Broken reed

I have a problem with one of the reeds on my button accordion. It is one of the reeds that form the C chord on the bass side when you open the bellows. My friendly neighbourhood accordion repair guy says I've broken a reed. He's going to replace it for me - depending on what he has around, he will either do a straight replacement with another identical reed, or if he has to, he will make a new reed for it from an accordion reed. The reeds on free reed instruments are little tongues of metal that vibrate to make sound in response to air being pushed through.

The timing was poor in that I have an opportunity to do some recording on Wednesday night. However, it should be ready in time. I'm going to give the fellow who is repairing it a plug. His name is Rudy and he runs Musical Instruments of Canada, located on Eglinton near Oakwood here in Toronto. He is the same fellow who installed a ceramic mic in the my Corona II and as well has done some bellows work on the same instrument. In my experience he does excellent work + he's a very pleasant fellow. Rudy also sells a lot of new and used accordions out of his shop, which is located on the second floor above another store.

I think it must take a lot of patience to tune a reed. The sound of the reed can be changed by scratching or filing the reed. It I understand this correctly, if you file it the reed plays sharper and if you scratch it, the reed plays flatter. There are other special considerations such as the style of tuning - called wet (or musette) or dry.