P.S. and I am still looking for more!
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Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #49 on: April 21, 2017, 06:22:54 PM »

i came back to this topic because I thought I might be misconstrued.
All I want to say is that I have the potential of many friendships here due to my liking for the button box
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Rog

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #50 on: April 21, 2017, 06:46:14 PM »

Love my Salterelle Nuage...but it's a bit heavy, which is a fault common to some Salterelles. Fettled a Tommy and didn't really like it very much - but its owner adored it. Played two different Oakwoods recently .. three voice and an old #7 (small box). To continue with the car analogy, this little box was like a Lotus Elan. Fast and light, but with an amazing sound. It's owner grinned broadly when I told him I'd buy it if he ever wanted to sell. It was a kind of ... 'no chance pal' look. So I reckon when it comes to top end boxes it's all a bit horses for courses. So my personal preferences are - quality reeds and the balance of the sound, the lightness/looseness  of the bellows, the overall weight of the furniture, and the speed of the keyboard. Having said that, I have an old pre pokerwork box with a wooden keyboard (with removable back) and I can't keep my hands off it at the moment.

Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #51 on: April 21, 2017, 10:51:49 PM »

Love my Salterelle Nuage...but it's a bit heavy, which is a fault common to some Salterelles. Fettled a Tommy and didn't really like it very much - but its owner adored it. Played two different Oakwoods recently .. three voice and an old #7 (small box). To continue with the car analogy, this little box was like a Lotus Elan. Fast and light, but with an amazing sound. It's owner grinned broadly when I told him I'd buy it if he ever wanted to sell. It was a kind of ... 'no chance pal' look. So I reckon when it comes to top end boxes it's all a bit horses for courses. So my personal preferences are - quality reeds and the balance of the sound, the lightness/looseness  of the bellows, the overall weight of the furniture, and the speed of the keyboard. Having said that, I have an old pre pokerwork box with a wooden keyboard (with removable back) and I can't keep my hands off it at the moment.
you want it all, pal…just like me!
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Bob Ellis

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #52 on: April 21, 2017, 11:26:31 PM »

I've only just got round to reading this thread. It prompted me to list the boxes I own or have owned in the past under two columns, 'old' and 'new'. The new ones are a Hohner Erica, three Castagnaris (a Mory, a Dony and a Benny), a Pariselle 2.6 row and a Clément Guais 3-row. The pre-owned ones are a Castagnari Benny, a Junior Martin one-row, an Acadian one-row, a Gabbanelli Compact and a Karnternerland 3 row. There are some very different boxes among this lot, but the one thing they have or had in common was their playability - I wouldn't have bought any of them if they had not been responsive. I have tried some stiff new boxes and some equally stiff old ones. Needless to say, I didn't buy any of them. All this leads me to believe that it is not whether a box is new or pre-owned that determines its playability, but the way in which it has been constructed and, in the case of older boxes, subsequently fettled.
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Bob in beautiful Wensleydale, Les Panards Dansants, Crook Morris and the Loose Knit Band.
Clément Guais 3-row D/G/acc.; Castagnari 1914 D/G; Karntnerland Steirische 3-row G/C/F; Ellis Pariselle 2.6-row D/G/acc.; Gabbanelli Compact 2-row D/G with lots of bling, pre-war Hohner Bb/F; Acadian one-row in D.

Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #53 on: April 21, 2017, 11:38:42 PM »

yes, but that is the whole point of the question. is the construction of the older boxes better ? we can see that the inferior wood in the old P.S. boxes appears to produce a better sound than the current attempts to replicate - or is it just my imagination?

maybe you are talking about playability/action and I am thinking about sound - both have equal considerations
« Last Edit: April 22, 2017, 12:06:27 AM by Michael Driscoll »
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gettabettabox

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #54 on: April 22, 2017, 01:02:08 AM »

The worst ever gift for a box player is his/her's perfect and oft-dreamed about complete and absolute accordion.
'Tis a holy grail you don't need to find.
There will be no excuses hereafter.
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Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #55 on: April 22, 2017, 01:19:09 AM »

The worst ever gift for a box player is his/her's perfect and oft-dreamed about complete and absolute accordion.
'Tis a holy grail you don't need to find.
There will be no excuses hereafter.

[/quote

hope we never find it then!
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Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #56 on: April 22, 2017, 03:32:17 AM »

i don't want to go on about the Paolo Soprani 2 row but was the metal sound board a big mistake?
The Hohners can look after themselves. Don't know about the Castis And the Saltis.
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Michael Driscoll

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #57 on: April 22, 2017, 09:20:19 AM »

from recollection the person said that the inferior wood sounded better!
« Last Edit: April 22, 2017, 11:08:30 AM by Michael Driscoll »
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Clive Williams

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #58 on: April 22, 2017, 10:38:50 AM »

OK, we should be on the new server. We lost 2 postings, both in this thread.

Richard said:

maybe you are talking about playability/action and I am thinking about sound - both have equal considerations
How are you defining inferior? Do you know what actual wood was used in the old Paolos? Oak would be inferior for making a toy glider, balsa inferior for building a house. And how was the wood used? The casing on my pepperpot where the bellows fit (the only place where you can see the thickness easily) is much thinner than on many modern boxes. Does this make it lighter? more delicate? more flimsy? You really have to know what you are talking about before you make these judgements.
I've been ploughing through a thread called 'different woods' from 2014 and haven't yet come across anyone actually naming a wood used in a box finished in pearloid or the like. They only mention cherry, walnut or whatever when the maker has used that wood for decorative effect and sales purposes.



Michael said:


richard, I don"t know what is inferior wood in the P.S. I was quoting from another comment to that effect on this website, some years ago.  I should be most interested to find out!
michael

IanD

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Re: Older v new
« Reply #59 on: April 22, 2017, 01:21:49 PM »

We're in danger of turning this into another "Does wood affect the sound?" thread -- let's not...

My favourite box overall -- if I had to pick one -- is still my Oakwood Model 4. Even though it's a bit battered and shows signs of having a hard life (unsurprising, it was my main box for morris and ceilidhs for at least 15 years) it still sounds fantastic and plays beautifully, though a good fettle might improve things like rattly bass buttons this probably won't happen until something actually goes wrong with it.

The other bought-new boxes I've got (mostly Castagnaris, still up to 20 years old...) are also all very good examples of their type (the Dony is another one-off). The Baffetti Binci is a bit of a thug but IMHO the best box ever made for Morris, including old Hohners (which I've played a lot) -- it has an unbeatable combination of drive, power, brightness, size/weight, the only real faults are some design ones which means the treble end is not the most comfortable to play.

The very old boxes I've got (Preciosa D/G, Melos Bb/Eb) are equally wonderful in their own very different ways, what's certain is that there are no modern equivalents.

What this shows is that there have always been some truly excellent boxes being made, certainly from the 1930s right through to the present day, but also that they all have very different characters -- saying "this is the best box ever" is almost always subjective, and always begs the question "For what?". I wouldn't dream of using my gorgeous G/C Tommy for Morris, or my BB for subtle playing along with a fiddle (yes, I know...), they're the wrong tool for the job.

Don't forget that if not for Marc Perrone persuading them to restart diatonic production in the early 1970s, we wouldn't even have any of the Castagnari boxes that so many people (including me) are so fond of -- and if the "new wooden melodeon" revival hadn't been triggered off by this, we probably wouldn't have the choice we have nowadays, and we might all still be playing Hohners as the only real choice...
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Oakwood Model 4 D/G, Castagnari Dony D/G/#, Castagnari Tommy G/C, Baffetti Binci D/G, Hohner Preciosa D/G, Melos Bb/Eb, Lightwave SL5 and Kala California fretless basses
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