CBA- Three rows or five?

[mrkeelermr]

Returning to the specific questions @123dwight asked:

Is a three row accordion severely limited compared to a four or five row instrument? Would a person pick up bad habits if he learned on three rows?

As I understand things, I believe the following are true:

• Learning on a 3-row instead of a 5-row will not give you bad habits in and of itself. Several musicians in this thread have mentioned moving from a 3-row to a 5-row but I see no reference to “bad habits” from starting on a 3-row instrument, only mentions of the increased versatility of having more rows of buttons which is I think undeniable. Whatever habits, patterns, fingerings, licks, songs, pieces, and so on that you learn on a 3-row instrument are up to you and can be more or less directly applied to a 5-row instrument.
• A 3-row instrument is not severely limited. Operative word here being “severely”. There is an enormous and highly varied repertoire for 3-row CBA. A 5-row instrument will give you more convenient or fluid fingering options, so in that basis a 3-row is in fact more limited. But you can still play basically anything and as @debra showed with reference to Alexander Skliarov winning the Coupe Mondiale on a 3-row instrument, the “ceiling” for what you can do with a 3-row instrument is very high indeed. Of course, @Jaime_Dergut is correct that a virtuoso can work magic with a limited instrument, but my point here is that while the 3-row is limited relative to a 5-row, it is not limited when you consider the truly staggering scope of what you can do with it musically.

Hoping those with more experience can confirm/deny/qualify what I said above. If I have mischaracterized anything it was not my intention and I would appreciate being corrected if I have made a mistake. I’m here to learn, too!

Anyway, @123dwight all that is to say, get a box and start squeezin’!

• If you can access and afford a 4- or 5- or 6-row instrument, then by all means go for it!
• If you can only access/afford a 3-row instrument, it is not a bad choice and by all means go for it!

Where I was at geographically and financially when starting out my only real options were 3-row instruments. In ~6 months of practice I have learned folk songs, pop songs, classical pieces, organ compositions, choir compositions and more but have yet to feel that I need more button rows. Someday in the future I may pick up a 5-row, but in the meantime I absolutely adore my 3-row bayan and have not felt limited by it in terms of my musical expression or playing music I like.

 

[dak]

Someday in the future I may pick up a 5-row, but in the meantime I absolutely adore my 3-row bayan and have not felt limited by it in terms of my musical expression or playing music I like.

In my estimate (not backed by actual B system experience), a fourth row tends to be more important for C system than for B system given typical chords. C system tends to have 2-row chords following finger curvature for adjacent rows and opposing finger curvature for gapped rows which makes 1 out of 3 chords really awkward without 4th row. B system has 2 out of 3 chords against finger curvature on adjacent rows (inconvenient but not too bad) and following finger curvature on gapped rows (which is pretty ok) for 1 out of 3 chords.

 

[mrkeelermr]

Thank you @dak for the extra clarification and flagging the B- vs C-system differences. The finer points for C-system are different and outside of my experience.

 

[Jaime_Dergut]

That being said, @Jaime_Dergut is correct about the merits of a 5-row instrument. I don’t disagree but wanted to share some of the merits of a 3-row instrument from my perspective.

I am not saying that 3 rows layout is lacking anything. I am saying that, if you want to buy a button instrument for learning, get one with 5 rows out of care for your fingers and own comfort.

If that's not a concern, then the number of rows doesn't really matter. Price is the same for both layouts, if brand new.

 

[micahcowan]

You can play pretty much anything on a 3-row. 5 rows buys you better alternative fingerings, which in my experience can translate to faster passages, less finger contortion in the case of certain RH chords (perhaps especially in C system), and mostly-consistent fingerings when playing the same piece in different keys.

 

[nico79]

It depends of your goal. Mine was to play quickly in any key, and not tunes of high dexterity. So to my opinion the best is to learn C Major and C minor scales on 3 rows and all chords and arpegio. And then the magic of the 5 rows accordion is that you can play them in any any keys, keeping the same fingering but just starting on the right button...So each tune you play you can play it it any keys with the same fingering. I feel sorry to repeat this to other readers, but this year, I sold 3 accordions and the buyers were amazed by this news

If you learn on 3-rows accordion you have to learn 3 different fingering for the major scale, arpegio and chords: 1 for the keys starting on the 1st row, 1 for for the keys starting on the 2nd, etc ...

So learning on a 3 rows accordion doesn't give bad habits, but is just (to my very personal mind) ...a waste of time

 

[micahcowan]

It depends of your goal. Mine was to play quickly in any key, and not tunes of high dexterity. [snipped]

If you learn on 3-rows accordion you have to learn 3 different fingering for the major scale, arpegio and chords: 1 for the keys starting on the 1st row, 1 for for the keys starting on the 2nd, etc ...

So learning on a 3 rows accordion doesn't give bad habits, but is just (to my very personal mind) ...a waste of time

I'm guessing you mean by ear? If the goal is to play any song you've learned and worked on, in any key, then you'd be best served to learn it on only 3 rows, so that you can simply shift your fingers to play in any key, without ever having to worry about wrapping to a new row (as you would if you practiced on 5 rows).

Which is in fact why I'd initially had a mind to learn all my music in 3 rows, so that I could easily shift it to any key... but I found that, in practice, the gains of freely using the 5 rows were too great to ignore, both for playing RH chords that fit the hands, and for making the difference between a very natural and a very awkward fingering for passages.