Learn to play the bandoneón

Well, out of the blue, I received a very interesting email from a real-life bandoneonist and instructor who has a very interesting method for sale. I’m intrigued. I’m amazed. Could it be done this way? I have had quite a lot of musical training, so…

Coincidentally enough, a few days ago my five-year-old received a toy accordion as a gift and I just can’t keep my hands off of it.

I feel like spending some quality time trolling the net for a used bandoneón.

Lest you think the bandoneón is just for playing soul-haunting tango in a smoky bar in Buenos Aires, I believe I can hear a bandoneón in the song Neighborhood #2 (Laika) on The Arcade Fire’s kick-butt album Funeral. I don’t have the liner notes in front of me to prove it, but I’m almost sure of it. (Note: wrong. It’s just an accordian.) The Arcade Fire is currently the most interesting “indie” band you’re likely to hear this year or next.

At any rate, the bandoneón also plays a central role in the get-up-and-dance La Revancha del Tango from Gotan Project which was a club hit in 2003. Not your basic tango authentico, and not to be missed. This Paris combo mixes Astor Piazzolla with drum machine and synth, forming something you might call tango electronico.

And lastly, from B.A. via Eighteenth Street Lounge, Federico Aubele delivers Thievery Corporation-produced beats peppered with lots and lots of bandoneón.

The bandoneón is a bellows and metal reed instrument much like the accordian. The bandoneón is “an offshoot of a family of german button and bellows instruments called koncertinas, invented around 1845.” Link It’s the defining sound of Argentinian Tango.

If you’ve ever heard a tango, and who hasn’t, then you’ve heard a bandoneón. Perhaps it doesn’t have the same effect on you as it does me, but I love the sound of that little box.