Yes, I know, I’ve been away from this blog for months; I’d
say “I’ve been busy” but the opposite is the case. You don’t need details, and
I really don’t want to give them, so I’m going to start out with a subject near
and dear to my heart…accordions.
I had a ruder-than-usual comment about the accordion today.
Not about my playing itself…this person has never heard me play, nor do I care
to play for them…but about the accordion in general. Actually, I don’t think
this person knows that I play one myself, and I really don’t take their comment
as a deliberate insult, but I think it deserves a response.
Here’s what was said: (paraphrased a bit) “Why would anyone
play the accordion? It’s not like it’s a musical instrument or anything.”
No big deal, really; I make rude accordion jokes myself all
the time. Quite known for them, in fact. Usually when I get something like this
I just take it as the good-natured comment it was intended to be. Besides, most
such comments come from people I know well and get on with, and they’re people
I know and that I know wouldn’t say anything deliberately rude or hurtful.
And, in truth, this was hardly hurtful.
But I must admit that that “not a musical instrument” crack,
coming as it did from a near stranger, got to me.
Look, if you don’t like accordion music I’m not going to try
to convert you. If you just can’t stomach the sound of the thing, nothing I can
say will suddenly make you love them and I’m certainly not going to try to
accomplish that. I am not going to engage in such a fruitless exercise. Tell ya
what I will do, though…
Below are three web links to Youtube videos of a guy named
Remco Sietsema. He’s from The Netherlands and, you guessed it, he plays the
button accordion. Well. Very well, in fact.
(Yes, I already posted a clip of Remco to Facebook; in
that clip he was playing beside Mark Söhngen, another accordionist from The
Netherlands but one that favors Cajun/Zydeco music.)
All I ask is that you give at least one of these a listen. Just one. (Unless, of course, like me you just have to hear them all.) Once you have done that, I challenge anyone to claim that the accordion isn't a musical instrument. I challenge anyone to claim that the sound it makes is not musical. If you don't like it, fine, you don't like it; there's a lot of accordion music that I can't stomach, either. But once you've listened to it, I dare you to call it unmusical.
And before you ask...no, I can't play like this. There aren't many that can. I am not in Remco's league; if I may extend the baseball metaphor a bit, Remco is in the All-Star game and I am barely playing sandlot.
But enough about me; here's Remco Sietsema.
And, for good measure, here's that Cajun jam with Mark Söhngen that I posted to Facebook a couple of days ago.
If you still don't like the accordion, fine. If you can't abide the music, or the instrument, or anything else about it, fine. The accordion may indeed be the Rodney Dangerfield of musical instruments ("...It don't get no respect! No respect at all!"), but do not sit there and tell me it isn't music.
(Oh, and those accordion jokes, memes, and pictures? Keep them coming. If you haven't noticed, I post a lot of these myself.)
We now return you to your regularly scheduled political ranting.
The Blues Viking
The opinions here expressed are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.
(ADDENDUM: I should add that Remco Seitsema has a presence on Facebook; I've been to that page but it's mostly in Dutch and no one in my family has spoken Dutch since the British showed up in New Amsterdam with their guns, saying "Right, you lot; you're all British now an' we're callin' this place New York!" Here endeth the history lesson.)
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