Hello, I'm a new member and thought it might be fun to introduce myself. I'm not actually an accordionist - I play woodwinds in the Seattle, WA area in a duo with a fantastic accordionist, who I also ended up marrying! (see pic) I'm an intense accordion enthusiast as all of my music involves listening to and interacting with the accordion. We play instrumental music that is rooted in traditional 'Fest Noz' music from Brittany, heavily influenced by jazz and perhaps a bit by by rock as well. Our full band has an electric bass and we're eternally struggling to find the right drummer who has both jazz and rock chops.
My spouse started out playing a (Petosa) piano accordion long ago in a jazz band, as she's an accomplished pianist, but switched to C system chromatic instruments years back, initially a Saltarelle Bourroche (via the Button Box) but as her need for range increased, a Beltuna Leader (purchased through John Castiglione, a very fine gentlemen to work with). She always uses a 3+3 chord-side setup for the complex chords she loves, and as we've discovered in recording our first album, completely dry tuning seems to capture the focus and tone that works best for our sound. The Beltuna has an internal Sennheiser mic system, installed by our superb local Seattle accordion tech Michael Arralde, which is superlative although we also use external mics on either side. I imagine we'll be selling off the Bourroche at some point, perhaps on this forum if there's an appropriate place to do so. We're trying to get a Saltarelle Pannonica as a second, lighter instrument as the Beltuna is fairly heavy and the bellows are extremely stiff - she has to do a whole exercise regimen to keep her shoulders strong enough to not be injured. There's actually a smashed Pannonica in the front room right now that didn't survive the shipping process, but that's an unhappy story that I won't dwell on here today.
I'm most interested in chromatic C system accordions, in particular solutions to recording them ( I also have some expertise to share in this area) and also details about different makes and models, who are the best retailers, notable recordings to look out for, and so on into infinity.
My spouse started out playing a (Petosa) piano accordion long ago in a jazz band, as she's an accomplished pianist, but switched to C system chromatic instruments years back, initially a Saltarelle Bourroche (via the Button Box) but as her need for range increased, a Beltuna Leader (purchased through John Castiglione, a very fine gentlemen to work with). She always uses a 3+3 chord-side setup for the complex chords she loves, and as we've discovered in recording our first album, completely dry tuning seems to capture the focus and tone that works best for our sound. The Beltuna has an internal Sennheiser mic system, installed by our superb local Seattle accordion tech Michael Arralde, which is superlative although we also use external mics on either side. I imagine we'll be selling off the Bourroche at some point, perhaps on this forum if there's an appropriate place to do so. We're trying to get a Saltarelle Pannonica as a second, lighter instrument as the Beltuna is fairly heavy and the bellows are extremely stiff - she has to do a whole exercise regimen to keep her shoulders strong enough to not be injured. There's actually a smashed Pannonica in the front room right now that didn't survive the shipping process, but that's an unhappy story that I won't dwell on here today.
I'm most interested in chromatic C system accordions, in particular solutions to recording them ( I also have some expertise to share in this area) and also details about different makes and models, who are the best retailers, notable recordings to look out for, and so on into infinity.
