I tend to get ribbed by friends sometimes for something like "this is actually quite edible" being near the top of the compliment scale one can expect from me. Too much of critic and pessimist to experience love at first sight. My own big one started out as a cheap stopgap measure that should have been good enough to tide me over the absence of my dedicated CBA, so that I could already start practising. I cannot play worth a damn but still get people to marvel at what comes out of my box. A Gola would make me look bad because people know what to expect from one. So unlike Jerry, I kind of accidentally tripped over the end of a lifelong journey.
I can't actually claim to have
quite fallen in love with it, and it's not my ideal instrument. But my phrasing sounds way better on it (so I guess, what I'm attempting is much more effective on it?) than my previous instruments, and I do feel "the joy" sufficiently when I play it, to very much want it. My ideal instrument would have a good 50 keys in the right hand, and a converter with a free bass whose tones are buttery smooth. None of the notes would sound harsh and would all require the same amount of bellows pressure to activate, so I suspect my truly ideal instrument is strictly fictional (as an acoustic, anyway), but I suspect that something pretty damn close must exist, provided I'm willing to pay the price of a new car for it.
I felt "the joy" when I was playing my Paolo Soprani LMMMH 120-bass, too. But I traded that in (along with the Pigini Studio B2) for the current instruments, because it wouldn't really let me "do phrasing" much. There was a very narrow window where the reeds would reliably sound, so I wasn't able to do this waltz even
this much justice (which I don't consider to be quite enough). Here's a
comparison video if you're curious (I've also become more comfortable with the piece since then, of course).
But I loved the
sound it made. I just couldn't sculpt it as I wanted. The new one is a LMMM, and it'll do me just fine, but I
will miss the H. The ability to phrase things as I want to is paramount, though.
I look forward someday to finding the instrument I truly do fall in love with... but in the meantime, I'll have a great grab-and-go jam machine (Americana Nemo II) that also has a converter (so I don't get too far from the feel of a
real free bass), a machine I can practice on late at night, play some richer accordion sounds I don't have access to, and play a buttery-smooth free bass (Roland FR-8xb, which I expect to purchase soon), and a non-compact, solid 96-bass that I suspect will be my primary instrument at home for standard Stradella stuff (the incoming Petosa).
I'm uncertain what I'll do with the FR-1xb I already have. I'll be a lot less motivated to play it if I have the FR-8xb, and it's tempting to use it in trade toward the new Petosa. But I think I'll hold off - I've been using it as a midi input when scoring arrangements, and it's plenty good for that (the 8xb might be too bulky for that use case). It's also a solid loaner instrument if I should get to the point where I want to teach lessons. I'm sure not going to loan my $5,500 compact converter! And like the Nemo II it's a great grab-and-go (even better, since it's super-light). But it's not great for jamming, since it has a small voice unless I plug it into an amp.
