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Author Topic: Tabs for beginners?  (Read 1627 times)

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Pat McInnis

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Tabs for beginners?
« on: December 28, 2018, 09:49:52 PM »

Now that I have my old AD Hohner together and sounding pretty descent, I would like to try and learn a few basics. I had a good look through Damien Connolly's BC book and he has a few pages of tablature with good push/pull instructions. This box will be going to C#D but I plan on practicing daily until that happens on the AD. i'm getting pretty bored just doing scales up and down, so would like to proceed. Also, can I get away with not learning Happy Birthday? There must be some simple Irish tunes to pick up. I got "Dirty Old Town" pretty dialed on my friend's single row D and I'm fully aware that adding a row complicates things considerably. That's why I'm here. Any advice or links would help to send me on my way.
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Lester

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #1 on: December 28, 2018, 09:56:59 PM »

I got "Dirty Old Town"
<pedantry> Dirty Old Town is an English song, written by Ewan McColl (English) about Salford, Lancashire </pedantry>

Pat McInnis

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #2 on: December 28, 2018, 10:47:19 PM »


<pedantry> Dirty Old Town is an English song, written by Ewan McColl (English) about Salford, Lancashire </pedantry>
[/quote]

Helpful. Technically the Pogues are English as well.

Back to the questions at hand maybe?
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Stiamh

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #3 on: December 28, 2018, 10:48:56 PM »

Do yourself a favour and forget about tablature - tabs will teach you nothing about how to play the box, and in fact all they may do for you is make you dependent on them!

Here's a video tutorial of a good tune to learn. You can play it in three different keys on the D row. The Britches full of stitches.

Pat McInnis

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #4 on: December 28, 2018, 10:54:57 PM »

Do yourself a favour and forget about tablature - tabs will teach you nothing about how to play the box, and in fact all they may do for you is make you dependent on them!

Actually helpful. I know that I shouldn't make a whistle learning comparison but tabs made learning a lot easier for picking up tunes on the whistle and it helped me learn ABCs which I mostly play by now.

I'll go over this tune and I'm sure more of your tutorials Steve. Thanks.
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Steve_freereeder

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #5 on: December 29, 2018, 01:10:04 AM »

Do yourself a favour and forget about tablature - tabs will teach you nothing about how to play the box, and in fact all they may do for you is make you dependent on them!

Yes - totally agree. The melodeon, being bisonoric (different notes on the push and pull) like its relatives the mouth organ and the anglo concertina, does not easily lend itself to playing from music, at least for beginners. Even beginners who can otherwise read music fluently and play other instruments can be flummoxed when trying to read and play from music.

The same sort of thing applies to tablature too. One example is the French CADB system described here, with examples here. It may be a good system in telling you which buttons to press and whether to push or pull the bellows, but (a) it is not really applicable to semitone tuned boxes and (b) it is 'music by numbers' and as Stiamh has already indicated, it will ultimately hold you back from really learning how to play the instrument.

A good way (perhaps the best way) to learn a bisonoric instrument is to get the tune in your head first of all, whether by humming, singing, whistling, etc. If you can hum a tune from memory you will be able to play it on the box. When I was learning the melodeon, I would learn a tune first by playing it on the whistle (either by ear or from written music) and once I had it established in the brain cell, I picked up the box and poked around on the keyboard until I'd got it.

Forget tablature. It is rarely worth bothering with.
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Jesse Smith

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #6 on: December 29, 2018, 02:02:38 AM »

Yes - totally agree. The melodeon, being bisonoric (different notes on the push and pull) like its relatives the mouth organ and the anglo concertina, does not easily lend itself to playing from music, at least for beginners. Even beginners who can otherwise read music fluently and play other instruments can be flummoxed when trying to read and play from music.

The same sort of thing applies to tablature too. One example is the French CADB system described here, with examples here. It may be a good system in telling you which buttons to press and whether to push or pull the bellows, but (a) it is not really applicable to semitone tuned boxes and (b) it is 'music by numbers' and as Stiamh has already indicated, it will ultimately hold you back from really learning how to play the instrument.

Regarding reading music - for a total beginner, I agree with you that until you've really got the keyboard and bellows direction under your fingers, playing from music isn't going to be much use. However, once you're fluent enough to be able to read directly onto the instrument, so to speak, I have found that printed music can be a very useful way to quickly get the basic skeleton of a tune into your fingers. I had a lot of fun this September sitting in with a pickup contra dance band and being able to play unfamiliar tunes from a handout (the slower ones at least, the faster ones I just vamped chords).

Tablature I have much less use for, but I do think it can be useful in showing the fingering where there are multiple options. Maybe that doesn't come into play with the semitone boxes, but for the fourth-apart system there are often multiple ways to play a phrase and tab can provide useful suggestions. Concertina would be the same, I imagine.

But I agree with you that learning by ear is ultimately the best way of really fully learning a tune, though it may the slowest as well.
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Hohner Pokerwork D/G (x2!), Hohner one row four stops in D and C, Hohner Presswood C/F.

Pat McInnis

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #7 on: December 29, 2018, 04:17:33 AM »

When I was learning the melodeon, I would learn a tune first by playing it on the whistle (either by ear or from written music) and once I had it established in the brain cell, I picked up the box and poked around on the keyboard until I'd got it.

Forget tablature. It is rarely worth bothering with.
[/quote]

Great to meet a fellow whistler. I haven't been playing too long but I really hope it will help me segway into accordion playing. Don't be offended if I don't use the word melodion. It's not part of our vocabulary and sounds dirty.

Anyways, point taken on tabs and learning. I'm just really chomping at the bit to getting started. Good old Stiahm gave me a link of him performing Britches full of Stitches. I will probably learn it on the whistle first, then hopefully translate it to the box.

Thanks again for the advice. Keep it coming and I'll keep doing scales until I'm told to stop.
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Jesse Smith

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #8 on: December 29, 2018, 04:37:37 AM »

Here's a video tutorial of a good tune to learn. You can play it in three different keys on the D row. The Britches full of stitches.

This is a really nice tutorial, and I very much appreciate how you drew attention to the way you articulated the repeated quarter notes by just pulsing the bellows rather than by releasing the button, and I like the comparison to a fiddler's bow. It was something of a minor breakthrough for me when I realized it was "OK" and actually quite nice to keep the rhythmic pulse of the bellows going through long notes, and until seeing your video I don't think I've seen anything else point that technique out.
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Hohner Pokerwork D/G (x2!), Hohner one row four stops in D and C, Hohner Presswood C/F.

Roger Hare

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Re: Tabs for beginners?
« Reply #9 on: December 29, 2018, 05:30:42 AM »

<pedantry> Dirty Old Town is an English song, written by Ewan McColl (English) about Salford, Lancashire </pedantry>
Yes indeed! James Miller was born in Salford, as well as writing the song. There are few enough
acknowledged famous Salfordians as it is - I'm one of t'others  (:) ...
« Last Edit: December 29, 2018, 05:38:03 AM by lachenal74693 »
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