As soon as I tried my first piano accordion, I realised why a lot of Irish players don’t use the bass buttons, or do so very sparingly – the chords on the common stradella system really aren’t suited to the music. There’s major, minor, dominant 7th, and diminished chords, and they’re all low, loud and thick sounding.
So, I've bought a 30 key, 72 bass accordion, and had some of the notes removed:
Major chord – removed the 3rd, to leave just 1st and 5th
Minor chord – removed the 5th, to leave just 1st and minor 3rd
Dominant 7th chord – removed the 5th to leave just 1st and major 3rd
Diminished chord – removed the 1st, to leave minor 3rd and 6th.
Its sort of in between the traditional "Stradella" system, and the "free bass" system. The buttons can be combined to create some really interesting and subtle harmonies, as well as the standard chords.
Hey Troy, How did you do the customization? did you remove reeds, doctor registers, or cut rods from the bass system?
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cut the rods i guess. I'm just working on this modification: I removed the cover and was impressed to see the mechanism: each chord-button will press down 3 rods connected to the flaps for the 3 tones, one of them to be deactivated somehow. removing them permanently was the only option i found (otherwise they will somehow be in the way because it's all so narrow). i did it for 1-2 rows and it plays/sounds fine, but with my recent method it takes quite a while of wiggling until they break. I'm looking for a more efficient way/tool to remove all of the 48 rods (a tool will have to be small enough)
DeleteBy the way i have been using this modified accordion a lot in the meantime, and I don't regret it.so many amazing possibilities to play chords!!! Thank you so much for this idea!
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