Accordiola Super Casotto

[Ester]

Hi,
I'm new in the forum.
I decided to buy my first chromatic button accordion. I have a piano accordion with 40 basses and no registers which I barely know how to play.
After reading and watching videos and asking some musicians I decided to buy one with a C system.
I found a second hand accordiola super casotto for 540 euros. It has 9 registers but if I'm not wrong it has no MM? Is that important?(I attached a pictures) Does it sound like a good instrument for a beginner? Is the price alright? I checked on different sites and I found the same accordion from much cheaper to much more expensive.
I also found a Manfrini (I attached a pic too) for 360 euros. Same registers on the right side, I think, but registers in the left side (?) and no casotto. I understand that the cassotto makes the sound more mellow. I'm not sure if I'm still able to make the difference.

I prefer the sound to be not super wet.

I found cheaper instruments but with less basses, or less registers.

Any advice will be much appreciated.
Thanks!

 

[losthobos]

The Accordiola looks superb, with this reed set up and cassotto I'd be very happy....

 

[Dingo40]

Welcome Ester !
You live in a gorgeous historic spot!
I have no practical experience of CBAs but your's look great to me
They both seem to be LMH, so no MM combination available, but you can still play anything you like!
The five row treble is good (from what I've heard).
Other members here will be able to help you with more specific advice.

 

[tcabot]

Welcome.

I've got an Accordiola "Cassotto II" from the 60s which might be a bit older than the one you've got in your pics. I believe it was their top of the range model before it got re-badged as Chromaton V - the Piano V's CBA cousin (In fact, exactly the same accordion inside). That's a 5-voice double cassotto instrument that is absolutely superb & has got a very sweet tone.
My Accordiola's cassotto has got a really nice, clarinet-like middle. It's not just about making the sound mellow - some partials get suppressed, some get amplified, significantly changing the timbre of the cassotto voices.

You seem to have a more recent 3-voice model with an LMH setting (presumably, L is in cassotto). Not a bad combination, especially for a learner instrument where you're often advised not to have musette tuning. The box is likely to be light & well balanced.
The left hand side still has 3 registers (big master + two buttons next to it).

The price is very attractive (at least by UK standards), but at this age it might need some servicing work done to it (same for manfrini). Get it serviced & you'll probably never part with it, even if you buy something else in the future.

PS There is a strange-looking button on the grille - could that be a sordina? In which case it's definitely a winner.

 

[Ester]

Thanks everyone! It helps a lot.

 

[Ester]

Welcome Ester !
You live in a gorgeous historic spot!
I have no practical experience of CBAs but your's look great to me
They both seem to be LMH, so no MM combination available, but you can still play anything you like!
The five row treble is good (from what I've heard).
Other members here will be able to help you with more specific advice.

Yes, Sweden is gorgeous. I moved to Sweden last year and I'm very pleased. Music is a very important aspect of the culture and second hand "dragspelar" are indeed much easier to find at a good price than in Spain because so much people play them

 

[tcabot]

A "Super cassotto" has popped up on ebay yesterday with some guts photos and it's disappointing to see that it comes with machine riveted reeds instead of tipo-a-mano, like on Cassotto II. Indeed, single cassotto for the L voice, as expected.
Still an attractive buy if you got yours for 540 in good condition.

 

[losthobos]

@tcabot can you pop link to super cassotto....thanks

 

[tcabot]

Ebay

I have no affiliation with the seller and the asking price, imho, is very optimistic for a dural-equipped box , but you can see some photos of the insides.

It appears to have inherited the 3-axle right hand keyboard design (cassotto levers sit on their own independent axle), but no winkelbass in the left.

There's still that interesting-looking button on the grille, suggesting that it might be a sordina.

 

[Ester]

Hi. I finally didn't buy either of them. The Accordiola Super Cassotto had a few keys that didn't work properly. So, I went to a music shop nearby and they had some second hand accordions. All their accordions are revised by themselves. It seems that they are related to an accordion luthier in the same town.
Anyway, after showing me a few, the owner remembered he had another one since a few years ago. He showed it to me and I liked it a lot. He said that the price hadn't been updated since they acquired it. I payed 3500 sek (around 320 euros). It's in a really good condition I think. I like the sound very much. But I don't play (yet) so I have no criteria. I'd be grateful if you guys could let me know what you think. I attach pics.

 

[Ventura]

320 euro's was a steal for a vintage Paolo Soprani 4 reed treble with
true Musette voicing

it is even red ! their best color

so this was a professional level model from a fairly legendary company
built during their actual original period of existence

if you take care of it and keep it maintained well it could last you your lifetime,
so do not be afraid to spend some money on it occasionally

it is obviously old, and many parts of an accordion simply harden or
otherwise deteriorate with age (leathers, gaskets, glue, wax)
which are what you will need to maintain or replace over time

good luck learning to play and i hope you have a lot of fun with it

 

[Tom]

Welcome Ester!

This is a beautiful accordion, for a great price, as Ventura noted. I hope it inspires you to play the heck out of it. Congrats!!!!

 

[Ester]

320 euro's was a steal for a vintage Paolo Soprani 4 reed treble with
true Musette voicing

it is even red ! their best color

so this was a professional level model from a fairly legendary company
built during their actual original period of existence

if you take care of it and keep it maintained well it could last you your lifetime,
so do not be afraid to spend some money on it occasionally

it is obviously old, and many parts of an accordion simply harden or
otherwise deteriorate with age (leathers, gaskets, glue, wax)
which are what you will need to maintain or replace over time

good luck learning to play and i hope you have a lot of fun with it

Thanks!

 

[Ester]

Welcome Ester!

This is a beautiful accordion, for a great price, as Ventura noted. I hope it inspires you to play the heck out of it. Congrats!!!!

Thanks!

 

[Ester]

Welcome Ester !
You live in a gorgeous historic spot!
I have no practical experience of CBAs but your's look great to me
They both seem to be LMH, so no MM combination available, but you can still play anything you like!
The five row treble is good (from what I've heard).
Other members here will be able to help you with more specific advice.

I just realized that my profile was not updated and according to it I was still living in Italy! Well, yes another beautiful historic spot .
I'm Spanish, my husband is Italian. We moved to Sweden recently. Both countries, Italy and Sweden have their own interesting accordion tradition as I'm learning now

 

[Tom]

I just realized that my profile was not updated and according to it I was still living in Italy! Well, yes another beautiful historic spot .
I'm Spanish, my husband is Italian. We moved to Sweden recently. Both countries, Italy and Sweden have their own interesting accordion tradition as I'm learning now

Cool! I don't know anything about Sweden (never been there, would like to) but in Italy I would definitely say traditionS, with an S!!! Good luck!

 

[Siegmund]

A "Super cassotto" has popped up on ebay yesterday with some guts photos and it's disappointing to see that it comes with machine riveted reeds instead of tipo-a-mano, like on Cassotto II.

For those of us who just fell off the turnip truck yesterday, or a year or two ago...

Is there an easy way to tell at a glance what quality the reeds are, when looking inside an unfamiliar instrument?

 

[JerryPH]

The highest quality reeds have a couple traits:
- diamond shaped rivets
- a blue stripe across the top and down one side of the reed tongues.

They sometimes have identifying markers/names on them too (Bugari, Binci, etc...)

I recently looked at a box full of new uninstalled Gola reeds from the late 50's-early 60's... it was like holding gold... lol

 

[Tom]

For those of us who just fell off the turnip truck yesterday, or a year or two ago...

Is there an easy way to tell at a glance what quality the reeds are, when looking inside an unfamiliar instrument?

I don't think so. Besides, even on a "Gola" they could have been swapped out. Maybe some of you could tell by listening. I could not.

 

[tcabot]

No 100% guarantee, but:

- Tipo-a-mano and a-mano would usually have the characteristic facets on the rivet from hand-riveting.
I think there might be different techniques in eastern europe where the rivets are installed with straight hammer hits. In this case there's no way to tell the rivets apart from machine stamped ones. But over there good reeds are usually on solid planks.

- "Solid Plank" reeds almost always mean a-mano or at least tipo a mano.

- "A mano" in very traditional sense, i.e. fully hand-made reeds are easy to tell apart, as the reed tongues are shaped with hand files. The file marks are not as straight and uniform as grinding machines.

- Most modern (last 70 years or so ) "A-manos" are machine-ground but are usually cut from strips of steel, so the base square of the tongue would have bluing on the edges. The tongue itself won't have bluing on the edges. Tipo-a-manos typically wouldn't have blued base edges.

An important thing to remember is that the quality of the reeds is very dependent on the "mano" who's doing the work. The first couple of reeds that I made are, technically "a mano", but in reality you'd be better off with good machined stamped ones .