One hand plays chords while the other squeezes air
The accordion is a bellows-driven free-reed aerophone that packs melody on the right and ready-made bass chords on the left. Patented in Vienna by Cyrill Demian in 1829 after Berlin experiments around 1822, it rode European migration into vallenato, forró, norteño, klezmer, and classical conservatories alike.
Name and principle come from German Akkordeon and Akkord—a concord of sounds. Air forced past brass or steel reeds makes the tone; valves keep pressure from leaking. Kin include concertina, harmonica, and bandoneon; unlike those, the classic accordion splits melody (diskant) from left-hand accompaniment. Demian's first patent barely resembled today's box: mainly a left-hand buttonboard with the right working the bellows, sounding a full chord per key, even different chords on push versus pull (bisonoric). He aimed at a light traveler's singing companion.
Britain met the instrument about 1828; The Times sniffed in 1831, yet popularity grew, reaching New York by the mid-1840s. In Tula, Russia, Ivan Sizov and Timofey Vorontsov built simple models around 1830 from a German import; by the late 1840s their shops made 10,000 a year, over 50,000 by 1866 with neighboring villages, and more than 700,000 yearly by 1874. Charles Wheatstone's 1844 concertina patent united chords and keyboard in one squeezebox with external reed tuning. Adolf Müller's 1854 Schule für Accordion catalogued the exploding Viennese variety.
Modern players choose piano or button manuals, unisonoric or bisonoric layouts, and sizes from tiny boxes to 120-bass standards or 160-bass free-bass converters. Dynamics live entirely in bellows motion—swells, bellows shake (resfulego in Brazilian forró), even whooshes via the silent air button—because key touch itself is inexpressive. Electronics and MIDI now let some boxes feed PA systems or synth modules.
From Demian's travel chord machine to street dances and concert halls, the squeeze still does two jobs at once.
Source: Accordion
