Hi all,

I thought you might be interested in this, so I decided to write a post. Pretty much one month ago I bought a used accordion from a very sweet old man an hour away from where I live. I tracked it down online and it's fully functional, had been restored a few years ago. It's a Hohner Concerto IV which is 30 years old and sounds like a charm. The bass has two registers, the treble has 3 (two 8' and a 16').

I learned the piano from ages 10-12 (currently 27) and then decided I don't like it anymore. At 15 I learned to play guitar and then at 18 started the piano again, this time by myself. Over the years, I already learned some rudimentary bass and ukulele by myself, and through composing I learned some music theory.

When I approached the accordion, I could not play jack. All I could do was hold down some buttons and do some slow legato. The bellows were confusing at first. The piano-part of the Accordion went pretty fast for me. Old skills kicked back in and I was able to play some fluent easy lines fairly quickly.

The bass and bellow-control was more of a problem. However, I felt that guitar-skills come in pretty handy there. As a guitarist, hammering down with your fingers in a staccato manner can come quite easily if you like to play the occasional solo on guitar. Music theory helps to understand where which chords lie, why they do, and how you have to rethink to bring it in a workable form for your thoughts.

I'm fairly happy I bought a 120-bass accordion because I soon made use of the major-7th chord buttons because they sound nicer than just the major-chords in some settings. I love the counterbass-line, that provides some cool possibilities, and am eager to explore the dim7th-chords. I feel that, had I started with only a 48- or 72-bass accordion, I would probably already be out looking for a bigger one. So if you're like me and have some background in theory and an instrument like piano, chances are you might want to go for a big one immediately if you are certain you want to learn this instrument. (Because I tend to have strong desires one day and then none at all the other day, I actually waited like a year before I picked up the Accordion to make sure I actually want to go through with this)

I am currently learning with a pretty nice and easy self-teaching-book (german by Peter M. Haas) and I really dig it. I reckon in 2-3 months I'll be through with it and go on to a more advanced book. I also made use of several YT-channels, most notably Moshe Zuchter who seems like a really cool dude, and the Liberty-Bellows-Channel.

Overall, the Accordion is easily one of the most fun instruments I have ever picked up. A guitar to your chest already feels nice, but there's nothing like holding down some bass-chord and play some tunes to it. The vibrations against the chest are amazing, it feels like you become one with the tunes. I really love this instrument and hope I can become good at it despite being fairly limited right-hand-wise (never got much good at elegant piano play).

Thanks for reading!