Past threads about these accordions?

[Dingo40]

There's at least two threads regarding accordions with the keyboard style in these clips, but I can't find them. Can someone help, or at least remember the name given to this type?
Thanks!?

 

[knobby]

Something like “Janko“

 

[Dingo40]

No, I don't think it's that, Knobby. I seem to remember a short word meaning "fake " or "false ", but neither fake, nor faux accordions brings up any hits on google .
I remember there being quite a lengthy article as well.
Ah well, someone will come up with it .?

 

[Dingo40]

Ahhhh! Got it! The word I'm looking for is "finto "!?

Look here:

Finto-Piano

In the book The Golden Age of the Accordion there are excerpts here and there from old accordion company catalogs; an interesting feature of items available in the 1920s are accordions which have a piano keyboard plus a row of buttons below the keys, usually two but sometimes three. Somewhere...

www.accordionists.info

 

[Dingo40]

finto

FINTO - translate into English with the Italian-English Dictionary - Cambridge Dictionary

dictionary.cambridge.org

 

[debra]

Indeed, finto-piano. These are really just CBA accordions. This one just might have a working piano-keyboard but I doubt it. Most of these boxes were just CBA meaning the row of white piano-keys do not have the notes of a PA but are just the "next" CBA row. Some have a complete row of "black" keys, of which some where painted white to hide that they are there. So you would have BBWBBBWBBWBBBW... They were mostly used by CBA players wanting to play in American establishment that would not allow CBA but only PA. With a finto-piano you could fake having a PA while "secretly" just playing CBA.

 

[Dingo40]

Thank for your insights, Paul??

 

[JIM D.]

The Finto- Piano keyboard design was indeed a variation of a CBA button keyboard but not for it's superior features but
simply for it's aesthetic appearance value here in the Us.
In the 30's here the piano keyboard was introduced by Pietro & Guido Deiro on performances . Formally accordions
only appeared here with button keyboards. The piano keyboard offered many piano players to adapt to an accordion
easily and perform with a portable instrument. A few PA's were introduced previously in Europe but The Deiro Bros.
introduction of PA's on performances was felt to be considered an "American Standard" design.
You see back in the 40's American cars & luxury cars, Clothing fashions, Movies & Sports became well established
as MADE IN USA and considered American Standards. The PA was considered American design an the Button keyboard
accordion simply as a 'Foreign' design. The Finto-Piano design offered a button box player appear & perform with
A MADE IN USA design. The Finto keyboard really has no advantage to a button box but simply a visual appearance
of an American standard design. The accordionist could tell it's a CBA but the non musical audience simply
considered it an American standard keyboard.
Many famous accordionists appeared & performed with a Finto such as Leon Sash, Alice Hall, John Barsuglia,
Pietro Frosini and many others.

 

[Dingo40]

Thanks Jim: interesting!??

 

[Chickers]

JIM / PAUL/DINGO/ KNOBBY:
Wow, what a "wealth" of information.
All you folks on the forum always impress me with your knowledge, and depth of experience with accordions, and music.
Seriously, I feel quite fortunate to be on this forum, and to have the opportunity to be educated on accordions, and music.
I guess luck was with me when I kind of "stumbled" upon the forum while surfing the internet.
I strongly feel anyone thinking about taking up the accordion should subscribe to this forum right from the get go.
I feel information available, and the experiences shared by so many, can help make many of the accordion learning,
and buying processes go so much more smoothly----and money saving by avoiding some poor decisions based on many
mis-understandings, and bogus information out there. I know this from my own personal experience. I have made some of those
poor buying decisions.
Thanks loads for all your contributions, and for your willingness to share the knowledge.
Take care, and I wish you all a Happy and Better New Year. I'm looking forward to 2021.
CHICKERS
SEVEN HILLS, OHIO U.S.A

 

[dunlustin]

A bit off-topic but Deiro's influence is even earlier than JimD notes:
'He became a professional entertainer and took engagements in France and Germany playing the chromatic accordion. His success as a performer led the Ronco-Vercelli accordion company in Italy to ask him to demonstrate their new piano-accordions at the Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition in 1908.' ( see Wikipedia entry)
First recording about 1910: (4) Guido Deiro World's Foremost Piano-Accordionist - Part 1 - YouTube
Quite the Dandy, he was no 'slouch' socially - by 1914 he had married Mae West!
Definitely worth a read: Guido Deiro: Accordionist, Composer, Arranger, Educator'
Without Guido, perhaps there would have been no need for a finto-PA.

 

[debra]

JIM / PAUL/DINGO/ KNOBBY:
Wow, what a "wealth" of information.
All you folks on the forum always impress me with your knowledge, and depth of experience with accordions, and music.
Seriously, I feel quite fortunate to be on this forum, and to have the opportunity to be educated on accordions, and music.
I guess luck was with me when I kind of "stumbled" upon the forum while surfing the internet.
I strongly feel anyone thinking about taking up the accordion should subscribe to this forum right from the get go.
I feel information available, and the experiences shared by so many, can help make many of the accordion learning,
and buying processes go so much more smoothly----and money saving by avoiding some poor decisions based on many
mis-understandings, and bogus information out there. I know this from my own personal experience. I have made some of those
poor buying decisions.
Thanks loads for all your contributions, and for your willingness to share the knowledge.
Take care, and I wish you all a Happy and Better New Year. I'm looking forward to 2021.
CHICKERS
SEVEN HILLS, OHIO U.S.A

Oh boy, if we are all considered experts now that doesn't bode well for the world of accordion experts... Jim of course is a true expert, having been involved with accordion sales and repair for many decades. I on the other hand am pretty much a newbie. I've been playing for many decades but only got to really know the ins and outs of the instrument in the past 10 years or so, and only am "qualified" in some sense for a few years... But... I search and read a lot and am always willing to share the little knowledge and experience I have, and that may give the wrong impression about what I know. (There is at least 100 times more stuff I do not yet know about accordions...)

 

[Ventura]

i have Columbia green label 78 RPM records of Guido Diero around here somewhere

 

[Zevy]

My teacher, Charles Nunzio, told me that Frosini (his teacher) couldn't get work unless he had that dummy keyboard plastered on his accordion! People listen with their eyes!

 

[debra]

My teacher, Charles Nunzio, told me that Frosini (his teacher) couldn't get work unless he had that dummy keyboard plastered on his accordion! People listen with their eyes!

There were also versions that had not just black keys for the fake piano keyboard but white keys in between E-F and B-C, white so you could not easily see them. This resulted in a fully functional 5 row CBA (whereas the ones that had only "real" black keys did not have a functional 5th row.