S q u e e z y t u n e s

It's a Goofus !

How about this for a fabulously wacky instrument ? It's a Couenophone, also known as a goofus. Whilst at first glance it just looks like a saxophone take a closer look at all the buttons. Those buttons are layed out as two octaves of a piano style keyboard - this means I might be able to play such an instrument. This particular model is currently up for sale, unfortunately the price of £750 means I'll never find out if I can play such a wacky instrument.

Goofus for sale

Squeezyboy on the Radio Again !

It looks like Catherine's "Mr Blue" track is starting to take off on the radio in America.

KCRW (in Los Angeles) played it again on Tuesday. I wish I'd heard the show because they also played Nancy Sinatra, Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Chemical Brothers, Coldplay, Beck, Celia Cruz, Marvin Gaye and plenty more greats.

KDVS (in Davis/Sacramento) played it on the 17th of June. Their show also featured Woody Guthrie, Leadbelly, Bessie Smith and Damien Rice ! I believe Catherine was also there in person sometime this week.

WXPN (in Pennsylvania) played it way back on May 20th. This appears to be a syndication of the show from KCRW.

KCRW playlist

KDVS playlist

WXPN playlist

Free Festivals in London

Now that summer is well and truly here the outdoor festival season has begun. You can go the likes of Glastonbury, Womad and the Cambridge Folk Festival or you could go to some of the many free festivals that take place instead.

Saturday 9th July - Croydon World Party has three stages including TY the UK hip-hop artist and SKA CUBANO whose latest CD is one that I will be buying as soon as I see it. To see Ska Cubano in action click here.

Sunday 10th July - Croydon Mela - featuring RIZWAN -MUAZZAM QAWWALI SINGERS, BOLLYWOOD STRINGS and PANJABI HIT SQUAD amongst others.

Saturday 16th July - Rise Make a Stand Against Racism Festival - Burgess Park, London. Featuring JJC & 411 SQUAD, RAGHAV and many, many others.

Only on Ebay

Last week I featured a fully working Clavioline and an original RCA Theremin circa 1929. The Clavioline went for a grand total of £227.99 which indicates how valuable good working specimans are. The theremin reached £3,695.91 but did not sell because even this sum did not reach it's reserve price. I suspect a figure of over £5000 was being sought.

This week I could only find one item of interest - a giant harmonica ! It's actually a chord harmonica as used in harmonica orchestras (yes they do exist!). It plays 48 different chords including major, minor, major sevenths and even augmented and diminished chords. It's a full 23 inches long and if you click the picture below you'll see it slightly larger than it is below. The auction can be seen here.

   

Vintage Flutina Players

Looking at my visitor statistics I can see that a few people have been looking for information on flutinas. As a little treat here are a couple of vintage pictures of flutinas in action.

I got all of the above images from http://www.musurgia.com/photos.asp who sell these original photos.