60 Fun Facts About Accordion

The word accordion comes from the German Akkord, meaning what?

The 1829 Vienna patent was for an instrument that sounded 'automatically coupled chords on the bass side'.

The accordion belongs to which family of instruments?

Sound is produced as bellows-driven air flows past a reed in a frame; harmonicas and concertinas are relatives.

What is the oldest name for the accordion group, from Greek for 'harmonic, musical'?

Native versions of the word accordion are now far more common.

The accordion's basic form is believed to have been invented in 1822 in which city?

Christian Friedrich Ludwig Buschmann is usually credited, though a possibly earlier instrument turned up in 2006.

Who patented an instrument called the accordion in Vienna in 1829?

His instrument had only a left-hand buttonboard, with the right hand simply pumping air.

What was the trade of the Viennese inventor who patented the accordion in 1829?

He was of Armenian-Romanian origin and worked with his sons Karl and Guido.

A key feature of Demian's patent was that pressing one key would sound what?

It could sound a different chord in each direction of play.

Which English inventor's 1844 patent brought chords and keyboard together in the concertina?

His design also allowed the reeds to be tuned from outside with a simple tool.

The earliest known Russian accordions were made around 1830 in which city?

By 1874 the town and its neighbouring villages were turning out over 700,000 instruments a year.

What is the most recognisable part of the accordion and its primary means of expression?

Key touch does not affect dynamics; all expression comes from pushing and pulling.

Accordion reeds are typically made from strips of which materials?

Valves on opposing reeds stop air leaking so each note sounds louder.

An accordion that produces different pitches on the push and the pull is called what?

Piano accordions are unisonoric; diatonic button accordions are usually bisonoric.

What is the most common size of full accordion, by the count of its left-hand buttons?

Small models may have only 8 bass buttons; heavy free-bass converters reach 160.

The standard Stradella bass system arranges its columns of buttons according to what?

That puts the I, IV and V chords of any key in three adjacent columns.

The Stradella bass system is named after a town in which country?

Northern Italy has been a heartland of accordion manufacture since the 19th century.

Which Italian town, home of pioneer Paolo Soprani, is still a centre of accordion making?

Many small and medium-sized makers still work there.

The first accordion with a piano keyboard was probably introduced in 1852 by Bouton of which city?

Piano accordions are the most typical type today and are used across many genres.

Which German company, founded in 1857 in Trossingen, became a giant of harmonica and accordion making?

It also made the Shand Morino, long considered the elite Scottish dance-band accordion.

What is the bandoneon, the signature instrument of Argentine tango?

German and Italian emigrants and sailors carried it to Argentina around 1870.

The bandoneon is named after which German instrument dealer?

He intended it for religious and popular music rather than folk.

Which Russian chromatic button accordion is named after an 11th-century bard?

Its broader rectangular reeds give it a fuller bass than Western instruments.

In Britain and Australia, a diatonic button accordion is commonly called what?

The name applies whether it has one, two or three rows of melody buttons.

Which Alpine button accordion is particular to Slovenia, Austria, Bavaria and South Tyrol?

The Swiss schwyzerörgeli and the Viennese Schrammel accordion are its cousins.

The rapid push-pull shake known as resfulego is heard in which Brazilian genre?

Luiz Gonzaga and gaucho player Renato Borghetti popularised the effect.

Which Colombian accordion genre is on UNESCO's list of heritage in need of urgent safeguarding?

It began with gaita flutes, guacharaca and caja before adopting the accordion.

Zydeco pairs the accordion with which percussion instrument?

The genre was created by French-speaking African Americans of Creole heritage in southwest Louisiana.

Which Louisiana accordionist was known as the King of Zydeco?

He won a Grammy in 1983 and spoke Louisiana French as his first language.

Which San Antonio-born accordionist played conjunto and Tejano music with the Texas Tornados?

He earned Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Grammys, Americana and Tejano music awards and Billboard.

Which accordion-playing bandleader hosted a TV show from 1951 to 1982 known for its 'champagne music'?

He was born in the German-speaking community of Strasburg, North Dakota.

Which accordionist was dubbed 'the happy Norwegian' by his champagne-music bandleader boss?

He held the accordion chair on the show from 1950 to 1982.

Why did 'Weird Al' say his parents picked the accordion over the guitar for his lessons?

The reference was to polka star Frankie Yankovic, no relation; the lesson came the day before his seventh birthday.

Which Austrian composer put an accordion into his 1922 opera Wozzeck?

Tchaikovsky, Umberto Giordano and Charles Ives all wrote for the diatonic button accordion too.

Which country is said to have more accordionists than every other country in the world?

Russian teachers and the People's Liberation Army made it popular there after its introduction in 1926.

In which country is the accordion 'the people's instrument', which all teachers must learn?

Barbara Demick reports the fact in her book Nothing to Envy.

The accordion is the dominant instrument of sevdalinka, a folk genre from which country?

The instrument spread across the Balkans and much of the world through European migration.

Which Dominican Republic dance genre uses the accordion in its popular music?

Chamamé in Argentina and sertanejo in Brazil do the same.

Which Finnish accordionist developed a quarter-tone accordion with the maker Pigini in 2005?

He has since written works for the instrument.

Which Argentine composer's concert tangos, written for the bandoneon, are performed widely?

The bandoneon's left-hand box gives it a nasal, muted timbre against a bright right hand.

Which Chinese free-reed mouth organ is an ancient forerunner of the accordion family?

Travellers reportedly brought the first ones to Europe in the 1740s and 1770s.

What was the accordion's reception when The Times noted it as new to British audiences in 1831?

It had been introduced from Germany around 1828 and reached New Yorkers by the mid-1840s.

Which one-sided melody-only instrument by Jeune complemented the 1829 bass-only accordion?

Combining the two gives something much like a modern diatonic button accordion.

Which Austrian musician described a great variety of instruments in his 1854 book Schule für Accordion?

Vienna and London musicians toured both cities in those years, so ideas travelled fast.

Which Scottish player's input shaped the elite German-made Morino model, named partly after him?

The instrument became the standard for Scottish dance bands.

Modern accordions may include which sensors to drive a synthesizer module?

Condenser microphones and volume controls also let players plug straight into a PA.

The German concertina was introduced in 1834, five years after the English version, by whom?

German concertinas are usually larger and square rather than hexagonal.

Which punk-influenced bands make prominent use of the accordion?

The Dreadnoughts and the Zydepunks are in the same accordion-punk company.

Which Mexican genre uses the button accordion, alongside Conjunto and Tejano across the border?

Swiss and Slovenian Alpine music and Argentine tango are other button-accordion strongholds.

Who is believed to have invented the accordion's basic form in Berlin in 1822?

An instrument discovered in 2006 appears to have been built even earlier.

Which two Tula craftsmen made Russia's earliest known accordions around 1830?

They worked from an early accordion received from Germany.

How many left-hand buttons do the largest, heaviest converter accordions typically have?

Converter models switch the left hand between free-bass and Stradella systems.

Which virtuoso occasionally used chromatic button accordions with a decorative piano keyboard added?

Frosini, the Deiro brothers, the Avsenik brothers and Magnante were the major influences of the early 20th century.

What does a 'converter' accordion let the player do?

Free-bass layouts arrange notes chromatically in three rows plus a duplicate row.

Which diatonic squeezebox is the favoured type in Scotland?

Despite the name, it is a diatonic instrument beloved of Scottish dance bands.

Weltmeister accordions are still handmade in which German town?

HARMONA Akkordeon GmbH builds them; Hohner still makes its top-end models in Germany too.

Which French accordionist's repertoire spans jazz, tango nuevo, Latin and classical music?

Bernard Lubat and Vincent Peirani are other French jazz accordionists.

Who was the first composer to write specifically for the chromatic accordion?

Tchaikovsky, Giordano and Ives had earlier written for the diatonic button accordion.

Which Russian-born composer has written solos, concertos and chamber works for the accordion?

Her bayan works are staples of the modern classical accordion repertoire.

During Brazil's accordion boom, roughly how many of its 65 factories were in the south?

Italian and German immigrants brought the instrument to Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina and Paraná.

Chamamé, a popular accordion genre, comes from which country?

Elsewhere the accordion drives gaucho, forró and sertanejo in Brazil, and vallenato in Colombia.

Which American composer wrote works for the diatonic button accordion, alongside Tchaikovsky?

Italy's Umberto Giordano also composed for the diatonic instrument.