Bulgaria seems to have no shortage of great accordionists and Milen Slavov is one of the brightest lights in Balkan traditional and contemporary music. He moved to America in 1997 and currently performs, composes, produces, and teaches throughout the United States and Canada. I know a few of our readers saw him perform with the Yuri Yunakov Ensemble at the International Accordion Festival in San Antonio last year.

We’ve seen some online accordion lesson courses before, but nothing quite like the ones that Milen is currently offering through his website. He offers both custom audio (he’ll send you an MP3) and custom video lessons based around one of four subjects: ornaments in Bulgarian music, Bulgarian/Balkan piano accordion music, phrases and techniques, or improvisation. Even cooler, though, you can schedule face-to-face lessons to be conducted via webcam.

Normally, I’m a little skeptical of online video lessons because there’s no substitute for the feedback you get from a real teacher. But I’ll admit I’m intrigued by the possibility of taking lessons (even long-distance ones) from one of the world’s top accordionists. If anyone out there takes a lesson from Milen, let us know. I’d be really curious to hear how it goes.

Few artists challenge notions of what the accordion can or can’t do quite like Poland’s Motion Trio. Since 1996, Motion Trio has been taking its unorthodox playing techniques (bellows scraping, accentuated vibrato) and eclectic repertoire (jazz, rock, avant garde) from the streets where they first honed their skills to the concert hall. According to trio founder, Janusz Wojtarowicz:

“Our idea is to take this instrument, which is only thought about for weddings or polka or tango, and to make it as serious as any other classical instrument… We want to show the world that this is a versatile instrument that can play everything from contemporary classical music to folk or even avant garde music.”

Last Sunday, the trio played at Carnegie Hall in New York and I found an excellent clip of their performance online. It cuts off abruptly at the end, but you’ll get the idea — their playing is inspired, quirky, and totally captivating.

You don’t see a lot of accordions on late-night TV (or any-time TV, unfortunately), so I was happily surprised to catch the Dropkick Murphys on the Late Show with David Letterman last Friday. With the band member Marc Orrell rocking a Roland accordion, they played a track (“The State of Massachusetts”) from their latest CD, The Meanest of Times. Here’s the video:

I usually associate bulky, five-row chromatic accordions with stern Eastern European men who play Rachmaninoff for fun. Not pony-tailed 19-year-old Japanese girls in short skirts. But this video of Koharu, accordionist for the all-female street band Minority Orchestra, has changed my perception. I tried running her website through Google’s translator, but then it made even less sense. Fortunately, her playing needs no translation.

If you enjoy this clip, be sure to watch her band performing in a vegetable patch.

[Found via Boing Boing]

I didn’t watch the American Music Awards last night because I know they’ll never top the 1998 show, which featured a one-of-a-kind, all-star accordion performance by Those Darn Accordions, Dick Contino, Weird Al, and Drew Carey. The accordion supergroup performed a medley of American Music Award winners of the past 25 years, from “Billie Jean” to “Achy Breaky Heart.”

Update: Thanks to Dick Clark’s copyright police, it looks like the clip is no longer available. Trust us, it was great!

I’ve never played a bayan (Russian chromatic accordion), but I’m consistently blown away by the bayan virtuosos I’ve seen and heard. A Metafilter post on Igor Stravinsky’s Petrushka led me to this excellent clip of Finnish accordionist (and 1989 Coupe Mondiale winner) Mika Väyrynen performing a selection from the ballet. It really shows how, in the right hands, one accordion can sound like an entire orchestra.

I’m hoping one of our German-speaking readers can help me out on this one. It’s a video interview with Art of Accordion, a German quintet who won the International Competition for Ensemble Music at the Coupe Mondiale earlier this year. The interview is interspersed with clips of the group slapping their accordions rhythmically while singing/rapping. I’m curious to know what they’re singing about and where they came up with this style.

If you’ve ever wondered how a diatonic accordion is built, this five-minute video from the Science Channel show “How It’s Made” is the perfect introduction. It follows Raynald Ouellet as he builds a one-row diatonic accordion at his workshop, Accordéon Mélodie in Quebec. (In addition to making beautiful accordions, Ouellet is a fantastic player and founder of the annual festival Carrefour mondial de l’accordéon.) From sealing reeds to fashioning bellows, it’s an excellent overview of building a diatonic accordion.

The accordion has always been the ultimate dance/party instrument and this video for “Heater” by Samim confirms it. This minimal techno track was one of the summer’s biggest club hits, tearing up dance floors from Ibiza to Berlin. Bruce over at Accordion Noir sent us the video, which features a prominent accordion sample from the classic Colombian cumbia, “La Cumbia Cienaguera.”