The Accordion in the Americas. Klezmer, Polka, Tango, Zydeco, and More!

368 Pages·2013·4.45 MB·English

by  Helena Simonett

The Accordion in the Americas
MUSIC IN AMERICAN LIFE
A list of books in the series appears
at the end of this book.
The Accordion
in the Americas
Klezmer, Polka, Tango,
Zydeco, and More!
Edited by
HELENA SIMONETT
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS PRESS
Urbana, Chicago, and Springfield
© 2012 by the Board of Trustees
of the University of Illinois All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America 1 2 3 4 5 C P 5 4 3 2 1
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The accordion in the Americas : klezmer, polka, tango,
zydeco, and
more! / edited by Helena Simonett.
p. cm. — (Music in American life) Includes index.
978-0-252-03720-7 (cloth) 978-0-252-07871-2 (pbk.) 1. Accordion—United States—History. 2.
ISBN ISBN
Accordionists—United States.
3. Accordion music—United States—Social aspects.
4. Immigrants—United States—Music—History and criticism.
I. Simonett, Helena, editor.
1083.a23 2012
ML
788.8'6097—dc23 2012008976
Contents
Introduction
HELENA SIMONETT

Chapter 1 From Old World to New Shores
HELENA SIMONETT
Chapter 2 Accordion Jokes: A Folklorist’s View
RICHARD MARCH
Chapter 3 From Chanky-Chank to Yankee Chanks: The Cajun Accordion as
Identity Symbol
MARK F. DEWITT
Chapter 4 ’Garde ici et ’garde lá-bas: Creole Accordion in Louisiana
JARED SNYDER
Chapter 5 “Tejano and Proud”: Regional Accordion Traditions of South Texas
and the Border Region
CATHY RAGLAND
Chapter 6 Preserving Territory: The Changing Language of the Accordion in
Tohono O’odham Waila Music
JANET L. STURMAN
Chapter 7 Accordions and Working-Class Culture along Lake Superior’s South
Shore
JAMES P. LEARY
Chapter 8 Play Me a Tarantella, a Polka, or Jazz: Italian Americans and the
Currency of Piano-Accordion Music
CHRISTINE F. ZINNI
Chapter 9 The Klezmer Accordion: An Outsider among Outsiders
JOSHUA HOROWITZ
Chapter 10 Beyond Vallenato: The Accordion Traditions in Colombia
EGBERTO BERMÚDEZ
Chapter 11 “A Hellish Instrument”: The Story of the Tango Bandoneón
MARÍA SUSANA AZZI
Chapter 12 No ma’ se oye el fuinfuán: The Noisy Accordion in the Dominican
Republic
SYDNEY HUTCHINSON
Chapter 13 Between the Folds of Luiz Gonzaga’s Sanfona: Forró Music in
Brazil
MEGWEN LOVELESS
Chapter 14 The Accordion in New Scores: Paradigms of Authorship and
Identity in William Schimmel’s Musical “Realities”
MARION S. JACOBSON

Glossary
Contributors
Index
The Accordion in the Americas
Figure 0.1 Accordion traditions in the Americas. Map by Helena Simonett.
Introduction
HELENA SIMONETT
When my grandfather would reach for his button accordion, a pre – World War I
Schwyzerörgeli (“little Swiss organ”), his grandchildren would gather at his feet
and listen. I marveled how his calloused fingers could run so effortlessly up and
down the keyboard and produce this magic sonorous tone: he made his
instrument purr like a cat sleeping on the stove bench. I also remember the
bellows changing color, showing beautiful wallpaper when pulled apart, and the
alpine flowers that decorated the wooden frame. But I began to detest this sound
of my childhood, and more generally Swiss folk music, when I entered my
adolescent years. I don’t think I ever knew, or wanted to know, the reason for my
rejection—the music was just old-fashioned and corny. Not so with Tex-Mex or
New Tango, though! I fell in love with Flaco Jiménez, with his shiny gold crown
exposed by his wide smile and energetic accordion playing, after seeing the
documentary film Polka: Roots of Mexican Accordion Playing on the Borderline
between South Texas and North Mexico, produced by the Dutch anthropologist
Robert Boonzajer Flaes and filmmaker Marteen Rens in 1986. Boonzajar Flaes,
who taught visual anthropology at the University of Amsterdam, cunningly
juxtaposes Jiménez and Austrian accordionists trying to play each other’s polka
styles (after listening to a tape), with the former—of course—much more
successful than the latter. While I discovered an array of new “world musics”
(many of which feature the accordion prominently, I have to point out), some
young people from my part of the country thought Swiss folk was cool and
began to fully embrace “ethnic” music—a trend that grew after the mid-1980s
and in the 1990s. Yet we all came full circle: “folk accordionists” such as
Pareglish’s Markus Flückiger play everything from “urchig” (original Swiss) to
Finnish, Irish, Chinese, and klezmer; my own Schwyzerörgeli is at arm’s
distance as I edit this volume. This volume is, in a way, my “coming out of the