Tune accordions sharp so that they stand out in group playing - A myth?

[pitzelberger]

I'm not sure it's useful to talk about myths and mistakes to be corrected

I didn't wanted to blame anyone.

When I first realized some years ago, that one of the second hand accordions I just bought is tuned to 443, I got quite confused. I found posts like the ones I cited above and though: maybe its not so bad. I even brought the box a few time to some gigs. I don't think anyone realized that it was out of tune, but I also don't think it was standing out particularly.

Since then I have been stumping over this tuning your accordion higher to stand out theory again and again, e.g. just yesterday someone wrote it in a discussion on Facebook. So I wanted to know whether there is anything about it.

 

[dunlustin]

"mistakes to be corrected" - was a nod to another post, not yours. Sorry if it seemed discourteous.
And just for fun - I've no idea of the tuning (probably A440 as I believe Colin Dipper made the Franglo concertina in this clip):



edited to move a parenthesis - Come on, what's wrong with pedantry!

 

[Ffingers]

"This video is unavailable"

 

[Siegmund]

I have read that solo violinists are often behind this "+2Hz to make me stand out" ploy.

As an ex-violinist... I don't doubt there were soloists who asked the whole orchestra to tune higher. Heck, Paganini wrote himself a violin concerto "in Eb major" that he played in D major with his strings tuned a half-step sharp, while the orchestra played in Eb. (G and D are the easiest, and most resonant, keys for a violin.)
But a) the rest of the violin section cringed at it, and b) am quite sure they didn't deliberately make themselves out of tune with the orchestra.

Just be grateful you don't play Anglo concertina - quarter comma mean tone tuning (???)
or English concertina which still had D# and Eb, tho' tuning is equal temperament.

I am sorely tempted to get a CBA tuned that way someday. I am one of those folk who regard equal temperament as somewhere between a necessary evil, and just plain evil.
The option for just intonation is one of the reasons I have a lingering Steirische Harmonika fetish, too, though I am not sure my poor brain could handle learning the fingering.

 

[debra]

"mistakes to be corrected" - was a nod to another post, not yours. Sorry if it seemed discourteous.
And just for fun - I've no idea of the tuning (probably A440) as I believe Colin Dipper made the Franglo concertina in this clip:

The bagpipe in this clip is still tuned too high compared to the concertina (hence the tremolo you hear when both play the same note).
A bagpipe is normally tuned 1 note "and a bit" higher than 440. The 1 note you can compensate for by transposing. The "and a bit" probably requires a tuning even higher than 442 to compensate for it. Maybe 444 or 445 would work. But the bagpipe can be adjusted (by pulling out parts of the pipes a bit) and that then brings it closer to 1 note (without a bit).
What surprises me most in this video is that you can even hear the concertina when the pipe is playing. (It does look like a model with just one drone instead of three, so that makes it less loud, but still it's softer than I expected. Maybe that is just a sign of the skills of the player.)

 

[Pipemajor]

The bagpipe in this clip is still tuned too high compared to the concertina (hence the tremolo you hear when both play the same note).
A bagpipe is normally tuned 1 note "and a bit" higher than 440. The 1 note you can compensate for by transposing. The "and a bit" probably requires a tuning even higher than 442 to compensate for it. Maybe 444 or 445 would work. But the bagpipe can be adjusted (by pulling out parts of the pipes a bit) and that then brings it closer to 1 note (without a bit).
What surprises me most in this video is that you can even hear the concertina when the pipe is playing. (It does look like a model with just one drone instead of three, so that makes it less loud, but still it's softer than I expected. Maybe that is just a sign of the skills of the player.)

The mistake you are making here is classing all bagpipes the same. There are dozens of different types of bagpipes but the most common one is the GHB or Scottish Great Highland Bagpipe with which most are familiar. The drones can range from none up to 4 or 5 depending on the type but do not greatly influence the volume just as playing 3 or 4 note chords on the accordion doesn't necessarily have to increase the volume much.
The main difference and volume is in the chanter and reed combination. Chanters are either straight bored giving a very quiet sound or conical bored which produces, like the GHB, much greater sound volume, much like the bell end on a brass instrument.
The reed also has a vast bearing on the sound produced and strong reed requires far more pressure to blow, increasing the sound greatly whereas a softer reed requires much less pressure thus less volume and sound. If you listen to virtually any other type of bagpipe whether it be Scottish smallpipes, Border pipes, Northumbrian, or Uillean or most of the other types, you will find they are much softer.
The Great Highland Bagpipes weren't called Warpipes for nothing!!

 

[boxplayer4000]

Bagpipes are a law to themselves and could present a problem to accordionists (and any other instrument) which was trying to play along. Quite often the pipers were 6’6” individuals with faces obscured with a lot of hair and it never seemed a good idea to point out that his thing was out of tune. Traditionally they were close to A 440.
The bagpipe in the video with the concertina is not a traditional Scottish bagpipe. It is playing in key of F and as far as I can tell is about 15 cents sharp. (I isolated a single note and extended it to let my tuner hear it.) Apart from the bagpipe chanter reed and the concertina reed there is the single drone reed as well all playing against each other.

 

[TomBR]

Just a (pedantic) word about myths - the word does not necessarily mean something that is false or untrue.
A myth is a story which may or may not be true but which forms part of a belief system or culture, or which helps to explain the world.

If many accordionists believe that it's a good thing to have an instrument tuned slightly sharp to help them cut through then that's a myth, however the accordions may actually be tuned!

 

[Dingo40]

myth meaning - Google Zoeken

 

[AccordionUprising]

I'm a bit confused after reading these responses. Some say "it's a myth", and others, "accordionists requested higher tuning to stand out." But I don't see agreement.

We know accordions have different tunings. I've heard more modern ones that seem to be A440. Are all the higher ones regional styles where every instrument is tuning up to that? Or are some accordionists tuning higher to "stand out"?

No definitive answer here? Can it be both a myth and something people do? I'm not clear.

A related problem I've heard is players of older instruments using "modern" chord combining on instruments with old seventh chords that did not sound like the cool jazz they were hoping for.

(Bagpipes aside. )

 

[debra]

I'm a bit confused after reading these responses. Some say "it's a myth", and others, "accordionists requested higher tuning to stand out." But I don't see agreement.

We know accordions have different tunings. I've heard more modern ones that seem to be A440. Are all the higher ones regional styles where every instrument is tuning up to that? Or are some accordionists tuning higher to "stand out"?

No definitive answer here? Can it be both a myth and something people do? I'm not clear.

A related problem I've heard is players of older instruments using "modern" chord combining on instruments with old seventh chords that did not sound like the cool jazz they were hoping for.

(Bagpipes aside. )

There should be no confusion. The confusion is not just in the meaning of "myth" but also in the meaning of "stand out".
An accordion tuned higher, say 442Hz, playing together with other accordions tuned to A=440Hz will clearly "stand out" but in a very negative way: it will just sound like an accordion that's badly out of tune. It's no myth, it's a matter of physics. Some people don't even like the sound of an MM register which besides having tremolo will average out the two mixed frequencies. When there is 16 cents tremolo, meaning one M is at 440Hz and the other M is at 444Hz, the sound averages to 442Hz and it sounds clearly too high and not nice when the others just play M. (With less tremolo it's not so bad. 8 cents tremolo will average out to 441Hz.) Accordions with MMM tuned symmetrically will average out at the frequency of the single M and blend in better with other accordions playing a dry-tuned register (M, L, LM, etc.).

 

[pitzelberger]

There should be no confusion. The confusion is not just in the meaning of "myth" but also in the meaning of "stand out".

I think everyone in this thread agrees that accordions tuned sharp stand out.

However, when I initially started this thread, the term "myth" was not referring to the fact that a differently tuned accordion can be perceived as such, but more to the "myth" that accordionists chose to do this deliberately such that they can be head better, e.g. in lack of other means of amplification. (I should have been maybe more clear on this.) With regards to this question I also see a bit of confusion in this thread, as some say it just sounds awful while others indicate that (at least in early times) this has been the common practice in the US.

 

[donn]

If it helps, instruments like the tuba made for players in Europe, in some cases are dimensioned for an ideal pitch of A=444Hz. Reportedly it has become standard pitch in orchestras there, and an orchestra typically has a tuba. Does not typically have an accordion, but tubas and accordions have been observed together in other contexts.

 

[Squeezeplay]

I have a friend who played trumpet in the Boston orchestra, he is retired now, but his horn is definitely A-440.

 

[debra]

Saturday (April 1st, and not a joke), the Dutch Symphonic Accordion Orchestra (NSAO) will play a concert (now sold out) at the Rotterdam City Hall, with the city's organist. We will play an organ concerto by Poulenc together (with organ) as well as Bach's keyboard concerto BWV 1056 (with grand piano). Luckily the vast majority of NSAO has accordions tuned to 440Hz (only 3 Piginis and 1 Victoria out of tune at 442Hz) as both the organ and the grand piano there are tuned to 440Hz. There have been more joint concerts with different organ players on different organs. All these organs were tuned to 440Hz. It doesn't really matter which tuning sounds better or worse in general. It matters to have a widely recognized world wide ISO standard that says tuning should be 440Hz.

 

[hoboist]

I am sorely tempted to get a CBA tuned that way someday. I am one of those folk who regard equal temperament as somewhere between a necessary evil, and just plain evil.

I agree! Are there people that tune their accordions that way. I especially hate the thirds (C-E or D-F# etc...). Is there a way to get more acceptable thirds and still have the opportunity to play in 3 or 4 # (in the key of A or E) and 3 flats (in the key of Eb)?

 

[Javthedog]

Five minutes to spare? This might be worth reading:

Concert pitch - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

And did you know?
(Most) instruments are tuned at standard concert pitch (440 Hz), whilst a bagpipe is tuned around 470–480 Hz

Aha - bagpipe players usually march while playing - harder to miss a moving target!

 

[Alan Sharkis]

Paul may remember this story but others may not.

When I was in eighth grade, all the schools in the district had small bands that got combined when we traveled to the different schools to perform. The usual routine was to tune to whatever piano the school had in its auditorium. Accordions were very popular in those days (1952-1953) and there were six kids playing accordion in that group.

One school had a piano that was tuned so flat, probably 438 or lower, that although the other instruments could tune to it, the six of us had to sit like dummies with our accordions on our laps and play nothing. We didn’t quite understand it then.

But in later years, I was often told that accordions tuned sharp were loved by accordionists who played with other instrumentalists, but those other instrumentalists hated it.

 

[Ventura]

anyhow i thought we were supposed to stand out in a jug band
orQUestra ONsomble or Opry because we played hell out of our 'cordeens !

not because they were tuned funny

 

[Javthedog]

What do you call a group of accordions?...... a cacophone