Serious Question - buying an accordion

[Uncle Buck]

I'm looking to buy my wife an accordion for her upcoming birthday. She took lessons as a kid, hasn't played for decades.

I don't know squat about accordions. Anybody here who does who might have a suggestion or two? Any "red flags" to look for on a used one?

[Dan Schultz]

I also do a little accordion repair. The biggest danger is leaving an accordion in very warm conditions... such as in a car on a hot day. Another hazard is storage in an place that's doesn't have good enthalpy control. Temperature fluctuations cause the beeswax holding the 'guts' together to age faster. Also... humidity will rust the reeds.

Any or all of the above conditions will 'kill' an accordion quickly.

Be careful of the age. The reed plates are held onto the wooden manifolds with beeswax... which as I said earlier is very sensitive to heat. The beeswax and rosin mix will melt at slightly over 100 degrees. Beeswax dries out. The 'normal' life is perhaps twenty years or so even if the accordion is stored in ideal conditions.

Formost... do not buy one sight-unseen... such as on Ebay. See it in person. Pick it up and give it a shake. If there are parts rattling around inside.... pass it up. If it smells musty... pass it up. If it's fairly old and even a couple of keys don't work... pass it up. Chances are age has taken it's toll on the beeswax.

What might seem like a simple overhaul on an accordion... resetting the reed plates and retuning can cost $300-400. Just dirt on the reeds will cost this much to fix.

Never attempt to clean the reeds while they are attached to the manifolds. If fact... don't attempt to clean them with anything other than the correct solutions.

It's Old-World technology. Pretty simple in principle. But... very complicated to make work right.

[Uncle Buck]

Gotta love TubeNet. I just got some free advice that's worth it's weight in gold!!

Thanks!!!!!!

[Donn]

On the bright side, you might be able to get a pretty sweet deal on a used accordion these days.

Aside from the issues mentioned above, bear in mind that they can be kind of heavy. Mine weighs about as much as my 40K sousaphone. The weight comes from construction, from number of registers, and from the width of the bass side. The full size Stradella bass setup is 120 buttons, 6x20, and that's very common, but you'd hardly ever use half the 20 columns - roots D E A D G C F Bb Eb Ab covers a lot of ground in normal popular music. A 72 bass from F# to Db would do for most, or a 60 bass with same columns but minus the useless diminished row, and should be perceptibly lighter.

The registers or banks or whatever they'll call them are separate sets of reeds, to be used alone or in combinations. Sometimes the number of switches equals the number of banks (note that each side may have multiple banks), others I think may have switches for various combinations. It's good to have all the reeds you can carry if you want to play outdoors etc., but I'd look for one with a good, clear sound first and multiple banks second.

Lastly, some accordions are built to a smaller scale on the piano keyboard side, good for players with small hands. They may also have fewer keys, which saves weight but comes with obvious musical limitations.

[Uncle Buck]

Thanks for all the good advice. This is very helpful!

[Dan Schultz]

"Button boxes" are "harmonica" versions of accordions.

pull/push = draw/blow

If you're going to buy her an accordion, I can make you a trifecta deal on an accordion, a banjo, and a soprano saxophone. If you also buy a snare drum, I can toss in two roosters.

How much for the leeetle girl?