A few players do the Scott playboy special and the Creole Stomp at the same time. It works pretty well for the most part. You and your friend would have to play the Scott Playboy Special on the C and the Creole Stomp on the b flat...I think.

John

Some recorded versions of J'ai Ete Au Bal drop from G to F mid-song, then go back up to G again (Steve Riley, Kevin Naquin). On a C accordion, you go from 2d to 3rd position. But with two players, have the C accordionist play the song in G and your B-flat player could play the key of F portion in 2d position. This would give the tune a lot of kick. If you want to mess around, then have the B-flat player drop it down to E-flat (3rd position). Eventually, come on back up to G, which will positively scream by comparison to the low key of E-flat.

If you both play C accordions, many two-steps have a call and response pattern that you could use to trade phrases on an instrumental break.

Darryl,
There are literally dozens of choices you can make. Almost any two chord song played in the G position can be played in the F position as well. With that said, the person on the low accordion plays the song, and the person a whole step up plays in the F position. Some examples are Chere Toute Toute, Flames of Hell, Saturday Night Special, etc. On three chord songs, you can noodle around and get some interesting variations on the melody.

Ganey, Thanks for your comments.

I have Le Flammes d'enfer on many CD's including Jason Frey and Travis Matte and Jude Moreau's CD, but, with reference to my previous post, could you advise a band/artist who I can access for sound samples/CD for Chere Toute Toute and Saturday Night Special?

Thanks, Darryl.

"could you advise a band/artist who I can access for sound samples/CD for Chere Toute Toute and Saturday Night Special?"

I would be curious to learn whether sound samples are really of any use to folks learning Cajun music.

Sound samples licensed by copyright holders of Cajun music are typically 30 seconds long, much too short to even hear the A and B parts of singles that were 3 minutes long, too short for sure in a traditional presentation to hear an accordion lead followed by the vocal, the steel guitar remarks, and the fiddle. MUCH too short to get the flavor of a song, in my opinion. This is why I DO NOT post 30 second clips despite my having a license to post clips of ALL the catalogs of Swallow and La Louisiane Records. Just absurd, in my opinion.

You may want to buy Cajun Social Music from Folkways Music. It has Nathan Abshire and Allie Young doing leads on Chere Tout Toute. It may be only $1 on Emusic, ITunes, or any of those services.

Neal,

Appreciate and agree with your comments up to a point.

However, I guess I really wanted to just sample a few bars of these tunes to see if they were likely to be the melody and structure I was looking for... and within my/our capabilities to reproduce in a band format.

I purchase plenty of CD's from Music Machine in Eunice, Floyds, Amazon, etc.etc. and I find that being half a world away with minimal Cajun/Creole/Zydeco genre music and musicians, a 30 sec. sample has generally been an excellent guide for me commit, or otherwise, to a CD ...I've rarely been disappointed.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

Thanks for the link to Folkways etc.
Darryl.

Darryl,

How 'bout Chez Seychelles?

One could use two accordions to play harmony in
the "A" part.

Fairly simple melody and frequently a crowd favorite.

Merci,

--Biggeroo

I have an LP that is a Sonet compilation (British) of 45 singles from J.D.Miller's Crazy Cajun and Bayou Classics. One tune is Wayne Toups playing an accodion duet with Pat Savant. It is J'ai Été au Bal and it is pretty wild.
Harlan

Thanks guys..knew you'd help out.

I've been through my Cajun /Creole CD collection and have Le Stomp Creole by Jesse Lege and Creole Stomp by Steve Riley off of his Happytown CD and J'ai Ete Au Bal by various artists.

I just don't seem to have Scott Playboy Special or Chez Seychelle.( I know as soon that as I hear the first bar or so I'll know the tunes ).

Can anyone advise a Band/Accordionist who I can access for on-line sound sampling for these pieces with a view to purchasing a CD.?

We find that our best learning method is to play, play and play the CD tracks and get the melodies sunk into the brain matter. We just make sure initially that we get the melody line and tempo generally right then work on the fine tuning.

Thanks, Darryl.

Look for Walter Mouton (and the Scott Playboys) From the 70's

More recently,
It's also on Kevin Naquin & The Ossun Playboys "Bayou Groove" CD

Walmart sells the Steve Reliely version for download here. (as a medley with the Mardi Gras jig)
http://www.walmart.com/swap/LoadArtistTracks.do?artistId=16453

The W. Mouton (single version) is on this compilation album.
http://www.cajuncrawfish.com/item-detail.cfm?ID=SW-6104

It's all over the internet.
Even a version of Chez Seychelles by Beausoleil

Good luck,
DP

Hey Darryl,
The Sat. Night Special and The Evangeline Special are the same tune.
Jude

Jude,

Track 13 " Jude Moreau and the Bon Temps Playboys " CD...yep..got it....will run through that tomorrow.

Thanks, Darryl.

BTW...Had band practice today and the Bb is working great....all I need is some Jude Moreau skill level and it'll be even better !!!!!

Hummmm dual accordions.

Yeah dual is cool.... but check this out:

We put a dream team together a ways back.
Now through all the music this gathering produced, there was a finale showing of accordions.

Jason Frey, Jude Moreau, Chris Miller, Jesse Lege'

Seems to me there was a fifth accordion, can't quite remember just who it was ... help me out here Jude and Chris (who was it?) ... it may have been Ed Poullard on accordion with the other four. (?) But I am thinking it was Andre Michot that set down the guitar and grabbed a box and joined in to make it 5.

Now then: This band arrangement was over the top heaping with talent (the greatest assembly of 8 that I personally have seen/heard). I was courious and sorta wanted to see what would come off with multiple accordions doing matters with the same song(s) ... it works fine with some hot two steppers... but when ya slow things down, it is more acclimated to a single accordion (at lest for what I am thinking).

So here's Jesse winding it up on stage come the end of the set ...all of a sudden, another accordion pops in (Jude), then another (Jason) and another (Andre)... all the while ya got Chris Miller in front sporting a big ole blue (as I recall) piano accordion and just oozing with that " oh my Gawd check out that sound" ... it beat anything I'd ever seen or heard! PERSONIFIED ! It was enough to make a sound man nuts

Shucks, I never come across 2 let alone 5 accordions doing it simultaniously performing on the stage till then. But let me tell ya, those skally wags were cooking it and serving it up, pushing and pulling, yanking and a whole gob more, I can tell you. Don't know why that stage did not catch fire, cause there was a whole lot of heat and energy taking place that day.

When all was said and done; There was a gob of high five slapping, a ton of yapping and a gob of bull you know what bragging going on... That was and still is (in my estimation)the "Dream Team" the most outlandishly terrific assembly of the best, come together on one stage as a custom unique band of musical French gypsies... Said it could'nt be done, SHAAA, well they did alright.

Now then: If they'd just do something with those Gawd Dang Dat Tapes I give em, we'd all be able to slobber over the end results of that assembly!

Nonc D