My mom gave me an accordion about a month and a half ago. She is a brilliant player and both my great aunt and great grandmother taught accordion lessons. I only heard Norwegian polkas growing up and I thought they sounded pretty tacky. Then about 10 years ago I heard this cat from South America named Astor Piazzolla, and his music made the hair on my arms stand up. In the last several years I've discovered Eastern European and other assorted Gypsy music (all using the ubiquitous accordion). Shortly before moving back to Minneapolis from Atlanta, I called my mom and asked if she still had any accordions laying around, and that I was hell-bent on learning the instrument finally (as daunting as all of those buttons looked).
Sure enough she had two, but sold two others a couple of years ago which made her a bit sad because they were excellent instruments. In any case, the one she gave me required some repairs, and after $150.00 and some strange vibes from the accordion shop guy, one of the switches gave out on me a few days ago. We both decided that we were scammed, and that the shop needed the money when they should have told us it was not worth repairing. So I frantically started searching around Ebay for a new squeezebox, but was a bit shocked to find out that they start at $450.00, and that other accordion shops in the area had ones that started at $600.00 and topped out at a whopping $5,000.00. These polka people are dead serious about their accordions!!!
To make a short story longer, I had lunch with my mom today and we stopped by a used instrument shop, only to find the one accordion they had to be too small albeit beautiful. After figuring out what type of amplifier I would need at the very least, we left the shop, and as soon as we got into the car she offered me her incredibly beautiful and expensive accordion. It used to belong to my great aunt who bought it back in the 60's or 70's for a crapload of money even for the time. Needless to say it is an incredibly valuable instrument now (priceless to my mom and I because we both share a passion for our cool relatives and their old stuff).
Alright, I just want to finish by saying in about 6 months from now, my brother (a stellar drummer), Mike Lewis (a stellar upright bass player), and myself are going to takeover the world as a band called !SALUD! (!CHEERS!). Of course I'm overly ambitious and we'll probably only end up taking over Minneapolis.
Take care everyone!
