Button-Accordion Tunes 2 Play 4 Fun
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    • Basic BUTTON LAYOUT
    • Basic NOTATION
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    • Intermediate NOTATION
    • Intermediate PRACTICE
    • Advanced MUSIC
    • Advanced LAYOUT
    • Advanced NOTATION
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    • Accordion Links
  • CANADIAN
    • JIGS & REELS >
      • Auntie Mary
      • Aunt_Rubys_garden
      • I rowed up in a dory
      • Maple-sugar-reel
      • Pretty_little_Mary
      • Up_the_pond
    • NL - newer >
      • Fishing_in_a_dory
      • Grey foggy day
      • Joe Batt's Arm longliners
      • Loss of the Marion
      • Music and friends
      • Northern Lights of Labrador
      • Outport people
      • Rose in her hair.
      • Rubber_boots
      • Saltwater joys
      • Song for Newfoundland
      • Sonny's dream
      • Surrounded_by_water
      • The St. John's Waltz
      • Take me to the country
      • This Is My Home
      • Woman of Labrador
    • NL - older >
      • Badger_drive
      • Cliffs of Baccalieu
      • Feller from Fortune
      • Great big sea hove in ...
      • Harbour Le Cou
      • I'se The B'y
      • Jack was every inch a sailor
      • Kelligrew's Soiree
      • Let me fish off Cape St Mary's
      • Lukey's boat
      • Now I'm 64
      • Ode to Newfoundland
      • Old Brown's daughter
      • Old Polina
      • Paddy and the whale
      • Ryans and Pittmans
      • Squid jiggin' ground
      • Star of Logy Bay
      • Sweet forget-me-not
      • Tiny Red Light
    • OTHER - newer >
      • Both_sides_now
      • Did_she_mention_my_name
      • (The) Farmer's Song
      • Four strong winds
      • I'm movin' on
      • Log_drivers_waltz
      • Make_n_Break_Harbour
      • Sea-People
      • Song-for-Mira
      • Working-man
    • OTHER - older >
      • Bluebird
      • Farewell_to_NS
      • Maggie
      • O Canada
      • Peggy Gordon
      • Red River Valley
    • Christmas Songs >
      • (A) Children's Winter
      • Christmas_fancy
      • Christmas in the harbour.
      • Marys_lullaby
      • Mummers song
      • Old_Christmas_waltz
    • BY "EAR" >
      • Bluebirds_sing
      • Capelin time
      • From an island to an island
      • Land_of_fish_and_seals
      • Light and Power Boys
      • (The) Music takes me back
      • Mussels in the corner
      • Newfoundland_waltz
  • AMERICAN
    • USA - newer >
      • Adios_Amigo
      • Annie's song
      • Ballad of the Green Berets
      • Blowing in the wind
      • Blue eyes crying in the rain
      • Bridge over troubled water
      • Bye bye love
      • Country roads
      • Crystal Chandeliers
      • Four thousand years ago
      • Have I told you lately that I ...
      • I can't stop loving you
      • I overlooked an orchid
      • I recall a gypsy woman
      • I walk the line
      • Me and Bobby McGee
      • Missing in action
      • Moon River
      • Old flames
      • Rambling Rose
      • Roses are red my love
      • Send me the pillow ...
      • Try _a_ little_kindness
      • Waltz across Texas
      • What a wonderful world
      • You're my best friend
    • USA - older >
      • Down_in_the_valley
      • Hammer_song
      • Happy Birthday
      • My grandfather's clock
      • Old_lamplighter
      • Old_Smokey
      • Shenandoah
      • Star-Spangled Banner
      • Streets of Laredo
      • Tennessee_waltz
      • This land is your land
      • Wabash cannon ball
      • Wildwood flower
      • Yellow_Rose_of_Texas
      • You are my sunshine
    • Christmas Songs >
      • An old Christmas card
      • Frosty the Snowman
      • Here comes Santa Claus
      • Jingle Bells
      • Jolly old St. Nicholas
      • Must be Santa
      • Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer
      • Silver Bells
    • BY "EAR" >
      • Edelweiss
      • If I should fall behind
      • Mary Ann regrets
      • Oh so many years
      • You're the nearest thing to Heaven
  • WORLD
    • JIGS & REELS >
      • Irish washerwoman
    • Australia - older >
      • Waltzing_Matilda
    • England - newer >
      • Bread_and_Fishes
      • Fiddler's Green
      • Let it be
      • Let me be there
      • World_of_our_own
    • England - older >
      • Dirty_old_town
      • Drink to me only ...
      • Girl_I_left_behind
      • It's a long way to Tipperary
      • Long_long_ago
      • Navvy_boots
      • Scarborough Fair
    • Germany- newer >
      • A_little_peace
    • Germany- older >
      • Brahms_lullaby
    • Ireland - newer >
      • After all these years
      • (The) Ferryman
      • Fields of Athenry
      • Gypsy Rover
      • My lovely Rose of Clare
      • Nancy Spain
      • Roads of Kildare
      • Rose of Mooncoin
      • Town_of_Ballybay
    • Ireland - older >
      • Black velvet band
      • Come back Paddy Reillly
      • Danny Boy
      • Galway Bay
      • Irish washerwoman
      • Maid in the Garrett
      • Molly Malone
      • My wild Irish Rose
      • Red_is_the_rose
      • Rose of Aranmore
      • Wild Rover
    • Norway >
      • You_raise_me_up
    • Scotland - newer >
      • Come by the hills
      • It's a dream come true
      • Mull of Kintyre
      • We'll meet again my friends
    • Scotland -older >
      • Auld Lang Syne - New Year's
      • Cock o the North /Aunt Mary
      • Loch_Lomond
      • Road to the isles
      • Wild mountain thyme
    • Wales-older >
      • The Ash Grove
      • Sweet_Jenny_Jones
    • Christmas Songs >
      • Christmas in Killarney
      • Deck the hall
      • Good King Wenceslas
      • We wish you a Merry Christmas
    • BY "EAR" >
      • Among the Wicklow Hills
      • Hills of Glenshee
      • In an Irish country home
      • It's good to see you
      • Love me when I'm old ...
      • My homeland
      • The little shirt my Mother made for me
  • GOSPEL
    • Songs - newer >
      • Because He lives
      • God on the mountain
      • He touched me
      • It is no secret
      • May_the_Good_Lord_bless
      • Millenium Prayer
      • One day at a time
      • 'Till the storm passes by
      • Unclouded Day
      • Will you walk with me
      • Wings of a dove
    • Songs - older >
      • Beautiful isle of somewhere
      • Church in the wildwood
      • Count your blessings
      • Do Lord
      • Give me oil for my lamp
      • Higher ground
      • How beautiful Heaven must be
      • I'll fly away
      • In the sweet by and by
      • Just a closer walk with Thee
      • Keep on the Sunny Side
      • Kum ba yah
      • Let_the_lower_lights
      • Life is like a mountain railroad
      • Mine eyes have seen the glory
      • Precious memories
      • Shall we gather at the river
      • Standing in the need of prayer
      • Stranger of Galilee
      • When the roll is called up yonder
      • When the Saints go marching in
      • Whispering hope
    • Hymns - newer >
      • Give_to_us_laughter
      • Here I am Lord
      • How great Thou art
      • Jesus you have come to the lakeshore
      • Morning has broken
      • Pass it on
      • Spirit, Spirit of Gentleness
    • Hymns -older >
      • All people that on earth
      • Amazing Grace
      • Be Thou My Vision
      • Blessed_Assurance
      • Crown_Him_with_many_crowns
      • For_the_beauty
      • In the garden
      • I love to tell the story
      • Immortal_invisible
      • Jesus loves me
      • Joyful, joyful, We ...
      • Precious_Lord_take_my_hand
      • Softly and tenderly
      • Take time to be holy
      • We love the place O God
      • What a Friend we have in Jesus
      • Will your anchor hold
      • Wonderful_words_of_life
    • Christmas Carols >
      • Away in a manger (JRM)
      • Away in a manger (WJK)
      • The First Noel
      • The friendly beasts
      • Go, tell it on the mountain
      • Hark the herald angels sing
      • I heard the bells (Marks)
      • I saw three ships
      • Joy to the world
      • Mary's Little Boy Child
      • O come, all ye faithful
      • O little town of Bethlehem
      • Silent Night
      • When a child is born
    • BY "EAR" >
      • Lord, don't give up on me
Button-Accordion Tutorial  Project

(Dual-row G-C or A-D, with Accidentals)
Based on  tunes2play4fun.com  &  Facilitated by ZOOM

MINI-COURSE BA1
The Button Accordion, its Music & Notation

UNIT ONE (of SIX)
​Button-Accordion INs and OUTs


SLIDE SET & NOTES - INSTRUCTIONAL SESSION ONE


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Good morning, and a virtual welcome to St. John's, NL.   

The photograph behind me was taken looking due east from my home-office window in mid-May of 2019. 

​You may notice a small iceberg just outside the harbour, pushed southward in part by the strong and cold Labrador Current.



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And welcome also to my online Button-Accordion Tutorial Project, which is intended for beginners with dual row (G-C or A-D) accordions.  

This Project's songs, melodies, tunes & notation, along with accordion info, are taken from the tunes2play4fun.com web site, and the instruction and practice sessions will, hopefully, be facilitated by ZOOM.
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This is a six-unit mini-course, labelled Button Accordion One, or BA1, for short, and titled "An introduction to the Button Accordion, its Music & Notation."

The Goals are 
1. to help beginners learn to play tunes for fun on their accordions, and
​2. to investigate Zoom as an instructional & practice medium for button-accordion tutorials.

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If you find this mini-course beneficial, and if you wish to continue with this type of tutorial, then there can be more such mini-courses, BA2, BA3, etc.

In any event, there are
no charges
no fees
no examinations
no guarantees
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There are three components:

1.  Zoom instruction sessions,   
     Tuesday mornings, 10:35
2.  Optional Zoom practice sessions,
     Friday morning, using break-out
     rooms to facilitate peer tutoring..

3.  Internet 
tunes2play4fun.com
     for  private non-Zoom learning and
     practice.  At the end of this session
     I'll give you the site password.


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These are the themes for each of the 6 units, which will take somewhere between 6 & 10 weeks to cover.  All of these slides have been placed on our tunes2play4fun.com site, and I'll give you the required password at the end of this session.

We start today with The INs and OUTs of the button accordion,
and next week we'll move on to playing familiar melodies, and so on.

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So, what about the INs and OUTs?  Well, today we'll be
1. Looking at our accordions.
2. Listening to their sounds,
3. Looking inside one of them.
4. Introducing extra accordion
    terminology
5. Reminder of how to look after them.
    and, finally, we'll
Look ahead to Friday's practice and next week.  A lot to cover in 30 min.
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The outside is fairly simple.

Three parts. 
A bass end, operated by left arm,hand, thumb & fingers.

A treble end operated by right arm, hand, thumb & fingers.

The bellows that are pushed and pulled from the bass end.
​
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IDENFICATION DEMO

BASS End - six parts, as listed



BELLOWS
​            - bellows straps
            - reinforced cardboard



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IDENFICATION DEMO

Treble End - four parts, as listed




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DEMO
1.  Star of Logy Bay (waltz tune)
     
Right fingers on treble buttons
       play the melody.
      Left fingers on bass/chord buttons
       provide the waltz (1-2-3) beat.

Melody - harmony - chords

2.  When the Saints (march tune)


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Next we'll look inside to see what is involved in producing the accordion sound.  I'll use my oldest accordion.

First, the treble end of the accordion.  I'll remove the treble grill.

​Each button is connected by a lever mechanism to an elongated cover.  When lifted, a pair of holes is exposed, corresponding to a "pair" of reeds that can give us the associated musical note.

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Here because of the camera angle, only one of the two holes can be seen when button 5 is pressed, and its elongated cover is lifted.

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The ten reed plates in each of the two rows are matched to the ten treble buttons.  

When a button is pressed, and the bellows pushed (for example), the air flows through two holes to activate two very similar metal reeds (one on each opposite reed plate).

Longer reeds give lower-pitched notes, and shorter reeds give higher-pitched notes.

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Next, the bass end of the accordion:

​Controlling the bellows and air-flow is an essential part of playing the accordion.  

​
You do not want to run out of air-flow while playing, either on the push or the pull.  

The air-lever can help you quietly gain or release air from the bellows.

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For this single-row button-accordion, two of the bass buttons (1 & 3) connect by a lever mechanism to elongated hole covers and control the flow through three holes, corresponding to the three notes that make a chord.

The other two (2 & 4) connected to smaller hole covers and control the flow past two bass reeds that give us the bass-note sound.

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Here we can see the three holes that are uncovered when bass button 1 is pressed.  On the other side of these three holes are three reed plates, with three reeds sounding on the push and another three sounding on the pull.

Playing multiple notes at the same time gives us a chord.  A three-note chord is sometimes called a triad.

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Since we have only two chord buttons (giving three notes each), we only need six reed plates (or 12 reeds).

The bass-note  reeds are "hidden" in the block on the left.  They are opposite the air holes that are opened by the bass-note buttons.




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Let's review some of the musical terms we've used today and add three more.

I should mention that it is not necessary to memorize these terms, or anything else in this mini-course.   Over the next6 few weeks we'll meet these terms from time to time and will effortlessly become familiar with them.  Familiarity breeds understanding.

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Melody vs Tune

(Keep it short - just read slide)







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Musical KEY - This determines which accordion (if you have more than one) and which row you may need to play.

DIATONIC sets of notes:  Those
found from buttons 2 to 10 (inside row), or buttons 2 to 11 outside row.  

ACCIDENTALS - notes found on button 1 for each row.  These notes do not fit the musical pattern of buttons 2 to 10 (or 11) in each row, but are occasionally included in the music we play.

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Handling - keep bellows strap closed.  Do not lift by thumb straps.  Follow manufacturers instructions for cleaning.

Transport/Store - padded case.  Avoid extremes of temperature.  Avoid extremes of humidity.  Avoid dust.

Playing - avoid over-stretching or twisting.  Avoid using too much force on push or pull of bellows.  
Accordion is a dynamic instrument, but do not overdo it.

And, look after yourselves - avoid long practice sessions, especially during the "beginner" phase of learning.

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Looking ahead to Friday

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Read from slide









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Given a choice, which of the song melodies listed are the most familiar to you, and which would you like to learn to play?

Each week there will be at least five for you to choose from.  Each week, the list will include one Gospel number, and one that you may want to play for your younger children, grand-children, or even great-grand-children, for their entertainment and (perhaps) amusement.

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You will need to make a note of these instructions, particularly the password.

This portion of the site is limited to those in this Zoom-enabled tutorial project, so please keep the password confidential.

My email address for this project is tunes2play4fun.2021@gmail.com

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