Box and Fiddle
Year 18 No 05
February 1995
(1st) Shand Morino Day
Windygates, Fife 15th January, 1995
by Ian Cruickshanks (Kirriemuir)
This event was the brainchild of Dave Black and Bruce Lindsay Snr. The afternoon started with all the Shand Morinos arrayed on and around the stage including the original 4 boxes. Bruce Lindsay then introduced local fiddler and long-term friend of Jimmy Shand, Bob Mackintosh who gave a short talk on the sequence of events leading to the production of the Shand Morino and the part Jimmy Shand had in not only the design of the instrument but also the promotion of it by his skill in playing it, thereby influencing many other musicians to acquire one of these wonderful instruments.
Another lifelong friend of Jimmy’s, Sandy Tulloch of Dundee, then took centre stage to deliver information to us about the technical side of the Shand Morino. I doubt if anyone knows more about all aspects of the instrument than Sandy, as not only is he a very skilled exponent himself, he is also a highly skilled engineer, woodworker etc., and I’m surprised he has never made a Shand Morino himself! He’s made just about everything else from fiddles to working steam engines!
This is what Sandy had to say :
“Readers of the Box and Fiddle will have noted the excellent articles by John Gurney of Edinburgh on the history of the accordion.
Bruce Lindsay had the idea of holding a ‘Morino’ get-together, and for anyone interested I have put a few notes together for reference.
Morino was Hohner’s designer who built the first Shand Special before the war. After the war, Jimmy once more contacted Hohner and gave Morino the specification for a new and larger model. Because of post-war restrictions, delivery of the first four accordions was delayed until 1951. These four were owned by Jimmy Shand, Andy Gray of Duntrune, Jimmy Edwards of Moffat and myself, at that time in Glasgow.
There were 46 treble buttons arranged in three rows of 15, 16 and 15, linked by a special Morino system of levers to 46 pallets in two rows of 23. Each pallet covers three apertures serving six reeds with leather or plastic valves. Three reeds sound on the ‘press’ and three on the ‘draw’ of the bellows. This special system of levers allows equal travel and spring resistance for all buttons and equal lift for all pallets. A feature not found on other three row accordions at that time, but a most important one according to Jimmy. A similar system of levers is found beneath the keyboard linking the buttons to a set of pallets and reeds one octive lower than the treble and brought into action by the ‘couplers’ or registers. Use of these registers allows single, two, three and four reeds to sound as required.
Accordions which play different notes on ‘press’ and ‘draw’ are often called diatonic. But this is a musical term describing a musical scale of diatonic intervals. But two or three rows on the same principle are chromatic, and to distinguish these from the Continental system we call ours the British Chromatic Accordion.
The treble keyboard is at first sight a logical sequence whether on the ‘press’ or on the ‘draw’, but because of our seven note scale the intervals between the notes varies depending on the octave. So in the scale of E we have five octaves (some incomplete) but all with different fingering. And of course this applies to all other key signatures. Despite this complex and difficult arrangement, with full knowledge of the keyboard it is possible to play practically anything including chords, although there are one or two annoying notes ‘missing’ – or rather unavailable. I am told that a certain accordion that appeared some years ago with four extra buttons in a fourth row was in fact no different to the original model.
The bass system is the normal Stradella, 177 buttons arranged in the standard manner of major thirds, fundamental, major chord, minor chord, dominant seventh and diminished seventh. There are two bass registers allowing three or five voice chords. The bass notes and chords remain the same whether bellows press or draw is used.
The Morino’s tone is obtained not only from the quality of the reeds, but from the tonewood quality of the reed blocks, sounding boards and accordion body. The reeds are tunes in groups of three, one on pitch, one slightly sharp and one slightly flat. This gives the distinctive accordion sound, but if overdone can become discordant.
Despite the difficulties of a ‘press draw’ system and complicated keyboard, there is no finer instrument for Scottish music. The Shand Morino is superb. That Hohner have discontinued production of this model is incomprehensible.”
Following Sandy’s speech Jimmy Edwards of Moffat, Angus Oliver of Peebles, Dave Simpson of Invergowrie and Sandy Tulloch then put on the four original Shand Morinos and Jimmy Shand put on Jim Crawford’s box to pose for photographs. It’s the first time these four boxes have been together since they were delivered to Jimmy’s house in 1951!
All players present were then invited to play a couple of sets together led by Sandy Tulloch and then throughout the rest of the afternoon, Bruce Lindsay invited players up in ones and twos to play two sets each. As ever, each box had it’s own sound, and each player had his own style and individuality, as most of the button box players I know are self taught they tend to develop their own wee touches and ways of playing through the different ways of fingering the same sequences of notes. Sadly, of some 36 players present, only two (possibly three) under the age of 40 and in fact for the whole of Scotland I only know of two others under that age (I hope I am wrong and that there are a lot more!) I don’t just mean Shand Morino players either, I mean three-row players. What a pity Phil Cunningham and Ally Bain weren’t three row players, as the BBC in Glasgow would then be falling over themselves to do documentaries and Hogmanay programmes featuring the button box! Alas, the traditions which ensured young lads took up the melodeon, either through their fathers playing, as in the mining communities in Fife and the Central belt, or through the Bothy system on the farms of Angus and the North-East, don’t exist anymore. So, if we want to get the youngsters interested it will have to be some other way. I notice Stirling University caters for all other so-called traditional instruments and styles but I don’t recall the melodeon or three-row ever being featured there. Why not? As Sandy Tulloch said, “There is no finer instrument for playing Scottish Dance music on”.
Dave Black and Bruce Lindsay were overwhelmed by the response to the Shand Morino Day and would like to thank all the players and public together for supporting the idea, especially those who traveled great distances to be there. Hopefully, it wasn’t a one-off event and could it possibly become an annual event?
The following players were present (36) and most of them played – Jimmy Shand, Sandy Tulloch, Doug Milne, Bruce Lindsay, Jimmy & Alexander Lindsay, Jimmy Edwards, Jim MacKay, Dave Simpson, Angus Oliver, Jim Blake, Allan Kindness, Andy Greig, Roy Magna, Dave Arnott, Bobby Coghill. Ben Murray, David Ross, Willie McHardy, Jim Douglas, Harold Smith, John Grieve, Sandy McAllan, Jim Berry, Alec Stewart, Robin Waitt, Bill Stuart, Charlie Kirkpatrick, Dochie McCallum, Colin Chalmers, Ian Cruickshanks, Walter Beattie, Chic Boath, Jim Crawford, Murray Simpson and Roger Dobson.
Bill Black of Stanley phoned Bruce on the morning of the event apologizing for not being able to come as he had been unwell for the last two weeks.
Accompanists were – Graham Berry, Bruce Lindsay Snr, Bob Jarvie, Ray Elrick and Alf McConnachie on piano and Lex Keith and Bert Shorthouse on piano box. The late Lindsay Spittal’s box and the late Bobby Brown’s box were both shown as well.
Windygates, Fife 15th January, 1995
by Ian Cruickshanks (Kirriemuir)
This event was the brainchild of Dave Black and Bruce Lindsay Snr. The afternoon started with all the Shand Morinos arrayed on and around the stage including the original 4 boxes. Bruce Lindsay then introduced local fiddler and long-term friend of Jimmy Shand, Bob Mackintosh who gave a short talk on the sequence of events leading to the production of the Shand Morino and the part Jimmy Shand had in not only the design of the instrument but also the promotion of it by his skill in playing it, thereby influencing many other musicians to acquire one of these wonderful instruments.
Another lifelong friend of Jimmy’s, Sandy Tulloch of Dundee, then took centre stage to deliver information to us about the technical side of the Shand Morino. I doubt if anyone knows more about all aspects of the instrument than Sandy, as not only is he a very skilled exponent himself, he is also a highly skilled engineer, woodworker etc., and I’m surprised he has never made a Shand Morino himself! He’s made just about everything else from fiddles to working steam engines!
This is what Sandy had to say :
“Readers of the Box and Fiddle will have noted the excellent articles by John Gurney of Edinburgh on the history of the accordion.
Bruce Lindsay had the idea of holding a ‘Morino’ get-together, and for anyone interested I have put a few notes together for reference.
Morino was Hohner’s designer who built the first Shand Special before the war. After the war, Jimmy once more contacted Hohner and gave Morino the specification for a new and larger model. Because of post-war restrictions, delivery of the first four accordions was delayed until 1951. These four were owned by Jimmy Shand, Andy Gray of Duntrune, Jimmy Edwards of Moffat and myself, at that time in Glasgow.
There were 46 treble buttons arranged in three rows of 15, 16 and 15, linked by a special Morino system of levers to 46 pallets in two rows of 23. Each pallet covers three apertures serving six reeds with leather or plastic valves. Three reeds sound on the ‘press’ and three on the ‘draw’ of the bellows. This special system of levers allows equal travel and spring resistance for all buttons and equal lift for all pallets. A feature not found on other three row accordions at that time, but a most important one according to Jimmy. A similar system of levers is found beneath the keyboard linking the buttons to a set of pallets and reeds one octive lower than the treble and brought into action by the ‘couplers’ or registers. Use of these registers allows single, two, three and four reeds to sound as required.
Accordions which play different notes on ‘press’ and ‘draw’ are often called diatonic. But this is a musical term describing a musical scale of diatonic intervals. But two or three rows on the same principle are chromatic, and to distinguish these from the Continental system we call ours the British Chromatic Accordion.
The treble keyboard is at first sight a logical sequence whether on the ‘press’ or on the ‘draw’, but because of our seven note scale the intervals between the notes varies depending on the octave. So in the scale of E we have five octaves (some incomplete) but all with different fingering. And of course this applies to all other key signatures. Despite this complex and difficult arrangement, with full knowledge of the keyboard it is possible to play practically anything including chords, although there are one or two annoying notes ‘missing’ – or rather unavailable. I am told that a certain accordion that appeared some years ago with four extra buttons in a fourth row was in fact no different to the original model.
The bass system is the normal Stradella, 177 buttons arranged in the standard manner of major thirds, fundamental, major chord, minor chord, dominant seventh and diminished seventh. There are two bass registers allowing three or five voice chords. The bass notes and chords remain the same whether bellows press or draw is used.
The Morino’s tone is obtained not only from the quality of the reeds, but from the tonewood quality of the reed blocks, sounding boards and accordion body. The reeds are tunes in groups of three, one on pitch, one slightly sharp and one slightly flat. This gives the distinctive accordion sound, but if overdone can become discordant.
Despite the difficulties of a ‘press draw’ system and complicated keyboard, there is no finer instrument for Scottish music. The Shand Morino is superb. That Hohner have discontinued production of this model is incomprehensible.”
Following Sandy’s speech Jimmy Edwards of Moffat, Angus Oliver of Peebles, Dave Simpson of Invergowrie and Sandy Tulloch then put on the four original Shand Morinos and Jimmy Shand put on Jim Crawford’s box to pose for photographs. It’s the first time these four boxes have been together since they were delivered to Jimmy’s house in 1951!
All players present were then invited to play a couple of sets together led by Sandy Tulloch and then throughout the rest of the afternoon, Bruce Lindsay invited players up in ones and twos to play two sets each. As ever, each box had it’s own sound, and each player had his own style and individuality, as most of the button box players I know are self taught they tend to develop their own wee touches and ways of playing through the different ways of fingering the same sequences of notes. Sadly, of some 36 players present, only two (possibly three) under the age of 40 and in fact for the whole of Scotland I only know of two others under that age (I hope I am wrong and that there are a lot more!) I don’t just mean Shand Morino players either, I mean three-row players. What a pity Phil Cunningham and Ally Bain weren’t three row players, as the BBC in Glasgow would then be falling over themselves to do documentaries and Hogmanay programmes featuring the button box! Alas, the traditions which ensured young lads took up the melodeon, either through their fathers playing, as in the mining communities in Fife and the Central belt, or through the Bothy system on the farms of Angus and the North-East, don’t exist anymore. So, if we want to get the youngsters interested it will have to be some other way. I notice Stirling University caters for all other so-called traditional instruments and styles but I don’t recall the melodeon or three-row ever being featured there. Why not? As Sandy Tulloch said, “There is no finer instrument for playing Scottish Dance music on”.
Dave Black and Bruce Lindsay were overwhelmed by the response to the Shand Morino Day and would like to thank all the players and public together for supporting the idea, especially those who traveled great distances to be there. Hopefully, it wasn’t a one-off event and could it possibly become an annual event?
The following players were present (36) and most of them played – Jimmy Shand, Sandy Tulloch, Doug Milne, Bruce Lindsay, Jimmy & Alexander Lindsay, Jimmy Edwards, Jim MacKay, Dave Simpson, Angus Oliver, Jim Blake, Allan Kindness, Andy Greig, Roy Magna, Dave Arnott, Bobby Coghill. Ben Murray, David Ross, Willie McHardy, Jim Douglas, Harold Smith, John Grieve, Sandy McAllan, Jim Berry, Alec Stewart, Robin Waitt, Bill Stuart, Charlie Kirkpatrick, Dochie McCallum, Colin Chalmers, Ian Cruickshanks, Walter Beattie, Chic Boath, Jim Crawford, Murray Simpson and Roger Dobson.
Bill Black of Stanley phoned Bruce on the morning of the event apologizing for not being able to come as he had been unwell for the last two weeks.
Accompanists were – Graham Berry, Bruce Lindsay Snr, Bob Jarvie, Ray Elrick and Alf McConnachie on piano and Lex Keith and Bert Shorthouse on piano box. The late Lindsay Spittal’s box and the late Bobby Brown’s box were both shown as well.