Squeezebox Of Delights
Active member
Hello all!
I received something in the post the other day which people here may find intriguing. It's a Hohner 261/40 - the instrument built from Hohner's "Klangwerkstatt" kit from 1994. They seem to be fairly uncommon and I see they have been discussed before but without the input of someone who actually owns one, so I thought I'd talk about it a bit! Mine was preassembled by someone who obviously wasn't a professional craftsperson, but also knew a decent amount about what they were doing. There are wonky screws and questionable joints, but it's all solid. According to the seller, it came from Marcus Music in Wales, who are still in business making concertinas and drums.
It's undeniably a very simple box. In fact, it's the only non-toy piano accordion I've ever encountered that only has three sets of reeds! One in the treble, two in the bass - all flat mounted. As such it's got a pretty loud and clear treble, while the low notes of the bass are comparatively weak. The G bass is particularly weedy, which is annoying because much of the music I play relies heavily on the key of G. It's also the lowest note in the bass - although none of the notes are very low in general - so I wonder if it's to do with the depth of the reed chamber. Some experimenting may be in order! The chords are fine. It has three rows of them - major, minor, dominant seventh - and they all have just three notes each. I won't be needing the sevenths, so I will be giving it the dremel-and-superglue-special-a-la-Oskar-McIntosh to replace them with thirdless chords (not as scary as it sounds).
The treble action is okay. It's pretty typical for a later Hohner box - nice and smooth, and reasonably quiet, but slightly deeper than it needs to be. The bass action leaves a little to be desired, but that seems to be because it wasn't installed very well. A couple of notes were sticking and the button height was all over the place, but it's well on its way to being sorted out, and then I imagine it'll be just as good as a Hohner Student.
The hardware is about as simple as it gets. The bass strap is a single strip of leather secured by screws at each end, as are the bellows straps. The shoulder straps are also thin single leather strips, which would be a problem if the accordion didn't weigh next to nothing. The hardware is actually very reminiscent of a Hohner melodeon, such as a Pokerwork or Erica.
The construction is similarly melodeon-y. It has a boxy solid wood body with plywood seemingly only used for the bass and treble grilles, and the corners are protected by rounded metal pieces. It has the classic Pokerwork problem of the edge of the bass side digging into your arm, which I will sort out with a file and some sandpaper. Being a kit, it was supplied unfinished, leaving the builder to apply whatever surface finish they fancied. Mine has a shabby brown stain, which I actually really like. I think it suits the box very nicely, plus it won't show dirt as well!
Essentially my current plans for it are to tinker with it and modify it until it's a nice, lightweight folk box, then use it to take places that I wouldn't want to take the Excelsior - camping, on walks, to the beach, up trees, deep-sea diving etc.. I also fancy washboardifying it. If I can find a way to non-destructively attach a few bells and whistles, I think it would be very fun to perform with.
Overall, I really like this box. I suspect it may leave some accordion purists foaming at the mouth, but I personally think that for what it is, it's very good indeed. If anyone is interested in getting hold of one, there are a few unbuilt kits floating around on European ecommerce sites, and one at the Birmingham Accordion Centre, although I think theirs is horrendously overpriced. Here's a demonstration of the sound - Mrs. Saggs, by Chris Wood.
I received something in the post the other day which people here may find intriguing. It's a Hohner 261/40 - the instrument built from Hohner's "Klangwerkstatt" kit from 1994. They seem to be fairly uncommon and I see they have been discussed before but without the input of someone who actually owns one, so I thought I'd talk about it a bit! Mine was preassembled by someone who obviously wasn't a professional craftsperson, but also knew a decent amount about what they were doing. There are wonky screws and questionable joints, but it's all solid. According to the seller, it came from Marcus Music in Wales, who are still in business making concertinas and drums.
It's undeniably a very simple box. In fact, it's the only non-toy piano accordion I've ever encountered that only has three sets of reeds! One in the treble, two in the bass - all flat mounted. As such it's got a pretty loud and clear treble, while the low notes of the bass are comparatively weak. The G bass is particularly weedy, which is annoying because much of the music I play relies heavily on the key of G. It's also the lowest note in the bass - although none of the notes are very low in general - so I wonder if it's to do with the depth of the reed chamber. Some experimenting may be in order! The chords are fine. It has three rows of them - major, minor, dominant seventh - and they all have just three notes each. I won't be needing the sevenths, so I will be giving it the dremel-and-superglue-special-a-la-Oskar-McIntosh to replace them with thirdless chords (not as scary as it sounds).
The treble action is okay. It's pretty typical for a later Hohner box - nice and smooth, and reasonably quiet, but slightly deeper than it needs to be. The bass action leaves a little to be desired, but that seems to be because it wasn't installed very well. A couple of notes were sticking and the button height was all over the place, but it's well on its way to being sorted out, and then I imagine it'll be just as good as a Hohner Student.
The hardware is about as simple as it gets. The bass strap is a single strip of leather secured by screws at each end, as are the bellows straps. The shoulder straps are also thin single leather strips, which would be a problem if the accordion didn't weigh next to nothing. The hardware is actually very reminiscent of a Hohner melodeon, such as a Pokerwork or Erica.
The construction is similarly melodeon-y. It has a boxy solid wood body with plywood seemingly only used for the bass and treble grilles, and the corners are protected by rounded metal pieces. It has the classic Pokerwork problem of the edge of the bass side digging into your arm, which I will sort out with a file and some sandpaper. Being a kit, it was supplied unfinished, leaving the builder to apply whatever surface finish they fancied. Mine has a shabby brown stain, which I actually really like. I think it suits the box very nicely, plus it won't show dirt as well!
Essentially my current plans for it are to tinker with it and modify it until it's a nice, lightweight folk box, then use it to take places that I wouldn't want to take the Excelsior - camping, on walks, to the beach, up trees, deep-sea diving etc.. I also fancy washboardifying it. If I can find a way to non-destructively attach a few bells and whistles, I think it would be very fun to perform with.
Overall, I really like this box. I suspect it may leave some accordion purists foaming at the mouth, but I personally think that for what it is, it's very good indeed. If anyone is interested in getting hold of one, there are a few unbuilt kits floating around on European ecommerce sites, and one at the Birmingham Accordion Centre, although I think theirs is horrendously overpriced. Here's a demonstration of the sound - Mrs. Saggs, by Chris Wood.
