The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #116671   Message #2510791
Posted By: Bernard
09-Dec-08 - 12:17 PM
Thread Name: Who plays a Tenor Treble Concertina?
Subject: RE: Who plays a Tenor Treble Concertina?
Guran, no argument intended, but you are very confused. The baritone in F I originally had on loan from Bernard Wrigley and Steve Turner's Bass/Baritone/Treble are not the same instrument, which you would have realised if you had re-read my posts more carefully.

I use the term 'transposing' in its original classical sense - you play a note which sounds in a different pitch from the notation. Technically a guitar transposes an octave... and I'm sorry, but I do have exam results and theses I've written which back up the fact that I know what I'm talking about. I've also taken students to Grade 8 level (Associated Board) on Organ and Guitar, and flute students to grade 5. Transposition is part of the syllabus.

Keyboard instruments do not normally transpose, except for electronic ones with that facility. That is one thing that sets apart the baritone in question... it is simple. If you play a 'C scale' on that baritone you actually get an 'F scale', and all the other notes are similarly transposing.

I don't understand what you mean by 'all keyboard instruments transposing', which they certainly do not. You need to rethink what you mean and express yourself more clearly.

If I had a clarinet in Bb and played from the music, and someone else simultaneously played a clarinet in A from the same score, the two would be a semitone different (a minor second). They would both sound differently from someone playing a concert flute which plays in C.

In just the same way, if I played that baritone from music and someone else played a standard treble, the notes would be a perfect fifth apart.

Transposing has nothing at all to do with start and finish notes, merely the note produced when playing from notation. If it's unison, the note is exactly as represented in the notation. Anything else, technically, is transposing.

A concert flute is known as a 'D' flute because early flutes only went down to D - but they did not transpose. The lowest note on my flute is B, because it has a special 'foot joint'. It still does not transpose. You finger a C, you get a C.

Recorders follow a slightly different convention which I won't go into depth about here, other than to say you have to learn different names for the same fingering. C fingering on a descant is F fingering on a treble - same fingering, different note name, but represented on the notation at actual pitch. So they do not transpose other than by octave.

If you still haven't grasped it, we shall have to agree to differ.

As for Steve's Wheatstone, the descriptions are his, not mine, and I merely passed on what he said. He has the original paperwork pertaining to the instrument, so is in the best position to say what it is. The 'Anglo tuned' notes is a convenient way of saying 'different on the pull than on the push' - which is, after all, that is what the keys on an Anglo do. As for specifics, you'll just have to ask Steve - it's his concertina!

Wheatstone called it a Bass/Baritone/Tenor, which is a straightforward way of indicating the range of notes it can play. Neither Steve nor I gave it that name, Wheatstone did, and as it dates back to 1929 it's a bit late to ask them to rename it - if, indeed, the person who thus named it is still alive...