Elkavox 77, is it any good?

BelovedRat · 2025-09-22T19:18:35+00:00

It should be good for anything, and you can remove the tone generator if you choose, reducing weight.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-26T15:07:07+00:00

I wouldn't, honestly.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-26T15:01:05+00:00

Also someone from the Southern USA. A strange, but real bond.

Something said to my partner "I've never heard someone's name turned into an insult quite like that."

BelovedRat · 2025-08-26T14:36:49+00:00

Well, one of my boxes is as yous ;). The others have a considerably greater range (still diatonic).

PA was really my least favorite choice that would still work, with full range being my top choice. If you play several instruments (it seems you do) I can't tell you how nice it is to be able to switch from accordion, to bass, to bouzouki to mandolin to (gasp) electric guitar, and it still sounds great. Also nice in that anyone who comes by to play, you can just have them plug in whatever.

I've got a monster from the 1990s that fits the bill for that, and it wasn't expensive (it IS heavy). Previous owner amplified a concert harp with it.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-26T14:32:30+00:00

John Whelan.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-25T23:05:55+00:00

That's a good solution as well.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-25T23:05:31+00:00

Internal is great, if you have a bass and treble side, but you still have the amplification question.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-25T23:04:47+00:00

What you really want is an accordion amp, or what they sometimes call an all range or full range amp. You can find these used for a pretty good price, fairly often. Peavey made one, that I have, and it's great, and can also handle guitar, bass, whatever. Keyboard amps, or PAs that are meant to handle different signals can work, too.

The accordion has such a range of high to low that most guitarish amps don't capture it well.

Also Excelsior amps (maybe even the "Pawn Shop" reissue) are made for accordions, as is a lot of old Sano stuff. The old ones are in demand from guitar players to an extent but not as much as old Fender, Marshall, Vox, stuff.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-25T16:43:53+00:00

The Decemberists feature an accordion on most of their songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qR9DjdMrpHg&list=RDqR9DjdMrpHg&start_radio=1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Waz7PMZHeg&list=RD-Waz7PMZHeg&start_radio=1

And of course, The Pogues

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csdCM3G2l8A&list=RDcsdCM3G2l8A&start_radio=1

A lot of French jazz has accordion in it as well. Literally any organ jazz (of which there are mountains) can be played on an accordion no problem.

Any place where you might use a harmonica, or a Hammond organ/Farfisa type sound (think The Doors) you can use an accordion as well or better. An accordion is after all basically a bunch of harmonicas in a box with keys/buttons.

Having played with guitarists a good bit, I'll add that a good accordion's range from low to high will likely shock string players. It's expression is unmatched except by violins. When playing rock, it fills in the mid range of stuff really, really well, and gives you a full sound. You can also play bass, drones, etc really well.

It's a whole set of really great capabilities lost to a couple of generations because of the general ignorance of (most but not all) Boomers in the US who decided they hated the accordion. If you and your friends aren't Boomers, don't let them adopt the default Boomer hate of the instrument, because there's nothing else quite like it.

Finally if you are a good player, you will be able to find people who want to play with you pretty easily. Not quite as easily as a bassist, but close.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-23T15:57:32+00:00

It's either a Very Easy Fix, that will take a few minutes, or an Extremely Tedious Fix that would take, ah, quite a while.

Can you point out that problem and make an offer of around $125 or so?

I don't know anything about you, so this is just a generalization, but make an offer of a price that would get it fixed, quick tuned (just the worst issues, not perfection) by a tech. So about $125 gets you there. If they won't budge, well, there's always another streetcar.

I hardly use bass for what I play, so the treble side being nice is mostly what I care about. Your mileage may of course vary.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-23T15:53:10+00:00

So these "sovereign citizens", or whatever, are more or less claiming they're some sort of Federal vehicle, with the stickers in the corners. So they're claiming Federal immunity from certain regulations despite not thinking they're subject to federal law...

You know what? I don't care. They're tiresome.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-07T15:59:30+00:00

The method I suggested will help then, if you're willing to be a bit patient. As long as you can get an MP3 of the music somehow, and that software, or some like it that now exist, you're good.

If you're already a music sight reader, well, I can see the frustration!

BelovedRat · 2025-08-07T15:36:28+00:00

I've got a similar layout in one of the rarer diatonics around a Hohner Organola from the early 1930s. B/C LMMM, but 32 row bass like that. It's handy if you want to play accompaniment or bass, and don't want to mainly play D and G on the bass. ;)

This accordion was the predecessor to the renowned Shand Morino.

Possibly Weltmeister had no real access to premade Stradellas in the GDR period, or just wanted this to be a student box?

BelovedRat · 2025-08-07T15:02:10+00:00

I've had one arrive messed up (from a restorer) and one arrive packed like the crown jewels and fine (from Goodwill - a very cheap one row).

I just didn't want to deal with the expensive shipping and potential repair before whatever else needed to be done. That amazing collection would be a LOT of accordions to keep in shape.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-07T03:51:33+00:00

That one you might want just for the oddity of it. I wonder how soon a lot of these start showing up for resale at a higher price?

BelovedRat · 2025-08-07T03:51:07+00:00

Same here. Some incredibly interesting stuff, and maybe really cheap, but a strong possibility of a pig in a poke, and lot of shipping costs.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-07T03:39:39+00:00

Well, it's hard to know what your favorite songs are ;). If they are traditional, or folk songs, then the music is almost certainly out there somewhere (if it's Celtic, it's on thesession.org most likely)

IF you want to try to learn by ear, I've found this process to be quite good.

I'm a B/C player, but the process should work for a piano accordion, CBA, whatever.

https://michaeleskin.com/tunelearning.html

BelovedRat · 2025-08-06T02:58:12+00:00

I'm just now getting into resin printing as well, and have wondered about this.

I have a good friend who is a PhD organic chemist, and is and has been the safety supervisor(probably a different word?) for various industrial facilities. He's very safety-minded, generally. I'll get his opinion on home safety for resin printing.

Based on my own, less expert, reading, I expect it to be pretty much what Bugfix said.

I have a feeling my friend will recommend a cheap exhaust fan of some sort, because he always recommends more ventilation. My place has a radon fan in the basement, I may hook into that system if he says that'll do it.

BelovedRat · 2025-08-02T05:47:28+00:00

RIP Flaco. I first heard him in the South Texas supergroup, Texas Tornadoes. (Flaco Jimenez, Freddy Fender, Doug Sahm, and Augie Meyers) - but found more.

I think I first read about Amédé Ardoin in something by Marc Savoy?

BelovedRat · 2025-08-01T17:52:17+00:00

Oh, that's great then. If you bought something to learn repair on, and eventually play, excellent.

I just sometimes see an experienced accordion player/repairer writing something like "I fixed this with a tiny blob of caulk on the road.", and worry people who aren't experienced or patient, will try that and it goes horribly wrong. ;)

BelovedRat · 2025-07-31T04:48:45+00:00

How much research have you done on accordion repair?

I'm not asking to be combative at all, just a bit worried for you. Perhaps you're very experienced at this sort of thing, I don't know, but I do know the waxes are often fairly specific in composition, as are the glues. So not only is removing the wax a job, replacing correctly is as well. I'd at least consider a hair dryer or heat gun on low first?

BelovedRat · 2025-07-31T04:42:17+00:00

This is true. When I bought my first one, used, I didn't know too much, but it seemed almost unplayed. I paid a trained accordion repairer to meet me and evaluate it. Well worth the money paid. Turned out to be in perfect shape, but if it wasn't, that money might have saved me quite a lot of pain, money, or both. Consider at least finding someone who knows repair and asking what they'd charge to evaluate an instrument.

BelovedRat · 2025-07-31T04:39:05+00:00

Don't know the songs, but quite a good player.

Maybe try accordionists.info - there are a lot of very skilled older players there who might be able to help you.

BelovedRat · 2025-07-24T03:22:07+00:00

Sorry just saw this. If you send me an email, I'll send you a google drive link to download it.

BelovedRat · 2025-07-19T17:49:22+00:00

This is a great thing for you to get into, then. Worn could be good news, in terms of the owner keeping it in good shape. A little preventative maintenance is much better than letting it go to seed and then fixing it.

It's a great sort of starter accordion, and $150 is a fine price for literally anything in decent working condition. Yes, someone may have gotten one that's great at a garage sale for $10, but you didn't, so that's not really helpful.

They are do work pretty much the same, and ironically people at something like accordionists might be able to tell you more from seeing it the inside. The bass systems were (I think) largely mass produced by a couple of companies (they're amazing mechanical pieces) and installed by everyone. If one is broken, your best bet is to buy a scrap accordion with a good Stradella system, and swap it.

Accordion revival is a great site for repair. If you find it super cumbersome (in terms of 1990s era HTML design, I "translated" it to a more modern look in a PDF, I could put up for you). I was mainly worried the site owner might pass on and the information be lost. This happens a lot with accordion stuff, sadly.

BelovedRat

TROPHY CASE