An utter beginner from New Zealand

[dragonaura]

Hi, I'm a student from new Zealand just starting off on the accordion. I'm very happy to be learning this after admiring an old busker in town for a few years. I'm poor enough to be self learning from books, but I do have previous music tuition and theory knowledge from playing the clarinet and saxophone for five years. My learning instrument is a hohner 114, 1 row, 4 stop, button accordion. I do have a question for the people here with knowledge; what do the spoons do? It has two, not including the air spoon. I've been making sound by opening the air spoon and drawing the bellows out, then pressing the buttons while pushing and pulling the bellows. The two other spoons haven't done anything so far except make two notes when my brother and sister try to play (my sister brought a harmonica at the same auction that I brought my melodion at so we are trying to learn art the same time.) My accordion seems to be in great condition, air tight bellows with great sound, so I don't want to damage it by making a bad habit now. I've only been attempting to play for 3 days now but my family already scream and run away when they see me picking it up. I think I'm improving little by little, I've been making less mistakes on the beginning songs in my books
Hope to learn and grow my new found love with some advice from all of you

 

[dunlustin]

It's worth looking at melodeon.net which has a wealth of information about your type of "push/pull box."
The spoons are supposed to give one bass and chord on the push and another on the pull.
If your "box" is in G for example, the push will be Gbass and G chord and the pull Dbass and Dchord.
This allows a simple accompaniment for the right hand tune.
You will find lots about one-row playing on "melnet" as it is often known.
Good luck!

 

[Jack Campin]

If you're in Auckland, I'd bet somebody at Devonport Folk Club will know about that kind of box.