Missing octave in tenor bass

[Marty S]

Before my question it seems like a little background may be relevant. I’ve only been squeezing this crazy old thing (a plain full-size PA LMM) a few years, although I’ve played a fair number of instruments over my lifetime (I had my second thirtieth birthday a few years ago), but as I played around I was surprised to find I really liked it, I mean really, really liked it. When you get old enough you start thinking of how you’d do things in your life differently if you’d only known way back what you know now, and one of those things for me is I would advise myself to forget all those other (admittedly quite worthwhile) instruments and start squeezing as soon as I was big enough for a junior model.

Once I realized I wanted to develop a serious relationship with this gal—I named her Lizzie, because although she’s not “tin” she is black (some of you may understand that remark, and I name all my cars too)—and did some research, I decided to go ahead and invest the money for her rewax/tune and a few other things. (Even though my cousin gave her to me I've probably invested a little more in her than she’s supposedly worth, but she deserves it and I’m kinda fond of her.)

By this time I discovered that the old joke about the guy going out to his car in the parking lot and finding two other accordions in the back seat has a basis in reality. Even though I’ve only started playing in public recently, twice people have come to me afterwards and wanted to give me their old squeezeboxes—which of course I couldn’t refuse even though they were junkers only good for parts. But in checking them out I learned things, the relevant one here being that the lowest note is not C on all accordions.

So finally now here’s my actual question; The repairman (“accordion technician”, what do you call him?) said he could install the three lower notes from one of those junkers in Lizzie, which has worked out pretty well and I’m glad he did it except for this one little issue; especially with just the tenor register selected (am I saying that right?) I notice a “hole” in the octaves—a missing octave between the two playing octaves for those three notes B, Bb and A. It is fairly well disguised when playing the full bass register—which is most of the time—and when playing only the tenor register I try to cover up the “hole” with my right hand. But when playing for people, with a dedicated second mic to my left for the bass, I think that “hole” may be more noticeable. I keep wondering what I should do about that: Nothing—it’s not worth messing with, take it back to that repairman—but he’s a super nice guy and I’m very “confrontationally averse” besides which, what if he doesn’t have those missing reeds, or take it to a different repair shop to see what they could do?

Any advice on this? I also have other questions to ask in other posts.

 

[debra]

There are two ways the bass side can be configured, which I tend to call the German and the Italian way. The difference is in how the octave jump is handled. When you play a (chromatic) scale, there is a lowest note, then you go up and up... and somewhere you jump down an octave.
The German way is to have that octave jump at the same note in each of the reed banks. It makes it very obvious where the jump is, and some people don't like this much because you hear so well that there is an octave jump.
The Italian way is to have the octave in a different place for different reed banks. Typically the two lowest reed banks have the jump at the same note, and the third reed bank will have the jump at a different note. The fourth (and fifth) reed banks may have the jump at the same note as in the lowest bank or at the same note as in the third bank, or yet somewhere else.
It is in the Italian configuration that the different spots of the jumps have to be chosen carefully, because when they are chosen well they mask the octave jump quite well in the "tutti" register, yet still sound ok in the other registers. If not chosen well some of the other registers may not sound so well, and exhibiting what you are experiencing if done really badly.
The general idea behind having different octave jumps is to mimic what is called the "Shepard tone", a way to vary the volume of the notes in a scale to make the octave jump disappear completely to our ears. This cannot be achieved in an accordion, but an accordion can have a reasonable approximation, in the "tutti" register only. Often, trying to improve the sound by moving the octave jump around (which is what happened by replacing these three reeds) can make the sound better or worse... and I tend to believe that the accordion makers have often already achieved the best sound with the choice they made in the factory. Experimenting to achieve an even better sound can work, but can backfire, and I guess in your case it backfired...

 

[Big Squeezy Accordions]

Before my question it seems like a little background may be relevant. I’ve only been squeezing this crazy old thing (a plain full-size PA LMM) a few years, although I’ve played a fair number of instruments over my lifetime (I had my second thirtieth birthday a few years ago), but as I played around I was surprised to find I really liked it, I mean really, really liked it. When you get old enough you start thinking of how you’d do things in your life differently if you’d only known way back what you know now, and one of those things for me is I would advise myself to forget all those other (admittedly quite worthwhile) instruments and start squeezing as soon as I was big enough for a junior model.

Once I realized I wanted to develop a serious relationship with this gal—I named her Lizzie, because although she’s not “tin” she is black (some of you may understand that remark, and I name all my cars too)—and did some research, I decided to go ahead and invest the money for her rewax/tune and a few other things. (Even though my cousin gave her to me I've probably invested a little more in her than she’s supposedly worth, but she deserves it and I’m kinda fond of her.)

By this time I discovered that the old joke about the guy going out to his car in the parking lot and finding two other accordions in the back seat has a basis in reality. Even though I’ve only started playing in public recently, twice people have come to me afterwards and wanted to give me their old squeezeboxes—which of course I couldn’t refuse even though they were junkers only good for parts. But in checking them out I learned things, the relevant one here being that the lowest note is not C on all accordions.

So finally now here’s my actual question; The repairman (“accordion technician”, what do you call him?) said he could install the three lower notes from one of those junkers in Lizzie, which has worked out pretty well and I’m glad he did it except for this one little issue; especially with just the tenor register selected (am I saying that right?) I notice a “hole” in the octaves—a missing octave between the two playing octaves for those three notes B, Bb and A. It is fairly well disguised when playing the full bass register—which is most of the time—and when playing only the tenor register I try to cover up the “hole” with my right hand. But when playing for people, with a dedicated second mic to my left for the bass, I think that “hole” may be more noticeable. I keep wondering what I should do about that: Nothing—it’s not worth messing with, take it back to that repairman—but he’s a super nice guy and I’m very “confrontationally averse” besides which, what if he doesn’t have those missing reeds, or take it to a different repair shop to see what they could do?

Any advice on this? I also have other questions to ask in other posts.

Replacing the A, Bb, and B on the second lowest set of reeds with reeds an octave lower will solve this problem. It may be hard to find lower reeds that fit, or the reeds or reed block may have to be altered to make this work.

 

[Tom]

Welcome Marty! I think Big Squeezy makes good sense about mixing the octaves anong the registers. However, my guess is that 99% of your audience will not hear the difference, so, although it seems annoying to you, I recommend spending your time on things your audience will notice like smiling, chatter, eye contact, repertoire, smiling, a nice hat.

 

[Marty S]

Thank you people for your input.

Debra, that’s very interesting. Changing the high end of the bass block to be the new low end opened up an obvious hole which may have existed originally but was camouflaged before. In that case, I suppose maybe a knowledgeable repairman might improve this new bigger hole or not. But I tend to think one backfire is enough, and as Big Squeezy mentions it sounds like trying to fix that could get complicated. Since I can live with it I think I’d better leave it be and work on Tom’s advice—smiling, etc. (I’m reminded to heed that advice while playing today at a church. I want to post the video of it this afternoon for the June contest.)

That’s also interesting about German vs. Italian. The name on the front of Lizzie says “BertiniLux” which sounds Italian and there’s a sticker on the back saying “Made in Italy”, but there’s also a little “accordion man” impression in the body which I was told is a Hohner trademark, whatever that’s all about. And I happen not to care so much for the Hohner sound I’ve heard online—which I think of as a colder, harsher, hollow sound—while it seems Italian boxes generally have a warmer, sweeter sound to my ears, as Lizzie has. On the other hand, the repairman said Hohners go down to a G, which seems would be nice. So the more I learn, the “confuseder” I get.

And Squeezy, yes, the repair guy also said the junker’s lower reeds were sized a little differently but he could make them work. Which he did, but I noticed they don’t seem as loud as the rest. So I came up with this theory that—everything else being equal—generally speaking the reed length controls pitch but maybe the width controls volume, and maybe those lower reeds are a little narrower. Just a guess.

Which brings up another question which maybe should be a different thread but I’ll just ask it: Those “new”, lower reeds can be sluggish to start sounding, so that I may be past them and on to the next note without their playing. That bothers me more than the octave hole and the lesser volume. Can anything be done about that? (And should this question be a different thread?)

 

[debra]

...

Which brings up another question which maybe should be a different thread but I’ll just ask it: Those “new”, lower reeds can be sluggish to start sounding, so that I may be past them and on to the next note without their playing. That bothers me more than the octave hole and the lesser volume. Can anything be done about that? (And should this question be a different thread?)

A wider reed may indeed be louder than a narrower one. But really it is the width of the reed combined with the amplitude of the vibrations that determines volume. If a wider reed moves less far (in and out) it won't be louder than a narrower reed that mores further...
As for starting faster, that is determined by the "voicing", which is how far the reed top sits above the reed plate (when not playing). If the gap is bigger the reed may be slower to start but will sound louder and will not choke when you pull or push hard. If the gap is narrower the reed wants to start faster, but it may choke if you pull/push hard and then it may not start at all or start later when the "spring" force of the reed overcomes the force of the air pressure trying to keep it stuck in the hole. And one more thing: if the valve next to the reed isn't naturally closed the air pressure/flow going through it to "suck" that valve closed causes the reed next to that valve to be slower to start.

 

[Marty S]

A wider reed may indeed be louder than a narrower one. But really it is the width of the reed combined with the amplitude of the vibrations that determines volume. If a wider reed moves less far (in and out) it won't be louder than a narrower reed that mores further...
As for starting faster, that is determined by the "voicing", which is how far the reed top sits above the reed plate (when not playing). If the gap is bigger the reed may be slower to start but will sound louder and will not choke when you pull or push hard. If the gap is narrower the reed wants to start faster, but it may choke if you pull/push hard and then it may not start at all or start later when the "spring" force of the reed overcomes the force of the air pressure trying to keep it stuck in the hole. And one more thing: if the valve next to the reed isn't naturally closed the air pressure/flow going through it to "suck" that valve closed causes the reed next to that valve to be slower to start.

Debra, sorry I took so long to reply. During the week I don’t have much discretionary time, such as for going online, but thanks belatedly for your comments. Yes, amplitude—controlled by the amount of air pressure exerted—would have a great impact on the volume of all the reeds together. And thanks for explaining about “voicing“. I’d heard about that before but didn’t understand what was being talked about. I had to read it several times, but now I can see. So thanks again.