Alternative to Stradella -- am I dreaming?

[Siegmund]

I feel like I remember reading about somebody's system where the chord buttons played 2 notes rather than three, with the idea that this made it much easier to play the jazzy 7th and 9th chords (getting C-E-G-B from the adjacent C-E and G-B buttons, rather than a big stretch to press C major and E minor at the same time, for instance.)

I went looking for a diagram of it, and I can't find it. (Presumably the major and minor rows just become major and minor thirds, but what do the other two rows do.)

And I was under the (mis)impression that this was called a Moschino system, but all the references I can find to Moschino are to a nonstandard layout for single note free bass.

Can anybody tell me what this was called, or point me to a link to it? (Or did I just imagine the whole thing? I would swear I read about it on this forum maybe 2 years ago.)

 

[losthobos]

CJS system....major and minor are Root and 3rd or flatted third respectively....Dom 7 is made up of 3rd and b7 and the Dim row is b3 and 6...
Pretty sure that's correct....
They are based in Turin and sell custom made complete own brand accordion but will also convert your bass side to their system...

Chiovarelli Jazz System |

 

[Siegmund]

Thank you! Yes, I believe that's the system I was thinking of (and the timeframe is right for having seen it on the forum in 2022.)

 

[earth2matt]

There is a general discussion here about Moschino, which is a free bass system.

B

Thread 'Free Bass -- Moschino system'

Jul 6, 2014

I see that George Secor has joined us. He is a fine accordionist who plays an unusual free bass system called the "Moschino System."

It is clever and logical.

Hopefully, he will see the title of this thread and post some interesting information. It is a system that should not be overlooked.

• Bill Palmer
• Replies: 17
• Forum: Accordion Chat

I also have a blog about learning to play it.

Little Fly

My experience learning Moschino free-bass accordion

moschinomeanslittlefly.blogspot.com

But, to answer your question - it isn't a 2 note per one button system - it is free bass. But because of the arrangement, it is easy to play all sorts of chords (well easy if you are George Secor) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Secor

Basically one can play Root Triads 1-3-5 or 1-3-5-7 (maj or dom) or 1-3-5-7-9 or aug chords or 11th or 13th chords without Rachmaninov's hands. I think of these as open chords and move through the circle-of-fifths with a simple shift.
1st inversion or 2nd inversion chords are easy, and work with root base also. This leaves a more open sound: I like 1-7-3 for less aggressive jazz blues/chords.

The real power of the system is to be able to alternate chromatic jumps or 5th jumps and do left hand runs, like in playing Bach.

 

[Squeezebox Of Delights]

There's also the Serafini Darwin system, used Exclusively, I believe) on the instrument of the same name. It uses two rows of six bass notes, and two corresponding rows of six thirdless neutral chords, with the idea that you can use the buttons as building blocks to construct your own more complex chords.. It's unisonoric, unlike the bisonoric bass on most melodeons, and I'd be interested to see it applied to a small PA/CBA.

 

[SteveBox]

used Exclusively, I believe

Not exclusive. In addition to Marc Serafini, the Loffet Workshop, Miguel Gramontain, and Castagnari also offer the Darwin system, and there may be others. If there are registers on the bass side, one of them is usually used to remove the fifths from the chords, giving you two octaves of bass notes instead of the open chords.

Serafini, Loffet, and Gramontain have produced small three-row CBAs with this system, but mostly they promote its use on diatonics. Castagnari, so far, has only advertised diatonic models.