Select the accordion best suited to your musical style in order to avoid spending unnecessary money or becoming disenchanted and giving up altogether.
Melodeons are diatonic button accordions composed of one to three treble rows and eight bass buttons, all playing simultaneously when pushed or pulled. Each button produces two distinct notes when pushed or pulled, creating an instrument known as bisonoricity.
What is it?
Diatonic accordions feature one 10-button row and can produce various keys. They’re sometimes called melosdeons; in Basque it’s known as trikitixa or soinu txikia; for the Swiss variant with double action bass keyboard it is called trekharmonika or acordio diatonico.
This type of accordion can play trebles in one to three keys with matching bass notes and chords, while its chromatic model can play every note imaginable; it requires numerous additional metal reeds and a much larger box, however.
Diatonic accordions are bisonoric, meaning each button produces its own sound when pushed or pulled on the bellows. Conversely, chromatic models are unisonoric – each button produces the same tone regardless of whether pushed or pulled on them.
History
Although commonly associated with dance music, accordions offer much wider musical appeal. Their distinctive sound and versatile nature allow them to play various styles from classical to traditional music with equal ease.
Cyrill Demian, an Armenian instrument maker living in Vienna, created the original accordion in 1829 and patented it under his name in Vienna. His invention consisted of a box filled with free reeds connected by buttons on either side and keys for chording production on the left; compressed or expanded air from bellows at its core was used to blow on them and produce sound.
Today, accordions are experiencing a revival. Specialized accordion festivals and gatherings have recently taken place throughout the world and more musicians are picking up this instrument to play it.
Origins
At its core, an accordion consists of one or two treble rows and two basses. Melodeon is often used to refer to these compact diatonic instruments with simple bass button layout, though this should not be mistaken with organetto type of chromatic accordion.
Initial accordions were monophonic; in the 1800s however, accompaniment buttons were introduced that allowed melody and chords to be simultaneously played on one accordion. This innovation proved vital in expanding its usage throughout various world folk traditions; even President Abraham Lincoln carried one as well as frontiersmen like Wyatt Earp enjoyed playing it! The name accordion became commonplace during this era and eventually President Lincoln carried one himself!
Styles
There are various styles of diatonic accordions. Single row diatonics are popular among Irish musicians and English Morris dancers; multi-row melodeons are widely used in Latin American (Norteno & Conjunto), Tex-Mex and other Mexican styles; diatonic melodeons (referred to in Europe as accordions) follow a diatonic scale that produces two notes depending on bellows direction, making this instrument versatile for most situations.
Chromatic accordions such as the Russian Garmon and Finnish C-system models are also widely available, providing users with an extra advantage by being able to play chords as well as melodies for greater musical versatility; however, these models remain less popular than their diatonic counterparts.
Accessories
There is an assortment of accessories for the Diatonic Accordion available, ranging from straps and gig bags to reed blocks and voices activated via switches (known as couplers or registers). Voices allow players to control timbre and pitch changes with each button pressed via switches (also referred to as couplers or registers).
Single action diatonic accordions typically feature two rows of buttons with the melody row containing one less button than its chords counterpart, for a total of 25 treble and eight bass buttons – known as bi-sonoric or unisonoric accordion arrangements.
But there are accordions which combine diatonic and chromatic features, including the Russian garmon, Steirische Harmonika and Swiss Schwyzerorgeli accordions – not forgetting diatonic accordions which use all four voices together, including diatonic accordions popularly found in Irish music as well as melosdeons used for Irish folk tunes.