Chapter 9.  England

The poverty which was to be found in nearly all rural areas in the late nineteenth century seemed to favor the German-made concertina, much to the dismay of those in more proper society.  The author of this 1885 article bemoaned the state of music in rural England:

A show of hands as to the most satisfactory instrument would probably result in favour of the German concertina.  This foreigner, with its "fatal facility", has helped drive out the fiddle and to spoil the ears of a rustic people.  It is now the concertina that is the rule at rural merrymakings, and the fiddle that is the exception.2

As the concertina grew in popularity in the mid-nineteenth century, it brought its repertoire as well.  The 'merrie dances' of old were being replaced by ballroom dancing, both of quadrilles and round dances, especially schottisches, polkas, and waltzes.  In country areas, these newer dances coexisted with older English country dances and step dances (reels, hornpipes and jigs), but the round and square dances were slowly edging out the older ones.  A Cambridgeshire account of a platform dance in the late nineteenth century festival gives an idea of the changing mix:

Harry Huntley ... was the last harp player known to have played for dancing.  He and his father, Jack, who was a fiddler, used to play together at Comberton and other feasts and at the fairs.  They took round with them a dancing booth with a sectional floor and a box for the musicians: the two Huntleys, and a concertina player and a drummer.  A box was placed in front of the booth for the collection of money.  When long-wise country dances were in vogue it was easy for each dancer, as he reached the box, to place in it his fee for the players, but musicians found it more difficult to get their money when round dances, waltzes, etc., became more popular.  To ensure that every dancer paid, someone had to be stationed at the door of the booth or other dancing place to collect the money as the dancers arrived.3

[Musical] groups of four or five would come around - we played mainly to the higher class folk, and to the farmers, when we would get a glass of cider and a piece of Christmas cake, but the working class, who were mainly players, would join in with us with their concertinas, and we found many good players.  Sometimes they gave us a step dance in the kitchen, with a glass of wine.  The 'tina was a lovely instrument for quick music.  Then at Christmas time we'd have dance parties in the kitchen.  We used to have one dance, we would do, "The Polka", and at intervals all dance and meet at the centre.  Then we had another dance called "The Heel and Toe", and we finished with a jig.  Then of a Saturday night or at Christmas time, many would take their 'tinas to the pubs and after closing time they would do step dancing on a farm wagon with the 'tina, and dance for prizes.4

Band with two German concertinas, Saint Blazey, Cornwall, ca.1890.  With thanks to Stephen Chambers.

Perhaps the largest impediment to the recording of concertina players in the early to middle twentieth century Britain was the attitude of those whose hands held the purse strings in the music world, such as this correspondent for The Musical Herald in 1890 Norfolk:

The merriest time for the labourer is after harvest, when he draws 5 or 6, the amount of his contract for getting in the harvest.  His highest flight of merriment at that time is to do a shuffle on the floor to the accompaniment of a concertina.  It cannot be called dancing; it is vigorous and rough.  The songs that the labourer knows are either negro minstrel songs or the popular ballad two or three years after its death and burial in towns.  To such a man, instrumental music is a luxury outside his range.  If then, the instrument that a labourer sometimes chooses is cheap and vulgar, we must be content.  Better to have a tune on a concertina than a songless people …

Concertina aside, another impediment to collecting recordings was the prevalent attitude to the collection of the material itself, especially the round dance tunes that were the bread and butter of concertina players in England, Ireland, Australia and South Africa.  Reg Hall, in his research into the life and music of Sussex musician Scan Tester, had this to say about the attitude in Britain during the English folk revival of the late nineteenth century toward these dances:

The sources of this material [Scan Tester's round dance tunes] have never, to my knowledge, been discussed in print.  In fact, within the folk dance communities in England, Scotland and Ireland, with the notable exception of Peter Kennedy's field collecting in the 1950s, the material has been ignored and largely despised.6

A British duet, one with German concertina, late nineteenth century.
With thanks to Neil Wayne.

With this situation as a backdrop, it is a source of wonder and joy that out of the scarce handful of concertina players of the instrument's heyday, two who did manage to be recorded were among the most extensively recorded 'traditional' concertinists of that era, anywhere: William Kimber (1872-1961) and Scan Tester (1887-1972).  Kimber was recognized and valued mainly for his morris dances, which by the early twentieth century had gained a measure of widespread respectability, due largely to the efforts of Cecil Sharp.  Fortunately, Peter Kennedy also sought out examples of both country dance and round dance tunes from Kimber, who was an avid player of such dance music at local social gatherings in rural Oxfordshire, and who was knowledgeable about the dances that each tune accompanied.  It is equally fortunate that Scan Tester lived long enough to catch the interest of Reg Hall in the 1950s and 1960s.  Hall was then a young accordion player who was interested in rural dance music and song.  In the music of Scan Tester he found a rich mixture of step dance, country dance and ballroom dance tunes.

Of the four others in the English section of the archive, only two played extensively for dancing - either social or morris.  Ellis Marshall (1906-1993) played in the Northwest morris dance tradition, and like Scan Tester and many others in this archive, he utilized a straightforward octave style.  Fred Kilroy (ca.  1910-ca.1976) was born slightly later, but to a changed world in which modern chromatic popular music had taken root in England.  In his early years he played for social dances, minstrels, and for the morris, and as a result his music shows stylistic elements (not least of which is octave playing) of earlier times.  However, his recordings also show a strong influence of the brass bands and concertina bands that were so prevalent in northern England.

The last two musicians in this chapter, Bill Link (d.1979) and Eric Holland (ca.1905-1977), might arguably have been left out of this archive, because they played mostly for listeners rather than dancers, with music styles shaped largely by the twentieth century.  Nonetheless, they are included here - not only because recorded examples of Anglo players are so rare in England, but because they demonstrate the large changes in playing styles that occurred not only in England but, in different ways, in Ireland and South Africa, as playing for dancing receded and playing for listening, as paid entertainers in pubs and the like, advanced.  Both men seem to have largely played in pubs and as musical hires for urban holidaymakers on coach trips, with repertoires primarily consisting of current popular songs.  Their playing exhibits a general lack of a strong, danceable beat, which is understandable given the change in fundamental purpose of their music.  They played extended range Anglos of 39 and 40 buttons (three and one half rows) partly in order to smooth out the jerkiness of the Anglo for their listeners.  Although they were among the last to play the Anglo in England before the folk revival of the late twentieth century, their use of the Anglo concertina in this newer musical purpose was largely supplanted in urban pubs and cafes during their lifetime by piano accordionists playing even smoother "lounge music."  Holland and Link are closely similar in their relatively smooth legato phrasing and modern tune repertoire to many middle to late twentieth century concertina players in South Africa, who also played 39 to 40 key extended keyboard Anglos.7

William Kimber

Moreover, he was an active musician for social dancing.  He recorded many English social dance tunes, most of them as field recordings made when he was well into his eighties.  Of most interest to the follower of social dance music are the field recordings made in 1951 and 1956 by Peter Kennedy at Kimber's home (Maud Karpeles also helped with the 1951 recordings).  These recordings have not been widely distributed, and will form the focus of this discussion.  Here we see another side of Kimber, who recorded schottisches, polkas, jigs, a waltz, a highland fling, a galup, and a barn dance, as well as three and four hand reels.  In some of these recordings, Kimber speaks enthusiastically about his experiences with country social dances, and describes some of the dance steps in detail.  Clearly, he played for many social dances, and the list of dance styles reflects the ballroom dances popular during his lifetime.  Like Scan Tester, he apparently did not play for many quadrilles, which seem to have gone out of fashion in the English countryside by the end of the nineteenth century. 

William Kimber in morris regalia, 1906, standing next to his two row Anglo concertina.
From Cecil Sharp's 'The Morris Book', 1923.

William Kimber's playing has been transcribed and analyzed in some detail elsewhere,10 from which a general picture emerges of his personal style.  His playing fits nearly completely within the C and G rows of the instrument, eschewing the top row of accidentals; he learned on a two row instrument and never shifted his style when, in middle age, he was presented with a three row Jeffries Anglo.  At core an octave player, Kimber moved his two hands in unison as they followed the melody line, with the right hand playing notes an octave higher than the left.  He utilized both rows when playing in C, with lower melodic passages played on the C row (e.g., do-re-mi-fa), and higher passages on the G row (so-la-ti-do).  He typically droped out the lower octave notes on the second and fourth beats of each measure in common time in order to emphasize the first and third beats.  This gave a driving beat that is easily heard by dancers.  He also tended to add a third interval partial chord to the left hand lower octave note, making a characteristic harmony that closely follows the melody line.  This left hand accompaniment is staccato, minimizing the harsh sound of close chord intervals.  Finally, Kimber tends to add a full chord at the beginning and end of important phrases, again for emphasis and to be heard by the dancers.  The use of partial chords within octave playing was not unique among early players; George Bennett in Australia and Faan Harris in South Africa are just two of several others who played in that manner.

Bacca Pipes is a morris jig that illustrates these basic points of his playing style, including his use of both octaves and partial chords, with both dropped out on the off-beat for rhythmic emphasis.  The tune is played on a C/G Jeffries Anglo concertina.  The melody line (and octave/partial chord accompaniment) weaves back and forth from the C to the G rows of the instrument.  Kimber played this tune for a jig danced over a set of crossed churchwarden-style tobacco pipes that were placed on the floor.  The recording was made in 1946 and is included here courtesy the English Folk Dance and Song Society. 

Getting Upstairs is an American minstrel tune written by Joe Blackburn in the 1830s, and used by Kimber for a morris dance.  It was likely also used elsewhere at that time as a single reel or quadrille tune.  Kimber plays this tune in the key of G, almost all on the G row, again using intermittent octave notes with partial chords on the left hand.  The recording was made in 1946 and is included here courtesy the English Folk Dance and Song Society.

Over the Hills to Glory is a schottische that Kimber recorded in 1946, and is closely related to both the schottische The Lass o' Gowrie and the Irish polka The Lakes of Sligo.  It and the following schottische, Moonlight, both share the rhythmic bounce that Kimber produced by dropping out every other left hand octave note.  This technique was very suitable to the needs of noisy dances in houses and public halls.  He plays the tune in the key of G on his C/G concertina, frequently crossing rows from C to G to C again.  The recording is included here courtesy the English Folk Dance and Song Society.

The Moonlight Schottische is a tune of unknown origin, although there were several schottisches with this same name published between 1880 and 1910.  Of it, Kimber said, "This is a good dance, a good tune...  [a] plain schottische, four left, four right, eight round."  It was recorded in 1951, and it is included courtesy of Topic Records.  He plays it in the key of C, in a cross row manner using both C and G rows.

The following three dance tunes were recorded in 1951 and are included courtesy of Topic Records.  The Mayblossom Waltz is an unusual tune with an oom-pah feel to it; perhaps it was learned from the playing of a fair or carousel organ.  It is played in the key of C, and has another unusual feature.  Kimber plays two accidentals, F# and Bb, at several times during the piece, the only time he does so in his known recordings.  It is the only waltz that he recorded.

Kimber played the Little Polly polka at a smart tempo in the key of C, as always with an intermittent left hand accompaniment of octaves and partial chords, in a cross-row fashion.

Kitty Come is a barndance (a variant of the schottische) of unknown origin.  Kimber plays it in the key of C, in a style similar to the above examples.

William Kimber's headstone, at the Parish cemetery in Headington Quarry, Oxfordshire.
Photo by Gary Coover, 1979.

Lewis 'Scan' Tester

Scan Tester with one of his Jeffries concertinas, c.1965.
Photo by Brian Shuel, with thanks to Reg Hall.

Step dances are relatively uncommon in much of England today, although they are still prevalent among travelling people as well as in Suffolk sessions.  They were still common in Tester's youth in Sussex, where they were typically danced in country pubs.  Much of his early playing was in the all-male preserve of the taprooms of these country pubs.  He described these occasions as follows:

Course, they used to come in the pubs, you know, with their heavy boots on - the old pelted boots and all - and yorks and all on, and you see 'em out in the room that time of day doing the old stepdances, and they used to, if there was enough of 'em, they'd form a figure eight or form a four angles, you know, cross angles, and, you know, there was a lot of different ways they used to dance.

There used to be what we called a reel.  It was ordinary four corners, four of them, and they used to step, and then the second part they change over and go in and form the figure-eight.  And really, it was old people that done it, mind you.  The young ones, they used to join in.  Get two in a set, see, and learn 'em.12

...  where the lasses wore their best summer clothes and rather heavy shoes.  There was no smart band in those days, but I remember being lulled to sleep by the wheezy tones of the concertina.  I remember the smell of the oil lamps and the sound of happy laughter from the dancers.  The dances were really happy and joyful, and one wonders, by the doleful looks on the dance floor of today if the young folks are as happy at the dance as we used to be.13

After the band stopped performing in 1931, Scan and Will Tester continued playing in pubs of the surrounding region, albeit sporadically.  By the 1950s, Scan was 'discovered' by musicians Mervyn Plunkett and Reg Hall, who increasingly drew Scan into a series of activities surrounding a revived interest in country pub music.  At this time, few in the London folk revival scene had heard the old waltzes, polkas, and schottisches of country pub music, and Scan and his repertoire of old tunes attracted interest from a number of enthusiasts.

Sussex Anglo concertina player Scan Tester (1887-1972),
with Daisy Sherlock (piano) and Reg Hall (accordion),
playing at a house party in West Hoathly, Sussex, 1957.
With thanks to Reg Hall and Roger Digby.

An adjacent chart shows the rich mixture of tunes in Scan Tester's recorded repertoire, by percentage; it was compiled from a listing of publically available tunes from Tester's repertoire by Reg Hall.15  Besides song tunes, the dominant dances are step dances (jigs, hornpipes, and reels) and ballroom dances: waltzes, marches, schottisches, and especially polkas.  There are a large number of popular songs of his day, in various rhythms including waltzes and one-steps.  The large number of step dances reflects the occurrence of step dancing in country pubs during Tester's youth.  The overall mix of dance tune types in Tester's repertoire does not greatly differ from that of the three house dance era musicians in Ireland (Carolan, O'Dwyer and Hourican; see bar chart in Chapter 8), except that Tester's reels are primarily single reels, and the Irish reels recorded by those three Irish women are mostly double reels. 

Sussex Anglo concertina player Scan Tester's recorded repertoire,
displayed as numbers of recorded tunes for each dance type.
Compiled from the discography in Reg Hall's 'I Never Played to Many Posh Dances', 1990.

Like most other players in this archive, Scan Tester played predominantly in an octave style; this he seems to have learned from his older brother Trayton, although Scan heard other (apparently much less accomplished) Sussex players in his early days.  As Reg Hall wrote:

Trayton was in the right position to have been the one who adapted the Fairwarp fiddle stepdance tunes for the concertina.  The articulated melody line, dressed by triplets and fill-ins between phrases and underlined by parallel octaves (the two notes of each octave played on different sides of the concertina), and harmony represented by the odd, almost accidental use of thirds in place of octaves, characterize the Tester style.  These techniques, together with the lift generated by the attack, staccato notes, the sharp intake of air in the bellows, and the heavy punctuation at the end of an eight bar phrase, were, in all probability, Trayton's gift to his younger brothers.16

The first track is a medley of three tunes, including a step dance tune and two music hall song tunes.  The step dance tune is in common time and played all on the C row of a C/G Anglo concertina, and nearly all in octaves.  The two songs are Roamin' in the Gloamin' and I Love a Lassie, written by Harry Lauder in 1911 and 1905, respectively.  Both song tunes are played using octaves throughout.

Roamin' in the Gloamin' (see the following transcription) is a good example of the type of music that arrived in the early twentieth century music halls.  It has a brief chromatic run in the tenth measure; such phrases were often the "hooks" in these early twentieth-century pieces.  Tester plays the tune all on the C row, with the exception of the F#'s needed for the chromatic runs.  He adds a considerable number of partial and full chords to this piece, not as separate oom-pahs, as is the fashion with many English Anglo concertina players these days, but as simple added thirds and fifths to the lower octave, in a style not unlike Kimber's.  The recording shows that with this simple playing of the piece he nonetheless held his audience in rapt attention as they sang along.  There is no elaborate arrangement of complex left hand chords, and neither is there a piano or a guitar 'interpreting' the background chords for him.  Our modern ears have come to expect music with elaborate and sometimes smothering chord arrangements, but Victorian and, apparently, Edwardian ears could do without.

Scan Tester's Schottische is played entirely on the C row, and in octaves; a transcription is attached.  In measure seven he runs into difficulty when the tune climbs high in its compass of notes: the upper octave climbs too high for the C row.  In situations like this the player has two choices.  Tester's choice was to drop an octave down for the remainder of the climb in that measure, thereby remaining on the C row.  The other choice, which a player like William Kimber or Dooley Chapman would take, would be to move the higher phrase to the G row.

St Patrick's Day (also known as the 17th March Jig) is a globally common tune; see Chapter 7 for a version played by Australian Charlie Ordish).  Tester plays it in the key of C, all on the C row, in octaves.  His B part is different from that of the standard setting.  As the B part of the standard setting rises significantly in pitch, and hence would be played partly on the G row, it may be that Scan altered the tune rather than be forced to change rows when playing in octaves.

Step Dance Tune is played in C, all on the C row, and in octaves.  It is in common time, in hornpipe rhythm.

The following three tune selections, also from the archive of Vic Smith, were recorded in the late 1950s or early 1960s in the Stone Quarry Pub at Chelwood Gate, Sussex, where Tester played nearly every weekend for over forty years.  The recording was made by Ken Stubbs.

The first track contains two popular Harry Lauder song tunes, and the singing of pub-goers is evident in the background.  Stop Your Tickling, Jock was written in 1906.  Keep Right On To The End of the Road was written after the death of Lauder's son in France during World War I.  Both are played in the key of Bb on Tester's Bb/F Anglo concertina.  Like the above three tunes, Tester plays these on the middle row (here, Bb), and in octaves wherever the melody allows.

An Untitled Waltz is played during the same session, also in Bb on a Bf/F concertina, mostly in octaves.  It is played all on the Bb row, except for one chromatic note, B, for which he reaches to the upper row.

The Man in the Moon is a signature waltz tune of Tester's that has become popular in English sessions in the past few decades.  He plays it in Bb on a Bf/F concertina, mostly in octaves, and all on the Bb row.  The percussion accompaniment was very probably provided by his longtime friend Ernest 'Rabbity' Baxter, who had a very large tambourine, about the size of an Irish bodhran but with jingles. 

From the above seven tracks of Tester's playing, one might get the impression that he only played along the middle row of his concertina, but such was not the case as the next two tracks show.  They were recorded by Bob Davenport and come courtesy of the archive of Reg Hall.

Tester plays See Me Dance the Polka in the key of G on a G/D concertina, mostly in octaves.  In both the A and B parts of this polka, he begins on the middle (G) row, but crosses to the bottom (D) row as the melody rises in pitch.  From this one can only assume that Tester was a skilled cross-row player, but preferred to stick to the middle row wherever possible.  This tune requires both rows because of its range.

Alexander's Ragtime Band was written in 1911 by American songwriter Irving Berlin and became a global hit, mainly for its melody.  Tester probably played it with his Tester's Imperial Jazz Band during the 1920s.  One of the new chromatic tunes that were coming from Tin Pan Alley, it had a catchy chromatic lead-in on the beginning of the chorus.  In this recording, Tester played the tune in the key of C on a CG concertina, mostly in octaves, using both the C and G rows.  Where the chromatic lead-in would normally be played Eb-E-Eb-E in this key, Tester eschews the accidental, playing D-E-D-E instead; he must have found the Eb awkward, or perhaps just didn't hear that note in the tune as played by others.  Such chromatic parts ultimately doomed the concertina, especially for those whose instruments only had two rows.  Tester's instruments had extended ranges including the accidentals, but Tester did not always make use of them.

Finally, here is Scan Tester's version of an Untitled polka that was compared in Chapter 4 with a similar tune played by Australian Dooley Chapman.  The recording was made by Reg Hall and is courtesy of Topic Records.

Ellis Marshall

There was ten of us at the time.  We had a concertina apiece.  [Kershaw] charged a shilling a lesson.  We used to go to his house every night...

I came to Royton when I were seven, and the Royton Morris dancing was going on then.  'Cos they used to go out every Saturday afternoon all round Oldham and Royton - used to make a living out of it practically.  They went as far as Blackpool when they were dancing, from here.  [They went out] for the day from twelve o'clock till about half past four or five o'clock.  [They used to stop at]different pubs - where the money were.  They danced all the way.17

The revived Royton morris team on a visit to Albert Hall, 1936.
The concertina players are Peter McDermot (left) and Ellis Marshall (right).
With thanks to Tony Marshall.

Ellis Marshall in full morris regalia, 1980.
Photo courtesy of Tony Marshall, John Cunniffe and Frances Stott.

A recording of Ellis Marshall's playing, from a recording made at Marshall's home in 1978, he plays through much the same medley, but solo.

Marshall and Coleman, like Scan Tester, played nearly entirely in octaves in those performances.  A transcription of the last tune from those tapes, Cross Morris, is attached below.  Beyond the ubiquitous octave notes, the tune is adorned with a few very simple along-the-row third-interval partial chords - somewhat like Kimber, but with much more sparse chording.  There is a complete dearth of the oom-pah-like chording favored by revival morris players.  Cross Morris is played in a cross-row manner.  Starting on the C row, it migrates to the G row for higher passages, such as the last half of measures 2, 4, 5, and 6, as well as measures 7-10.

The use of a simple octave style in playing for morris dancing was not restricted to the Royton morris side.  Caleb Walker (b.1907) played for the Manley morris dancers, and played with Fred Kilroy on that side (Kilroy earlier played for Royton).  Current day Anglo player Mark Davies learned to play from Caleb Walker, and describes both Walker's playing and the Manley morris in a way that evokes the above recording of Marshall and the Royton side:

Caleb Walker only played in the key of C, playing the tune along the right hand side C row and dropping down to the right hand side G row for the higher notes.  He played the roughly corresponding buttons on the left hand side and would often play chords on the left hand side.  So basically he was playing in octaves.

The Manley concertina players had a unique manner of playing.  There could be up to seven concertina players, a bass drum and a side drum in the band.  In a carnival procession the dancers and musicians could be marching for up to 2 hours without a break.  The concertina players thus held the concertina high almost in front of their faces with the weight of the concertina being taken by the elbows being tucked into the trunk.  This in itself was very tiring so at certain stages in various tunes all the concertina players would swing their concertinas in a circle above their heads, making sure they all did this in the same direction to avoid accidents!19

Fred Kilroy

Fred Kilroy in 1929, with some of the Westwood Morris Dancers.
With thanks to Alan Ward and 'Traditional Music' magazine.

Kilroy was recorded only on field tapes, and until recently his music has been not commercially available.  The Anglo International collection of 2005 included three tracks of his playing made by the late Paul Davies in 197621, and those plus a fourth track from Davies' field tape are included here.  Kilroy's playing style is dramatically different from that of either Kimber or Tester.  He admired the Maccann duet and purchased one early in his playing years, but in the press of money-making appearances with his Anglo he gave up on learning the duet.  Nonetheless his approach to the Anglo used decidedly less of the classic push-pull technique of Kimber and Tester (and most Anglo players), as Alan Ward was written:

Fred's style is very reminiscent of duet style - he avoids frequent changes of direction on the bellows by fingering the 'repeats' on the instrument - and it appears that this was nothing unusual at the time he learned to play.  Fred regarded 'melodeon style' (push-pull) players as under-developed.  22

This tune was played by Kilroy on a Bb/F instrument in old pitch, and the transcription included here is transposed for a C/G concertina.  On the C/G, it is keyed in the key of F, which tends to be a good choice for highly chromatic pieces like this.  Played mostly on the C row, the tune requires frequent cross-row ventures to the outer and inner rows.  Blaze Away is playable on a typical 30-button Anglo, but not with the fluidity of Kilroy.  The extra buttons of his 38-key Jeffries allow more options for playing nearly all notes in either a push or pull direction - especially important in playing chorded pieces with chromatic passages.  Not surprisingly, not only Fred Kilroy but most current South African players who play 'modern' chromatic music in a chorded style use expanded keyboard instruments, usually with thirty-eight or more buttons.

Fred Kilroy's Jeffries G/D Anglo concertina.  Photo courtesy of Roger Digby.

The arrival of this sort of highly chromatic music - the chromatic scales of which requires additional development of muscle memory to play - was one of the reasons the Anglo fell on hard times in the early decades of the twentieth century.  For the vast majority of players, pieces like this were too difficult to play, or required an upgrade from the usual 20-button instrument - and yet such music was extremely popular with audiences.  Only a few 'modernist' Anglo players in England persisted, Fred Kilroy chief among them.  In South Africa, Anglo players embraced this new music in much greater numbers, and a sizeable market for 40-button Wheatstone concertinas developed in the early decades of the century.

Kilroy was a break-out player relative to the others in this group of English players, and his playing shows a strong influence of the brass bands (and concertina bands) in the Lancashire area.  The Old Comrades March is a German military march (Alte Kameraden) that was composed by Carl Teike in 1889.  It was globally popular, even after World War II.  Kilroy plays it in the key of Bb on his Bb/F concertina.  It was played mostly in octaves, with added chords.  Kilroy's frequent use of third row notes reduced the number of bellows changes in fast passages.  This full use of three rows is starkly different than the mostly two-row style of the older players Kimber and Tester, and is generally unlike the styles of nearly everyone else in this archive except for Eric Holland (below) as well as Faan Harris and others of the Boer players.

During the 1920s, Fred Kilroy played for a blackface minstrel show band, The Kentucky Minstrels.  The following medley, the Minstrel Selection, contains tunes from the standard minstrel repertoire.  It begins with a snippet from The Star Spangled Banner and is followed by Yankee Doodle before delving into more typical minstrel fare: Dixie, three Stephen Foster tunes (Camptown Races, Old Black Joe, and Old Folks at Home), Old Zip Coon (a.k.a.  Turkey in the Straw), and Marching Through Georgia.  He plays these in a mixture of keys, including both Bb and F (the home keys of his instrument) as well as Eb.  He uses a generous amount of octaves as well as chords, and uses cross-row fingering frequently on all three rows to reduce the frequency of bellows direction changes.

The Great Broughton Darkies Band, c.1912, Northamptonshire.  Fred Kilroy played in a similar minstrel band in the 1920s.
The combination of concertinas, banjos and drums were a common instrumentation for minstrel and other street bands.
With thanks to Sue Allan.

On the Quarterdeck is a British march composed in 1917 by Kenneth Alford (a.k.a Major Frederick Ricketts, bandmaster of the Royal Marines) in order to commemorate the naval Battle of Jutland the previous year.  Kilroy plays it from memory in the key of Bb, with all the stylistic flourish of a brass band.

Eric Holland

Eric Holland with 40 button Wheatstone Anglo.  Photograph courtesy of Mark Davies.

Little is known about Holland until he joined the International Concertina Association in 1968.  At that time, the ICA had a membership that was principally comprised of players of English and Duet concertinas.  The humble Anglo was considered by many ICA members in this pre-folk revival era as a step down, for the lower classes.  Holland, like Kilroy, used his 40 key, three and one half row Wheatstone Anglo to good advantage for more legato playing, smoothing out bellows direction changes by finding alternate fingerings of notes that kept the playing of the melody all in the same direction for long parts of phrases.  This made his playing more acceptable to ICA members, who played concertinas that, being double action, could easily and typically play in such a legato style.  From the minutes of the ICA:

November 1966: Tommy Williams tells us that he has a recording of Mr Holland, of Crows Nest, Dorset, and has never in his life time of experience heard such excellent Anglo playing.  Hr Holland is reported to have a perfect legato phrasing, quite devoid of the jerky accents which are a characteristic of Anglos.  Tommy says the sound is indistinguishable from that of a good 'English' player.  Mr Holland plays a 40 key Anglo and does not read music.

May 1968: Yet another Sound of Music came from Eric Holland, who proved to be an Anglo-player extraordinary.  His playing is characterised by a strong melody line, with a true legato rarely heard on an Anglo, and a background of delicate accompanying figures.  While we had some reservations in respect of his almost continuous forte in the selection and a waltz encore, his subsequent folk dances had excellent piano effects.  As a concertina player we rate him high; as an Anglo player very high indeed.

Sept 1977: Mr Holland, of Swanage, Dorset, died on July 15th of a heart attack.  Jim Harvey writes: He joined the I.C.A. in January of 1964, but I knew him long before.  He was a great friend, and won the 'Ear' Players class at the 1975 Festival.  He played the Anglo in his own style and produced music more like a Duet Concertina.  We mourn the loss of a great player and friend.24

Eric Holland was recorded in 1968.  Here he speaks of his years of Anglo playing, as an introduction to his recording:

He played in a purely octave style, and is said to have learned to play from his father, who very likely played in that manner as well.  The following two waltzes Untitled Waltz 2, illustrate his general playing style.  He plays them in the key of C on the C row, nearly entirely in octaves, with occasional chords added for accent and as phrase endings. 

The march Scotland the Brave is likewise played in the key of C and fully in octaves, with a very few rhythmic chords added.  He plays the A part on the C row, and the higher-pitched B part mostly on the G row.

The Australian tune Waltzing Matilda is played in the same fashion.  It is played in a stately, deliberate way that would please listeners but probably not dancers.  The bulk of Holland's playing seems to have been done for such listeners.  The old days of playing for ballroom dances had long gone, and Anglos were generally not the thing for the groups that played such genres as Henry Mancini tunes or rock 'n roll.

Holland played a variety of light classics and operatic hymns, such as Shubert's version of the Marian hymn Ave Maria.  Like his other recorded pieces, it is in the key of C, played in octaves with a few added chords for accent.

Bill Link

Here Bill Link speaks about his 52 years of playing his Anglo, which was a Jeffries Bb/F concertina tuned in old pitch.

A holiday party poses in front of an old horse-drawn coach, late nineteenth or early twentieth century.
Note the concertina player, near the middle of the front row.  Bill Link played for similar festive occasions.
From the collection of Stephen Chambers.

Assuming a recording date of about 1975, he learned to play in the early 1920s - a bit later than most in this archive.  His recorded repertoire is predominantly a mixture of popular and music hall songs from the 1920s and later, which would be tailor-made for holidaymakers on the coast.  One of these tunes is My Wild Irish Rose, written by the American singer and songwriter Chauncey Olcott in 1899.  Link plays it in the key of F on his Bf/F concertina.  This is the typical key of Link's playing, whereas Eric Holland would usually stick to playing on the middle row in Bb (more properly, in the key of C on Holland's C/G instrument).  Link plays in octaves, but adds significantly more chords than Holland.  Those chords were a good choice for the casual listener on a beach resort.

That Naughty Waltz is another American popular tune that achieved widespread popularity.  It was composed in 1919 by Sol Levy and Edwin Stanley.  Link plays it in the key of F and fully in octaves, weaving the melody back and forth from the F to Bb rows.

Putting on the Style is another jazz-era hit, a polka song written by George Wright and Norman Cazden in about 1926.  It was resurrected in the 1950s and 1960s by skiffle and folk bands, as well as (even) the early Beatles.  Link plays it in F.

Notes:

1. By 'Our Special Commissioner,' 'Musical Life in Norfolk' the Musical Herald (London), October 1890, p.508-510.

2.  'The Music of a Village,' in The Musical World, (London), April 4, 1885, pp.221-222.

3.  Dr R Wortley, 1966, as quoted in Enid Porter, Cambridgeshire Customs and Folklore (1969), p.145.

4.  F J Collins, 'The Concertina in Cornwall, Around 1890' in The Concertina Newsletter 7 (August 1972): pp.9-10.  This reference was found in Stuart Eydmann, Life and Times of the Concertina, (1995).

5.  T L Southgate, English Music 1604-1904, (London, 1906), p.339, as quoted by Stuart Eydmann, Life and Times of the Concertina (1995).

6.  Reg Hall, 1990, I Never Played to Many Posh Dances: Scan Tester, Sussex Musician: Musical Traditions supplement No.2, p.83.

7.  Such modernist Boer players include, for example, Nico van Rensburg and Neels Mattheus, who play with a complexity and smooth phrasing that approached that of a piano accordion.

8.  For example, see Derek Schofield's extensive biography in the liner notes of the CD Absolutely Classic: The Music of William Kimber (London: English Folk Dance and Song Society, 1999), and T W Chaundy, 'William Kimber, A Portrait,' Journal of the EFDSS, vol.  8 (1959), p.209.

9.  Keith Chandler, 1993, Ribbons, Bells and Squeaking Fiddles: The Social History of Morris Dancing in the English South Midlands,1660–1900 (Enfield Lock: Hisarlik Press, Publications of the Folklore Society, Tradition 1), p.17, and Musical Traditions Records CD-ROM MTCD250.

10.  Dan Worrall, 2005, The Anglo Concertina Music of William Kimber: London, English Folk Dance and Song Society, 86pp.

11.  Reg Hall, 1990, I Never Played to Many Posh Dances: Rochford, Essex, Musical Traditions, Supplement No.2, and online as a PDF facsimile edition in Musical Traditions (MT Article 215).

12.  Scan Tester, as quoted in Reg Hall, Posh Dances, 1990, p.77.

13.  William J. Bird, 1986, Danehill and Chelwood Gate in 1919: in Danehill Parish Historical Society Magazine, vol. III, no. 2, pp.20-21.  As quoted by Reg Hall, 1990, p.46.

14.  Reg Hall, Posh Dances (1990), Appendix A.

15.  Reg Hall, Posh Dances, (1990), p.49.

16.  Reg Hall, Posh Dances (1990), p.96.

17.  Ellis Marshall, as quoted by Alan Ward in 'Fred Kilroy, Lancashire Concertina Maker': Traditional Music, nos.1 and 3, 1975 and 1976.

18.  Tony Marshall, Ellis Marshall's grandson, kindly provided details of his grandfather's life, as well as tape recordings and a photograph.

19.  Mark Davies, 2009, personal communication.

20.  Fred Kilroy's biography is paraphrased from Alan Ward, ed., 'Fred Kilroy, Lancashire concertina player,' in Traditional Music, nos. 1 and 3 (1975 and 1976). Fred Kilroy's rich playing may be heard on the recently issued CD, Anglo International (Folksound Records, Coventry UK).

21.  Anglo International (Folksound Records, Coventry UK, 2005).

22.  Alan Ward, 'Fred Kilroy,' (1975), p.15.

23.  This newsreel can be viewed at www.britishpathe.com. Search for the words 'miners' sword dance.'

24.  I am indebted to Wes Williams for providing these minutes from the International Concertina Association.