Akkordeonale 2016
International Accordion Festival
What’s more beautiful than an accordion?
Five accordions – at the Akkordeonale!
It’s been a long time now since this well beloved and often underestimated instrument found its way out of
its dusty and philistine niche to show its popularity and versatility in every musical branch: not only in
traditional or folk music, but also in rock, pop, classical and jazz music, the accordion is quite at home now –
even hip hop and rap have discovered it.
The Akkordeonale plays its part here, highlighting the musical evolvement of this cosmopolitan amongst the
instruments, across all cultures and styles. Blazing musical abundance awaits the audience: from traditional
to contemporary, from exotic to classical and jazzy. Accomplished and fiery! Adrenalin and true balm for the
soul!
For the eighth time now, Dutchman Servais Haanen has gathered musicians from different countries to
perform a programme of impelling blues with creole roots, classical music from Sweden, pure Basque zest
for life, metaphorical Italian scores and Dutch sound aesthetics, garnished with Swiss hammered dulcimer,
Spanish vocals and percussion.
Characteristic for the Akkordeonale is the coming together of the performing musicians in a vivid
interchange of solos and ensemble pieces. This is a challenge, since as different as the cultural
backgrounds are (and the personalities), are the musical approaches and styles: one has undergone an
ambitious academic training, the other one has learned his instrument from earliest childhood on in his
culture and thus the only real common language is music.
This creates a thrilling coexistence on stage. In the interaction, diverse musical possibilities intertwine with
improvisational talent, spontaneity and the passion to put on a great concert together, so that the musicians
become a unity, putting forth something new, something never heard before.
A unique celebration of sounds, a most exceptional event.
See – Hear – Enjoy!
Andre Thierry (USA)
Impelling blues with creole roots
Daniel Andersson (Sweden)
Viking goes Vivaldi
Janire Egaña Zelaia (Basque country)
Sun from the wild Basque country
Maurizio Minardi (Italy)
Fellini on accordion
Servais Haanen (Netherlands)
The Master of Fine Sounds
Accompanying musicians:
Vanesa Muela (Spain)
Percussion and vocals
Christoph Pfändler (Switzerland)
Hammered dulcimer
Andre Thierry (USA)
Impelling blues from the South of the USA
With his 30 years of age, Andre Thierry is already considered a legendary talent, having cast a spell over
other musicians already as a child. He comes from Richmond, California, and stems from a French-Creole
family with a high affinity for zydeco music.
Andre is a virtuoso on various types of accordion, playing cajun accordion (a single-row diatonic concertina),
two- and three-row concertinas and chromatic piano accordion. From traditional Creole waltz to his
speciality the hard impelling blues, he knows how to decorate traditional zydeco with jazz-rock and hip hop.
Daniel Andersson (Sweden)
Viking goes Vivaldi
Young Swede Daniel Andersson has played accordion since the age of nine and studied in Saint Petersburg
and Paris.
As is customary in the classical accordion world, he has participated in many competitions and gained
various international prizes. To name a few: he was already accordionist of the year in Sweden in 2005 and
twice won the national Swedish competition for accordion.
Quite the globetrotter, Daniel performs in Europe, the USA and Africa. He gives concerts as a soloist, but is
also on tour with various ensembles with an assorted programme of classical music, folk, tango and other
styles. He is also a welcome visitor to the Royal Swedish Familiy.
Janire Egaña Zelaia (Basque country)
Sun from the wild Basque country
Basque Janire Egaña Zelaia had an accordion put in her cradle by her family, so it was quite natural for her
to perform in public already as a child.
She plays chromatic piano accordion and the diatonic trikitixa accordion. Together with her band
„Dangiliske“ and fellow musicians, she has toured across Europe and South America. As a proud Basque,
Janire takes a stand for her culture but also loves to engage with different musical influences and styles.
With her radiating stage presence, she has already mesmerized the audience of the first Akkordeonale in
2009
Maurizio Minardi (Italy)
Fellini on accordion
Italian composer, accordionist and pianist Maurizio Minardi combines and interweaves musical influences of
minimalist classical music, jazz and folk with tango and rumba and thus creates an intimate expressive
sound. His highly acclaimed album „The Cook, the Clown, the Monk and the Accordionist“ is a parody of the
movie „The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover“ from Peter Greenaway. It has the qualities of a
soundtrack and stands in the tradition of composers like Nino Rota, Yann Thiersen und Ennio Morricone.
Alongside own projects, Maurizio performs together with Carmen Souza, Paolo Fresu, Enrico Rava and the
Royal Shakespeare Company. He is currently living in London.
Servais Haanen (Netherlands)
The Master of Fine Sounds
Servais Haanen, that musical maverick mastermind! Not just the organizer of the Akkordeonale, he
composes and arranges the festival’s ensemble pieces and guides the audience through the programme.
Servais’ introductions to each composition and each musician have already acquired cult status, famous for
their wit and wisdom.
For a long time now, he has been working on pushing the boundaries of what his accordion can do,
integrating elements of New Music, minimalistic structures and other unusual and exceptional sounds.
Thanks to his multifaceted work with bands (i.a. Appellation Contrôlée, Quatro Ventos, KlangWeltenFestival)
and his activity as a composer for various productions at music theatres and for film documentaries, Servais
brings into play diverse musical material.
In addition to being a docent for accordion, one of his dearest activities is his ensemble work with
exceptional or impossible instrumentation.
“It’s always huge fun for me to invent a new programme every year with musicians from the most diverse
countries, to be on tour with such a great gang and to put on such a great concert!”
Vanesa Muela (Spain)
Percussion and vocals
Vanesa Muela is a Spanish traditional singer and percussionist.
She gave her first concert as a six-year-old, meanwhile they add up to more than 3500 in Spain, France,
Portugal, Italy, Greece and Germany. Vanesas musical presentations are based on years of field studies of
the inhabitants of rural regions in Spain, which has earned her, as the first woman in Spain, the ethnological
award „Cultura Viva“.
Her instruments are traditional and varied and some are even everyday objects: e.g. seashells, spoons,
frying pan, mortar, zambomba (friction drum), pandereta (tambourine) and adufe (square frame drum).
Christoph Pfändler (Switzerland)
Hammered dulcimer
The young Swiss Christoph Pfändler learned hammered dulcimer because he fancied an exceptional
instrument. He didn’t grow up with folk music and didn’t show an interest in it initially – he was rather
attracted to the hard sound of bands like Metallica, Motörhead and AC/DC. This only changed during his
musical studies, when he discovered Swiss folk music for himself. Together with his „Metal Kapelle“ he
melds elements of rock, metal, pop, jazz, classical and folk music to a totally new sound, that’s sometimes
raw, sometimes tender, but always melodic. Chris performs at the Akkordeonale for the second time now.