Why does 5 rows button accordions exists?

[Jaime_Dergut]

Hello everybody,

Some days ago, when I was trying to play a harmonized march on my bayan, I realized that reaching some buttons while playing a tetra/penta chord is somehow uncomfortable.

So, that made me wonder, will this be easier if I have another 2 rows at the top?




What's really the purpose of having 5 rows of buttons instead of 3?

I am curious. In some russians videos I have seen about this, they say is more convenient in order for your fingers to reach out some of the buttons at the top (depending on the melody) but they don't explain much beyond that.

That will be everything.

Thanks for your time and attention.

 

[Pipemajor]

I'm sure Mr De Bra will be along to give a detailed reasoning, but, it the meantime, the purpose of the extra 2 rows makes it easier, especially with chords, to have more convenient/comfortable finger shapes. The extra 2 rows are a copy of the first 2 rows, meaning it is sometimes easier to carry on a passage using the 4th and 5th row, rather than going back down to the 1st and 2nd.
Also the scale finger pattern of the 1st row can be repeated on the 2nd and 3rd row, meaning you can play in all keys using only one finger pattern.
Hope that makes sense

 

[Ffingers]

As a raw (if over matured) beginner I can attest to the extra 2 rows creating alternative fingerings which can simplify the hand and finger movements considerably.
I started on a 3 row but soon got a 6(yes six) row instrument which came my way by serendipity.
Now I mainly use a lighter 5 row one which does not sound quite as delightful as the 13+Kg /29 pounder, it is a nicely tuned and well maintained box.
Both have 'flat' treble keyboards which I find more comfortable than the stepped keyboard on the other one.

 

[Vladimir M.]

So, that made me wonder, will this be easier if I have another 2 rows at the top?

As a raw (if over matured) beginner I can attest to the extra 2 rows creating alternative fingerings which can simplify the hand and finger movements considerably.

Better to see once than to hear/read a hundred times:

C-system example:
Basic layout:

C-major:

or

D-major:

E-major:

F-major:

G-major:

A-major:

or:

H-major:


This applies universally to all chord combinations, not just the few (major) examples...

2 rows

WARNING! You have the (click: B-system,) there will be different fingerings... So, try playing with fingering:

 

[debra]

I'm sure Mr De Bra will be along to give a detailed reasoning, but, it the meantime, the purpose of the extra 2 rows makes it easier, especially with chords, to have more convenient/comfortable finger shapes. The extra 2 rows are a copy of the first 2 rows, meaning it is sometimes easier to carry on a passage using the 4th and 5th row, rather than going back down to the 1st and 2nd.
Also the scale finger pattern of the 1st row can be repeated on the 2nd and 3rd row, meaning you can play in all keys using only one finger pattern.
Hope that makes sense

I do often use the 4rd row and sometimes (but not often) the 5th row. They exist for convenience.
But, are they necessary? When Alexander Skliarov won the "Coupe Mondiale" for accordion playing a 3 row bayan (many years ago) that was a clear indication that you can really play everything with just 3 rows...

 

[Siegmund]

Yes, for convenience, and especially for convenience in connecting chords or in fluidly playing a running melody in thirds or sixths. If I am just playing a single melody line I rarely use the 4th row and almost never the 5th.

But when I play in parallel thirds, my basic pattern (Osokin-inspired) is "2 and 3 in the back, 1 and 4 in the front", all the way up: C-E with 2-3 on the 2nd and 3rd rows, then D-F with 1-4 in the front, E-G on the 2nd, F-A with 1-4 on the first and 3rd rows, and now G-B on the back two rows with 2 and 3, so that no finger crossings are necessary. Then work my way forward again: AC 14 in the middle, BD 23 (4th row), CE 14 (2nd/3rd row), DF 23 (4th row), EG 14 (2nd), FA 23 (4th/3rd row), GB 14 (front rows), AC 23 (3rd row), BD 14 (front), back to CE 23 where I started. For some reason I tend to use 1-4 in front ascending but 1-5 in front descending; Osokin recommended 1-4 for the minor thirds and 1-5 for the major thirds.

The patterns for G and D major are similar but have the leap backward in a different place (from D-F# to E-G).

If I tried to play in parallel thirds with only 3 rows my fingers would get tangled up. It is doable -- CE 23, DF 14, EG 23, FA 14, GB 25, AC 34, BD 15, and repeat -- but it's a lot more memory work and the finger choices are forced. A great thing about learning a 4-finger pattern is the 5th finger is always there for when you have a turnaround or you have a leap of a third -- either 234 in the back and 15 in the front or 23 in the back and 145 in the front.

 

[dak]

Hello everybody,

Some days ago, when I was trying to play a harmonized march on my bayan, I realized that reaching some buttons while playing a tetra/penta chord is somehow uncomfortable.

So, that made me wonder, will this be easier if I have another 2 rows at the top?




What's really the purpose of having 5 rows of buttons instead of 3?

I am curious. In some russians videos I have seen about this, they say is more convenient in order for your fingers to reach out some of the buttons at the top (depending on the melody) but they don't explain much beyond that.

That will be everything.

Thanks for your time and attention.

You have to be aware that a fourth row is more important to C system players than B system players. Why? One of its most important use cases is defusing chord shapes. Chords are made from stacked major and minor thirds mainly, and a CBA has button diagonals arranged as minor thirds. That means that the typical chord patterns on C system follow hand curvature on two adjacent rows. Except that a third of the chords is against hand curvature and on the outer, non-adjacent rows. An additional fourth button row allows all of the chords to follow hand curvature on two advacent rows.

Now B system has its chord shapes at 2/3 of the time against hand curvature, but on adjacent rows. That's nicer. And in the third of the cases where you need to use non-adjacent outer rows, at least the shape then follows hand curvature. So it's not all bad like with C system.

A pretty obvious use case for a fourth row is stuff like from "Phantom of the Opera" theme, namely a chord pattern that is shifted up- and downwards in chromatic progressions. With a fourth row, you can just keep the same hand shape and do your progression by moving that shape over the button board. With just 3 rows, you have to use a completely different hand shape for every third step.

There are also other situations where more rows come in handily. For example, when you are having a trill in a higher voice while continuing to play in a lower voice. In that case you want the trill to occur on rows that facilitate a somewhat uncramped hand shape when playing the lower voice part.

There is the theoretical advantage that if you are a solid 3-row player, you can transpose all of your play to arbitrary pitches by just shifting everything on the button board while keeping the patterns. Personally, while I do find transposition on a CBA easier than on PA, shifting play two rows inward is just too weird to work out for me.

 

[nou]

As others wrote, there are three main reasons - alternative fingerings that can prevent finger crossing, isomorphism, and alternate chord shapes. On the handy diagram above there are only uniform repeats show, but when playing polyphonic music it is often easier to use „broken apart” shapes, e.g. for C maj in C-system root in the first row with 1, third and fifth in fifth row with 4 and 5, which leaves your 2 and 3 to play whatever else you need in a wide, easily reachable arc. This also comes handy for otherwise awkward pivots and generally greatly improves ergonomics when playing legato. If you have six rows like Ffingers, you can even use a single Osokin fingering for all keys instead of two. Isomorphism is really a powerfull tool.

 

[Pipemajor]

So, that made me wonder, will this be easier if I have another 2 rows at the top?

So, now you know!!

 

[OuijaBoard]

As a C system player I use the 4th and 5th rows almost exclusively for chords. For melody playing, especially for folk/roots genres, 3 rows is ample. My fluency and fluidity on CBA improved vastly when I made the outer 3 rows my default home base.

 

[Siegmund]

Now B system has its chord shapes at 2/3 of the time against hand curvature, but on adjacent rows. That's nicer. And in the third of the cases where you need to use non-adjacent outer rows, at least the shape then follows hand curvature. So it's not all bad like with C system.

I wonder if B system players use the fifth row more often than C players need to. (I have my suspicions that we do since 4-row instruments are found almost exclusively in the C-system-oriented countries like France and Portugal.)

On B-system we do like to keep our hands in the natural position, and will often play a root position chord 1-2-3-5 with 2 and 3 two rows behind 1 and 5. (The "unnatural" way works OK for a 3-note chord played 2-3-4 or 3-4-5 with the last two fingers in front, and works very well for inversions, where it's a middle note rather than the lowest note that is one row back.)

 

[losthobos]

Four legs good two legs bad as George Orwell would say.....
I love the possibilities of direction a five row offers ...it's not so much that there are more notes but often if you try out different optional fingers for runs chord or single note you'll soon notice that some 'phrase' better and more natural in certain shapes...

 

[Jaime_Dergut]

Thanks everyone.

For what I understand now, they are there just for convenience and comfort of the player.

For what I heard, some people have a rare dexterity on their fingers that allows them to play fluently with certain styles of fingerings, while others just don't have that, and is rather uncomfortable/painful.

It really varies among individuals and their physical limitations. Some virtuosos are as fast as lightning with a 3 row layout, but that doesn't apply to everybody.

 

[losthobos]

Not just convenience and comfort ....
The different fingerings SOUND different.....
We are all taught alphabet etc but I've yet to hear two children phrase 'the cat sat on the mat' the same....
The curvature of the phrase is what excites us not the notes...

 

[nou]

Not just convenience and comfort ....
The different fingerings SOUND different.....
We are all taught alphabet etc but I've yet to hear two children phrase 'the cat sat on the mat' the same....
The curvature of the phrase is what excites us not the notes...

Great point. I only recently started messing around with B-system, but I already prefer Osokin-like „spread” across 4-5 rows when playing legato phrases and 3 row fingerings for staccatto/clear beat phrases. That’s because the „big step” of Osokin makes it harder to keep uniform rhythm, but more ergonomic shape makes it easier to use all five fingers comfortably.

 

[Walker]

Though I'm a piano accordion player, I was able to borrow a button accordion last year and had several months to try it out. I found that the ergonomics of the treble keyboard accommodated a comfortable "closed" hand position most of the time. There was very rarely any stretching to reach far-apart notes. While this is a good thing, I found it was, nevertheless, important to select one's route. Having rows 4 and 5 so that I could travel smoothly, and have composed phrasing was important. I found Borut Zagoranski's scalebook to be useful in opening my mind to hand positions that were considered optimal (in scalic motions) which I applied in some musical situations.​

 

[Ffingers]

Though I'm a piano accordion player, I was able to borrow a button accordion last year and had several months to try it out. I found that the ergonomics of the treble keyboard accommodated a comfortable "closed" hand position most of the time. There was very rarely any stretching to reach far-apart notes. While this is a good thing, I found it was, nevertheless, important to select one's route. Having rows 4 and 5 so that I could travel smoothly, and have composed phrasing was important. I found Borut Zagoranski's scalebook to be useful in opening my mind to hand positions that were considered optimal (in scalic motions) which I applied in some musical situations.​

Being a very indisciplined kind of thinker/actioner I find that planning the finger movements on my B system box for each piece of (simple) music absolutlely essential in distinct contrast to learning patterns for practicing scales.

I am restricted in my hand movements by age and osteoarthritis but, by closely observing the actions of several top order performers have come to recognise that the very flexibility of the button 5 row keyboard allows for relatively easy accommodation of the requirements of the music, the musician, the individual performer's body movements and last, but not least, the variation in hand shapes, sizes and, apparantly, finger flexibility.

I do have the advantage of having the time to spend on such lengthy and detailed observations which many others will not have, but it has permitted me to adapt my instructed learning to the specific needs of my own restricted abilities.

Perhaps it is that the making of music is such a personal thing that the needs of the individual require more attention paid to them by their teachers in developing the students' skills.