The melodeon (or "button box" or just "box") is a small accordion whose keyboard is laid out in rows of buttons. Its small size and loud volume make it great for outdoor situations, and like many people I learned to play it for Morris dancing. Each row is like a harmonica, with the notes of a major scale arranged compactly (without accidentals) so you get different notes pushing and pulling the bellows.

Expanded Keyboard Layout

Most Morris musicians play a 2-row D/G box, meaning you can play easily in the keys of D and G, uneasily in nearby keys, and not at all in faraway keys like A flat.

The upside: within the walled garden of a few keys and chords you're a big rich orchestra of sound in a nice light box. The downside: when you venture out of the garden to the wide world of other music, suddenly everything is difficult.

Click here for the story of my attempt to expand the garden — a 3-row layout preserving the benefits of the D/G original while allowing a wider range of tunes to be played easily.

Tunes

One day when I was at Liberty Bellows they asked to make some videos of me playing melodeons they had for sale. Gosh, me? Well ... sure! Click below for the results — some of my favorite box tunes, played on the various fine melodeons they handed me. (Putting straps on them took me as long as recording the tunes...)

Please forgive the occasional mistakes and frequent accordion face in these impromptu recordings!

Time Will End

Weaver's March

Bledington Glorishears

Ganglat

Inga's Song

The Quaker

Tripping Upstairs

Cock of the North

Liberty Bell