| Leyland Accordion Club - 16th August 2006
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Our August Concert
The first player on stage at our August concert was Colin Ensor, playing We Just Couldn't Say Goodnight, Reine De Musette, You'll Never Know, May You Always, All Of Me and Down Forget Me Not Lane. Basil Berry then took to the stage with Chattanooga Choo Choo, I Only Have Eyes For You, What A Difference A Day Makes, Charade and A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square. Our next player, Bill Agnew, gave us a selection of medleys which included such titles as I Only Have Eyes For You, Mocking Bird Hill, I'm In The Mood For Love, Highland Cathederal and American Patrol. It was now Ann Parker's turn to play, starting with The Harry Lime Theme. Ann continued with The Frog Chorus, Black Mask Waltz and Hugarian Rhapsody. It was now 9pm and time for our first break of the evening. During both breaks we were entertained by the accomplished duo of Jay Ward on keyboard and Jean Southern on accordion. After the break, the music continued with Alan Gelling playing Autumn Leaves, All Kinds Of Everything, The Carnival Is Over and Carousel Waltz. Following Alan, Steve Heap and his friend Kevin then played a duet on accordion and banjo, playing I Saw The Light, I Recall A Gypsy Woman, Tennessee Waltz, Oh Boy, There Goes My Everything and Hello Mary Lou. After the second break of the evening, we started with Harry Davies and Stranger On The Shore, Harry then continued with a German drinking song, He'll Have To Go, another German drinking song and to finish, All I Ask Of You. Our next player was Mary Hall playing Im De Zug, Das Haus Am Meer and Heimweh. It was now my turn to play, I played Black Mask Waltz. It was getting close to the end as, by request, Kevin played one banjo solo; Buffallo Gals. Gerard Dawber then played The Spinning Wheel and A Hundred Pipers before giving up the stage to Jean Southern who finished the night off playing Accordion De Rue.
David Batty
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NAO North West Area Championship
The NAO North West Area Championship 2006 is to be held at The Marine Hall, Fleetwood, on December 3rd. Contact Gina Branelli on 01253 778764 or 01253 822046 for further details, or to obtain an entry form if you feel like taking part instead of just watching.
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NAO UK Championships & Festival 2007
The NAO will celebrate their National annual competition and festival in Scarborough, from the 4-6 May, 2007. The town is a superb location for this annual event with good shopping facilities, beach and cliff-top walks, hotels, guest houses, cafes, restaurants and pubs by the dozen. The Spa Complex, a Victorian masterpiece, hosts the Championships with six venues under one roof.The weekend will feature competitions for all levels including solo, duo, ensemble and orchestra as well as trade shows with music and instruments, a Ceilidh dance (with Gary Blair and his Celidh Dance band) and performances by international guests. Hotels and B&B's start getting booked soon for this event, so maybe now is the time to plan a trip to Scarborough if you are interested in this event. For further details, or for an application form if you plan to enter the competitions. Contact Pauline Noone, 112 Countesthorpe Road, South Wigston, Leicester, LE18 4PG United Kingdom. Telephone: 0116 278 4094 or E-mail: naouk@accordions.com
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This Wednesday
This Wednesday we see the return of Callum McKinnon to the club. Callum can normally be found playing up and down Blackpool seafront entertaining the holidaymakers in various hotels with his wide range of popular singalong material. Callum never fails to get an audience singing along and tapping their feet to his music. As usual, please let others know about our concert nights. I am sure that there are many people who would love to come along and listen if only they knew that we were here, knew what we did and had someone to bring them along for the first time. Doors open at 7.30pm for an 8pm start. I look forward to seeing you there. David Batty
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Let Me Entertain You
I told you about a new series called Let Me Entertain You which started recently. The programme, which is on each weekday from 4.30pm to 5.15, features a variety of acts trying to reach three minutes without being voted off by the audience. The Petulengros (Julie Langton on accordion, Leah Langton on accordion, Shannon Langton on drums, Nancy Langton on accordion and Daisy Lee Pattison on accordion) were on the show two weeks ago, getting 1 minute 31 seconds before being voted off by fifty percent of the audience. This earned them £100 because they lasted over one minute. The programme is entertaining because it features a variety of acts from a yo yo demonstration, to instrumentalists, to people talking about their hobbies, trying to keep the audience entertained for three minutes. The programme was on every day of the week, with the Friday programme consisiting of the winners from Monday to Thursday. This week the series ended with a competition featuring the winners from each of the Friday finals. If I see the competition advertised again, I will post details in here to see if anyone has any skill that they feel could entertain an audience for three minutes without being voted off.
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Our Radio Station
I have been approached by the owner of a large accordion website in New Zealand to ask if they can link with us so that they can broadcast an hour long weekly programme to listeners of Accordion Radio. I am looking at the viability of the project, including copyright issues to ensure I stay on the right side of the law should I decide that such a programme would be of interest to our listeners.
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Caister Accordion Festival
The Caister Accordion Festival takes place from the 2nd to the 6th of November. Guest Artists booked are Art Van Damme (USA), Giancarlo Caporilli (Italy), Pearl Fawcett-Adriano, Gary Blair, Jack Emblow & Tony Compton, Romano Viazzani and Norvic Concordia.
There is a choice of either chalets or caravans for your accommodation.
The organiser is Heather Smith: telephone 01482 805 387.
You can also email heather@accordions.karoo.co.uk
Bookings can be made on the following number:- 01493 728 931.
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Our Website
Our Internet website has had 97305 visitors as at 13th of September 2006. That's 1315 visitors to the main page of our website since last month.The club website address is www.accordionclub.co.uk, the radio station is at www.accordionradio.co.uk and the festival site is at www.accordionfestival.co.uk. This week I have had to put a notice on our noticeboard after a couple of traders (not well known ones) started to repost their adverts several times in big capital letters so they would get noticed. I deleted all their adverts for their activities so they will get the message that they should behave on the site. When I looked today, every sixth or seventh message was a copy of the same message from a trader asking for people selling accordions, then listing a big list of brands he wanted to buy, all in capital letters. Hopefully, they will get the message and the notice board will only consist of unique messages, not lots of copies of the same one. The website has brought us a few new faces down to the club recenly after people saw us on the Internet. At last month's practice night, we had a bagpipe player call in to see what we did. We persuaded him to get his bagpipes out of the boot and give us a few tunes. For many of us it was the closest we had got to the instrument. As you can imagine there was only room for one instrument playing when the pipes started up but it was interesting seeing them being played.
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Accordion Tuning With A Computer
If you visit www.dirksprojects.nl on the Internet, you can download and try a piece of software that will check the tuning of your accordion. This innovative software has all the features an accordion tuner needs without the need to buy an expensive electronic tuner. This instrument tuner is specifically developed for tuning accordions and similar instruments. It has unique functions that really simplify and speed up the tuning process. With this tuner it is possible to tune tones with two or three voices produced by two or three reeds. The two or three voices are measured at the same time. This makes it possible to measure these tones without disabling any of the reeds. It is not even necessary to open the case to measure them. This is ideal to analyze what is wrong with an accordion. It makes it also possible to verify the tuning of an accordion just after tuning it when the case is closed again. The beating of the tones is measured and displayed numerically. This way the beating can be tuned more accurately. With this tuner it is also possible to tune chords (three note chords) and basses (multiple tones in different octaves like C2, C3 and C4) in one go. The software requires a basic 300 MHz pc or laptop, so it will run on almost any computer that runs Windows 98, Me, 2000, XP or Server 2003.
Advantages of this Instrument Tuner:
• Specifically developed for tuning accordions.
• Tuning of tones with 2 and 3 voices (at the same time).
• Tuning of chords. (3 tones at the same time)
• Tuning of basses. (3 tones at the same time)
• Tune with your pc or laptop with external or internal microphone.
• Always accurate. Calibration works fully automatic.
• Large and easy readable screen.
• Very high accuracy of about 0.1 Cent.
• Very large range: E0 up to C9.
• Frequency of the A is configurable between 430 and 450 Hz.
• Transpose and ‘quadra flat tuning’.
• Detects and displays the note and octave automatically.
The website also allows you to download the manual that accompanies the software so that you can give the software a good try before deciding to buy it. I am sure that many accordionists out there who do a bit of tuning will be pleased that this software is available. The ability to download it, read the manual and try it before you buy it means that they have nothing to lose by taking a look at it. Should you wish to purchase the software then it is currently priced at $124 (US Dollars) which at todays interest rates is about £66. A good electronic tuner costs several hundred pounds so I can see a few people finding this sofware tempting. If you are not a repairer, you may not need the software to repair accordions, but you can still download it and give your accordion a test to see if it's all in good condition without opening the case.
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