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[Thrupenny Bit]

'What and how you practice' is exactly right.
It's something I've always wondered about and know I have room for improvement in the actual process of practicing.
I wish I knew more to enable me to hone the process.....
Q

[george garside]

another thing that can make a big difference to the quality of   playing is to stick with a few tunes until you have really got the hang of them and only then add another one and stick with it till it is suitably polished etc etc
The temptation to take the tune hoping  ever onwards approach  is likely to finish up with lots of tunes  played badly!

george

[Chris Rayner]

'What and how you practice' is exactly right.
It's something I've always wondered about and know I have room for improvement in the actual process of practicing.
I wish I knew more to enable me to hone the process.....
Q

I recently got https://www.amazon.co.uk/Music-Practice-Practicing-Professional-Performance-ebook/dp/B0113AJLPA this book.  Cheap, and full of good hints.

[boxer]

I used to play D/G and when I did so, drove tunes with a strong and constant left hand bass/chord accompaniment.  This meant that I could afford to be fairly careless with the right hand and the melody notes still fell into place more or less - I was never a particularly good player.  My reliance on the bass side was such that I couldn't play tunes coherently without a left hand accompaniment.  I never got far on D/G and stopped playing it.

It was a great challenge when 20 years later took up B/C.  The hardest part was to overcome my former reliance on the left hand accompaniment and to learn to play single lines of melody with distinct and even beats and controlled phrasing.  I wish I'd worked as hard on the right hand side of my D/G - I might have done a lot better.   

So my advice to a beginner would be to concentrate on the how the right hand plays the tune and produces its rhythm and phrasing, and to leave the left hand accompaniment for later.  Look particularly at how exploring the options for fingering and bellows direction (you've lots of choice on D/G if you cross rows) can help the rhythm and phrasing along.

Good luck

[Thrupenny Bit]

Along similar lines George:
I've recently drawn a line under my learning of tunes and organised my tunes into an abc file and printed it off so I have access to the dots.  It's an attempt to go back and really nail tunes, get them really embedded. Some tunes were 'almost learnt' but perhaps my technique or ability meant I couldn't quite play them properly so they've dwindled. I'm discovering going back my playing's improved and previous 'nearly' tunes are becoming well bedded in.

Chris: Oh now.... I've seen several books around this topic.
Right, I'll bite the bullet and get that. thanks for the tip.
Q

[Rob2Hook]

Like most of us, it seems that you are discovering the nuances of music by experience rather than learning the theory and applying it to your interpretation of a written score.  Common Time (4/4) does have two beats to the bar - notes 1 &3 - without which the melody becomes very flat and uninteresting.  If you watch an orchestral conductor, with a complex piece in 4/4 with different parts having cross rhythms they may use a cruciform movement of the baton giving a clear indication of all our beats, but with a more melodic piece it is normal to beat down strongly for beats 1 & 3 with a more relaxed rebound on beats 2 & 4, in keeping with the way the melody "lilts".  Of course if you were dancing to the music, most steps echo this emphasis with the main steps on first and third beats.

As Theo has already said, a waltz has a natural syncopation, a sort of La-di-da rhythm.  In fact most waltzes can be livened up a little by the occasion bar being played straight as a contrast.  Talking of contrasts, a Mazurka is pretty much the opposite with the second note often played a little early and with emphasis.

Ornamentation really can lift a melody, but beware of overdoing it or despite the complexity it again becomes bland.

Rob.

[Julian S]

Little things - (or maybe big) for me - getting back to playing for dancing after a long break, and performing with other musicians.
Putting the practice to real purpose...

J

[Tone Dumb Greg]

One thing rhat can help is not getting too hung up on "rules" such as basses should be staccato or use a different finger if you hit the same button a few times. It's nice to mix things up a bit.

[Thrupenny Bit]

Following on from Greg's post - my good friend here said once I'd learnt how to umm pah then stop doing it!
i.e. once you've got your brain to be able to control your left hand then don't slavishly stick to  it, as Greg says, mix it up.
Q

[Julian S]

Yep Greg and Q. For me nowt worse than slavish umm pah pah dominating and drowning a waltz melody - putting the rhythm into the melody is key. Bass end can both add so much - and detract

J

[george garside]

I would go one further - the rhythm must be inherent in the way the melody is played,  What goes on or doesn't go on on the bass can add or detract  from the treble rhythm  depending on the skill s of the player  but can never substitute for rhythemless treble.

Strange thing is that fidlers, wistleists etc   can play rhythmic dance music  without being the proud possesors  of um pa gear!

Just to prove the point  in a north west morris side I used to play for I arranged for our whistle player  to play solo for a dance,(just him , no bangy drums or other such things)  The dancers danced perfectly well to skilled rhythmic whistle playing.

coming from the opposite direction, so to speak,  in a ceilidh band with bass guitar, drum of some sort and keyboard  I save my energy by only playing  the bass where it will really add to the proceedings.  ? a bit like playing a DG like a BC?

george

[Andrius]

I don't know how my rules are good for music you play, but they seems to be good for Lithuanian music.
This time - only rules for solo melodeon playing, without bass, drum, violin or other instrument (it must be a little different).
1. To learn melody PERFECT. Melody is like singer in your rock band. It is leader, and no discussions about it.
2. Bass (not chord; "um") - it replaces bass and drum of your band; must be strong and organize rhythm of music you play.
3. Chords ("pa") - they are played carefully; sometimes can be skipped, but not so often - rhythm must be clear enough.
4. Left side of melodeon can not be louder than right - it is a band and right hand is LEADER of the band.

I am very familiar with tapping question. It is more important than it seems. I am teaching folk singing too, and there tapping question is more actual. It's individual for different songs, but some songs (mostly lyrical) sounds good only with one tap on two 4/4 measures. And that song becomes a real tragedy if you are taping 2 or 4 times per measure. But this is not constant - some songs must have strong exact rhythm.
I am not sure is it so important in melodeon music, but i am sure that there is difference. I don't like tapping at all, but sometimes I am using one tap per 4/4 measure to organize band during fast dances. And not tap, but tiptoe - down - tiptoe...

[Clive Williams]

Funny thing, today I figured out that I can change to a more "professional" sound by simply trying to push the buttons down as little as possible rather than fully down as I normally do. Gives a sharper, more stoccato, less mushy feel. Not sure I'll use it all the time, but it's an interesting thing to play with. All these years I've been playing, and I've only just figured it out. Guess I should get out to workshops more.

[Ebor_fiddler]

After yonks, I've only just realised how to use the "G" chord when playing tunes in "D". It's so b****ing obvious and just needs the air button to make it easy! Derr ...

[Matt Langley]

I had the same experience as ebor_fiddler I think.  After some years I suddenly realised that on a D/G box the two rows "are not equal" if you know what I mean; a D/G box is much more at home in G than it is in D.  You can play a tune in G just on the G row and you have all the major chords for the 3 chord trick (G,C and D) available on the left hand usually falling in the right direction - push or pull.  The same is not true of the D row (no pull G on the left hand) and when I started out I think I was largely ignoring that 4 chord - the G - when accompanying tunes in D. 

I later discovered that it is not that difficult to use the G chord in D tunes with a little bit of cross rowing (push the G and B notes on the G row instead of pulling on the D row) and went back and relearned a whole load of D tunes so I could add the G chord.  I'm sure that idea came from a tutor book but I cant remember which one now.

This all seems very obvious to me now but at the time it quite exciting and I think it helped my playing.  I suppose it also illustrates the benefits of using tutorial materials or taking lessons - let someone else make the mistakes and then learn from them  

Matt

[Winston Smith]

"let someone else make the mistakes and then learn from them"

That's certainly true, but then you'd miss that sense of satisfaction when you do actually get it!

[george garside]

Funny thing, today I figured out that I can change to a more "professional" sound by simply trying to push the buttons down as little as possible rather than fully down as I normally do. Gives a sharper, more stoccato, less mushy feel. Not sure I'll use it all the time, but it's an interesting thing to play with. All these years I've been playing, and I've only just figured it out. Guess I should get out to workshops more.

I have always worked on the theory that  the pallets only need to come off the board by quite a small amount to let sufficient air through for full volume and that opening them any further  has no extra effect other than slowing fingering down.  I find this applies to both staccato and lagato playing  and it is probably the reason why I have never felt the need to restrict button movement on pokerworks/ericas etc

george

[Gena Crisman]

Learning a bit about it, the 8 bass layout may seem weird and a bit arbitrary, but it does, in a certain sort of way, make a lot of sense, and make the most out of what it can offer you. You have access to both relative minor chords for the root and the 4th for both keys, which let you add in a lot of colour to your playing much more than having another unisonoric pair would.

For DG players, for a tune that's in G, in the same way it makes sense to substitute in an E minor for a G, or an Am7 for a C to give it that little bit more pazazz, it can make sense to substitute in a B minor for a D or an E minor for a G for a tune that's in D. For the D row tunes, you can 'make do' with not having a unisonoric G chord by pairing push notes with the G chord and pull notes with the E minor chord, (or mixing and matching, eg E bass pull to + G chord push for ~Em7) which covers you for both directions for the circumstances it makes sense to play IV: happily, I think it's the notes you do not have reversals that work best with the available chord. It turns out, a lot of the tools are there, although it can be harder work to use them. Learning this, though, also helps inform and makes you more aware of the tools for your playing in G; it's all too easy to stick to G/D/C when they're right there.

[Tone Dumb Greg]

After yonks, I've only just realised how to use the "G" chord when playing tunes in "D". It's so b****ing obvious and just needs the air button to make it easy! Derr ...

You mean swop to the G row while the harmony is G, or buy a 12 bass Saltarelle with a pull G chord?

The first option is cheaper. I'm finding the second option confusing.

Edit: Or what Gina says, and cheat with an Em?

[Thrupenny Bit]

Cheat with an Em, that's partly what it's there for!
Q