The accordion, my first major instrument, taught me music theory, and made it so much easier to play by ear in any key. Unfortunately when I went to college to try and get a 4 year degree as a music major, the music department refused to accept it as a legitimate instrument to base a music degree. I ended up passing every music theory and writing classes with A’s as well as becoming a tutor for others in music theory, but was never able to graduate with a degree because the next nearest instrument to transition to from accordion was piano, and with 3+ years of piano lessons, I was still not able to play the left hand at a level to earn the degree. A 4 year waste of money and time from a college with a self righteous antiquated attitude.

This video made me realize how little I actually knew about the accordion and now I’m tempted to try it for myself hahaha

Accordion is such an underrated instrument. I picked it up as a joke after playing a bit of piano/keyboard, but I find myself playing the accordion way more now. Such an expressive sound.

Leave it to you to just find one of the world’s best accordion players to give you a beginner lesson. I love his “You’re such a classical player” remark. One of the most freeing things about playing music other than classical is that it so often isn’t either right or wrong. There are multiple viable choices. Glad it’s teaching you things about piano. If you want to fool around with something that gets you into breathing but doesn’t entail buttons or discomfort, try a melodica. Limited range so you’re typically playing with other people but cheap, easy, and it will make you conscious of a lot.

The accordion needs a comeback, it's such a cool and expressive instrument!

I remember my aged (then) virtuoso Piano Teacher telling my 12 year old self many years ago that the "...definition of impeccable manners was: having the ability to play the accordion, but refraining from doing so." 🤣🤣 But I will say your rendition of "Julie..." was delightful.💖

Wonderful, Nahre. Growing up in NYC in the 1960s, accordion was the “poor man’s piano” for many of us living in apartment buildings. I am now learning piano, but I plan to return to the “squeeze box” when I retire.

Accordionist here, been following you for years and delighted to see this! Another comment on here mentioned "ignoring the assumed limitations of this instrument" which is spot on - I learned a lot when going beyond what is traditionally considered "possible" on it. As a forró player it is also my duty to recommend listening to Sivuca and Dominguinhos!

I love that you are a Yann Tiersen junkie. So many musicians I know just stare blankly at me until I play "that Amelie song."

"You're such a classical musician. You make one mistake and must play it a hundred and fifty times." I laughed out loud and feel called out!

I used to play the accordion when I was a child. This is nostalgic for me, and the perspective of a piano player is super interesting. Loved the video!

This reminds me of my journey playing the organ. It has completely changed my general keyboard technique (for the better), has made me even more comfortable NOT using the pedal when playing piano, and it has made me sight read, breathe, and think of dynamics and orchestration differently than before I really started playing organ.

Six years accordion player here, it just makes me so happy to see someone choose to learn the accordion. The accordion is a rare instrument nowadays and I really wish it could be revived.

I like the fact that you’re the type of musician who’s open to explore other instruments! .. I usually used to play piano and epiano for long, recently been exploring synths and electric guitars.. and it’s a unique experience when you come from different background of instrument to a newer one. Thank you for the content ..

I had the same enlightments with the diatonic accordion and the pedal steel guitar. They organized to fulfill every box of the tonal system and all it's inner relationships

I’m also a pianist who just picked up the accordion! I decided to start learning about a year ago so I could participate in a folk band at my university. It’s been a huge learning experience and it was so cool to see this video because it made me realize how much learning accordion has changed how I play and listen to music :) thanks for sharing!

My high school music teacher wanted to teach me accordion, but the association with corny Italian love songs and polkas made it unthinkable to me. Yet NOW, I have a friend who is the keyboardist for Weird Al, I guess there IS a place for the squeeze-box.🤓 Good luck on your musical journey.

The left hand side of the instrument reminds me of how playing guitar feels!

omg i love seeing people discover how wonderful squeeze box instruments are, i've played accordion for a few years now and its helped me learn so much more about the basics of music theory than when i was trying to teach myself how to play piano.

Congrats for the initiative. As an ex high level classical piano player, the jazz players and the accordionists are simply eating us alive in their capability of playing music. Respect for giving it a go.

Dang, 25 years learning music, this is really cool to watch, a master at her craft, constantly learning.

You successfully break down all mental barriers, and here's another example. Courage too!

I suggest you to check out the "bayan (accordion)" It has buttons on the both sides! I think you'd find even more of chords relationships if you try bayan It's a very virtuoso instrument!

I wish every musician-every person, actually-can learn from your open-mindedness. Not many people accept to leave their comfort zone like you've done here. Even fewer are able to turn the discomfort into such a positive experience! Bravo, as always

As someone who has also been learning the accordion for the the last month, this makes me really happy. It's a wonderful instrument ❤️

Shout out to the Melodica, a cheap and fun instrument which allows you to experience the importance of breathing in musical phrasing on the keyboard while not having those impossible left hand buttons to deal with…

I'm a trained drummer, fake-it-by-ear pianoist, and crude bass player. I've always thought that any skill you can pick up on a new instrument kind of lends insight to your other instruments and makes you a little better on all of them.

wow i love watching people learn new things!!!! youre so inspiring

If you have time to explore the accordion more, there are different bass systems that you can play with the left hand too. The bass system you were using is called Stradella (where each button plays a chord), but some accordions allow you to switch to a "free bass" system using one of the clips so that each bass button plays a single note, which means you can play all sorts of classical music/pieces written for organs etc. Fascinating instrument!

I love hearing about your musical journey. It’s always inspiring! Can’t wait to hear about your next adventure

I love literally everything about this. You are such a wonderful person.

This video resonates with me so much! I'm a guitarist and my best friend was a pianist/organist/accordionist. He always said that to him it's a miracle that ANYTHING could be played on the guitar. He saw the guitar as six simultaneous keyboards, one keyboard per string with the added restriction that each keyboard only allowed one note at a time.

Nahre: Thanks for sharing your explorations. Your videos remind me to keep pushing my own limits and you always come up with creative ways to do that and start me thinking about creative things I could do to expand my music. Once again you are such an inspiration.

Nahre, you're such a great source of inspiration in so many ways! My deepest thanks.

Nahre, this is so much fun! I absolutely love that Accordion is a combination of skills you're already proficient at and skills you're completely new to. That makes for a fascinating learning journey. Definitely one of my favorite videos if yours yet.

Omg nahre I LOVE the accordion!! Especially because it's used so much in folk music..... I would love love love to see you explore that with ur new instrument!! Big fan!!

Your curiousity and willingness to always learn new things is really inspiring. You are doing good things - thank you 🙌🏼

A few years ago, a fellow jazz pianist asked me about buying and learning the accordion. I was a bit surprised, as I'm more used to accordion players picking up the piano. He said that you can't take a piano on a family picnic, and also used the example of Russian soldiers carrying an accordion around on the battlefield or in while hiding underground during the siege of Stalingrad.

Accordion is a great second or third instrument, it really does get you thinking. It's not for wimps either let me tell you, my Lira model 20B accordion Weighs 30 lbs.! That's three _heavy side_ Gibson Les Paul guitars. Accordions are extremely expressive, and like the organ you can play more genres of music than any other instrument. I'm a guitarist since age 12 in 1978. In the 90's I rescued an early 60's Lowrey Berkshire electronic organ. I can't stress enough how important it is to try a different instrument if the one you've tried doesn't suit your fancy. I grew up with a Hammond L100 organ but it wasn't until I got the Lowrey organ that I fell in love with organ. Interesting though I did get a Hammond A100 (a B3 W/ internal speakers) after I played the Lowrey for a of couple years. I own 9 great organs now I consider the best brands/ models from 1946 to 1984. For all you reed fans, in 1946 Wurlitzer Theater Organ Div Tonawanda NY USA realized that after World War II they wouldn't be able to make any money making theater pipe organs anymore (plus they'd already retooled to manufacture b0mbs for the war effort). So they bought the patent for the *Electrostatic Free Reed Organ* from the Everett Piano & Organ Company. NOTE, the reeds were not used _acoustically_ , but for their harmonic character and accurate "never needs tuned" tone generation, and filtered for "Organ voicing" -FLUTE, STRING, HORN/REED, DIAPASON. A very cool graphic article on the North Suburban Hammond Organ Society (NSHOS) explains in thorough detail how the 1953-1963 Wurlitzer 4600/4410 Continuous-Free Reed, electrostatic reed organ operates. Actually I adlibbed a video playing my 1956 model 4410. links to to the article and Ken Griffin albums/ TV performance in the description below the video, VIDEO TITLE: *Wurlitzer 4600 Electrostatic Reed Organ aka 56' 4410 + Hammond HR40 , Spectratone + Leslie Horn V-21*

this was fabulous / priceless will make u even more brilliant than what u already are.. looking forward to enjoying the gift which keeps on giving.

I took accodion lesson as a boy in the 1970s. I was so excited and still play. Never was that good but still love it! Love this video...so fun!

Thankyou for such a wonderful video. I'm classically trained on piano and pipe organ and you reminded me why I love the similarities and differences between the instruments and the demands of each. The piano accordion has always been on my wishlist to learn. I think you did really well for just a years worth of practice. Keep up the great work 👍

Love hearing about all these musical journeys! Learning different instruments is super important to your musicianship I think.

You've done it again Nahre. You've done a simple video, and packed it with info and love of music...🤠👍🍁🍁

You're amazing. Love the videos/content you put out!

Excellent video, I can def relate. Been playing piano for 30y, incl. professionally, and discovered the accordion a few years ago. It was so easy to pick up and taught me so much. The 'breathing' part is very true. I've had a feeling of osmosis with my instrument and been able to express myself much better than on the piano. I had an electronic accordion and the bellows gave it a much more 'acoustic' feeling than any electronic keyboard I've ever owned. The other very true part is how the accordion forces you to be much more intuitive because you don't see your fingers so you need to focus on the feeling rather than looking in a rational way at where your fingers are. I'd encourage any experienced piano player to get a (piano) accordion. Some of the benefits I do not recall you mentioning is how easy it is to travel with an accordion (and pianists know how frustrating it can be to carry a keyboard). For what it's worth, I also tried playing on a button accordion. I did my best, spent a lot of time on it, and was very hopeful that I'd become fluent (not least because button accordions are much better for jazz than piano was, being laid out in a more logical way), but it's been really frustrating so it's been a bit of a love-hate relationship.

I was so psyched to see this video pop up! I hadn't played piano in many years, but have been playing lots of other stuff...like Accordion. I was SHOCKED to sit down at the piano about a month ago and find out that I suddenly just knew how to play in such an expressive, intuitive, and confident way. I used to do all my songwriting on guitar. It's basically all piano now.

I love the enthusiam!!! We can tell you loved this journey!!!

Love your style, humor, talent, and delivery... thanx!

Such a great idea. When I switch instruments, it really gives me an omniscient view on my writing. This a great video! Thanks!

I am happy you made this video about how the accordion has brought you new insight. You play it well.

I've recently been trying my hand at the accordion, and watching someone as talented and accomplished as you illustrating your struggles and lessons learned was heartwarming ❤

So many people disparage the "Stomach Steinway" but it is an incredible instrument. It was the most popular instrument in the early 20th century, supplanted only by the guitar - providing the bellowing is challenging - right on, Nahre - you're really on to something! Just play it a little bit every week and enjoy the secrets you learn from it.

Like you, I have been a pianist and keyboardist for decades. When I first played an accordion I was struck by something very unexpected, how visceral it was to play. On a piano the sound is “over there” just beyond your finger tips. Not far, but slightly apart from you physically. But on an accordion the sound is literally vibrating your chest, it rumbles your rib cage and feels as if your body is projecting the sound. It’s like standing next to a speaker at a concert, every note is not just heard but felt.

Awesome video Nahre!

Always love your video's. This one somehow made me very happy. I know several pianists who also play accordeon (or even bandoneon) and they are usually the nicest people imaginable. Curious and versatile.

I've been an accordion player for a few years now and I am so happy to see that you did this video! It's such a great instrument.

I love your insights here. Grade school piano lessons were always about playing the notes on the page. Nobody talked about chord progressions, inversions, etc. Accordion has opened this up for me.

5:40 When I started making the connections between the circle of fifths and chord structure in high school I remember being angry with my music and theory teachers for not making it more apparent. It's probably the single most important thing to understand for writing and even enjoying music second only to rhythm and song structure. Its crazy how much more musicians of the past had a much more intuitive understanding of theory despite all the information out there today. We put so much focus on learning chords and scales rather than learning the rules and patterns of music that make it all make sense.

More accordion, please please please! It sounds so wonderful in your piece.

Hey, sweet vids! For me this concept has been very important. Starting out as electronic music producer, I went to DJing, and then to learning guitar, and then to making instrumental music, and then to piano. Everything is so interconnected in music and there’s so much to learn and overtake the teachings from other concepts / instruments! I love how you apply feeling signatures to every tiny passage, I could only do the same when we talk about music sonically, for example character of a sample, I learn a lot from you!

this is so dope! so excited for your journey Nahre : )

What an insightful and poetic video. Thanks for being such an inspiration.

Wow! I have enjoyed your piano lessons. Now I will enjoy your accordion lessons.

Cory is a great friend and awesome guy!! So cool to watch this :))

Love the accordion and the Amelie soundtrack. Your teacher is amazing. I love the French Musette style and have listened for years, so many great players and pieces. I hope you continue with this instrument.

So glad people more people can see all the amazing things even beginning accordion has brought me!

As always, thank you for the inspiring video. I think as a lifelong musician the only thing I’ve learned is that there is no real craft if you can’t try and find creative ways to access beginners mind. One of the things I admire most about the work that you do here with these videos is you’re constantly looking at things from new angles and trying to find a deep understanding as well as a beginners entry point. Thanks for the great work!

Lovely! I can see this is not easy, but it's great that it makes you think differently and adds to your way of approaching and maybe even improving your harmonic development. Bravo Nahre, your dropping Juliard opened a whole new world for you and gained many followers of which I'm one!

Thank You for your passion and exploring music always looks so fun & fantasy and so happy. It encourage me so much. Really love when you play with smiling ☺️😇🥰

I loved this video. Thanks so much for sharing. I love watching people flexing their mind muscles learning something new, and breaking beyond their comfort zones with musical instruments.

This mirrors a lot of my experiences. I've played piano since age 4 and have become obsessed with the accordion since picking it up in 2019. It has totally rewired my brain and absolutely changed how I think musically. Last year I switched from piano accordion to the button version, aka CBA and that (additional) remapping has had profound impacts on my improvisation. It has gotten me out of so many ruts. Even the occasional mistakes prompt some fantastic paths that never would have occurred to me on piano. One recommendation: no genre is off limits. Cover absolutely every song you can throw at it...pop, punk, country, jazz, folk, classical bluegrass, and they magically transform into something entirely new, and the bonus is that all those curveballs rapidly build in familiarity with the patterns how to solve musical problems creatively. Keep it up and show us your progress!

Brilliant.. So excited you've started this journey.. Piano is/was my first instruemtn along with flute.. so the breath thing was always there with me but going to accordion gave me all those soem things.. exactly.. it's like the Satie said of his gymnopdies.. they are looking at the same sculpure from different angles.. I find this with all the folk instruemtns .. they tend to exist much more on a spectrum then in some kind of finished isolation.. and each gives you a dirrefetn take on the physicality of making sound..

I started out hours and hours ago trying to learn how to play ‘the wellerman’ on a $35 melodian. And now it’s 2am and I have found myself way over here completely out of my league. lol. Yet fascinated.

Hi! Your authentic presentation is so nice in these videos. I love your video production (sounds and graphics) too. 👍

I loved this Nahre! As a childhood accordion player who never got very good, and now who is learning piano as an adult, this made me smile. The accordion deserves much more love and respect (which it tends to have more so in Europe, less so in North America).

Love this video!!

Awesome! Love this take

I'm happy to see that the accordion is getting a bit more attention lately. I hope you'll continue to enjoy your new instrument :D

Great video- thanks! I’ve come back to the accordion after a long gap and realise how nice it is to be able to sustain (and breathe through) notes and chords, something more difficult on the piano, and nearly impossible on the guitar. Looking forward to hearing what instrument you discover next!🤣🎶

Amazing video (as always 😁) so inspirational!

It was a lot of fun to listen to play and explain the accordion. You're quite charming and I'm very happy that I stumbled across your video.

This is probably my favorite video of yours for all time. I always adore how you described lessons learned from anything you'd tried on. But this one confirms lot of things I'd believed all along like phrasing and how humanity an instrument players should allow those to play along in the performance. And besides that your essay is clear, and maybe because you're much cuter! 🤣 I really don't know now.

I've always LOVED the piano organ! It's got this low-fi organ tone, and the chords work really well to back minimalistic pieces.

Its realy cool to watch this Video as a piano and accordion Player since I am 5 years old. Great Video and greetings from Germany👍🤩 Maybe it is interessting to know that there are different left hand manuals so that you are able to play pieces for organ and especially Bach :)

Friends of mine have a room full of instruments. My good ole grand piano ended up there, but you also find there guitars, percussion and some accordions side by side with several other instruments that could make a happy weird orchestra. At some point, I started to mess around on the accordion, and composing a simple piece. I have been doing this over the years I have been there, often no more than once or twice a year. Still, every time I was there, I came up with something new. I have found it very fruitful playing the accordion. Even playing baroque pieces is happily possible. The other way round, I felt it difficult to translate pieces back to the piano. I had to tinker what makes good piano harmonies anew - at the accordion, they are quite at hand, but you'd need 3 or 4 hands at the piano to do the same music, and it tends to sound blocky if you do it with 2. In the end, every instrument gives its own perspective to music. Today, I have a harpsichord. Not that much different from playing the piano, still another perspective to music. As you have nearly no dynamics, other aspects start to play a greater role, like tone durations, timings, arpeggios and ornaments to convey your musical ideas you otherwise could convey using dynamics. Baroque music sounds the way it does for a reason, and one is the possibilities and limitations of the harpsichord that was always around during that age.

SUCH AN INTERESTING VIDEO! I'm into a deep crisis as a crap musician in this period...your enthousiasm is a breath of air and a great encouragement! Thanks!

Well done. Excellent endeavor and analysis

Nahre, allowing us to experience your experience....a treasure. Thank you.

First time watcher on your channel, but also an accordionist and if you want another mindblower, borrow a chromatic button accordion sometime! It takes a bit more learning but SUBSTANTIALLY less than you would think, and it really gives you an appreciation for note layout in the same way the stradella bass does.

I love seeing other musicians having a go at 'my' instrument. It is a lot of fun/frustration, but once you got the bass, it makes a lot of sense. Great for theory/harmonising rules as you are forced to learn them just to be able to play etc. I met Cory when he came to New Zealand, real nice guy, VERY lively. I loved your quote about 'its one thing choosing not to look and not being able to look' :D

Well done, Nahre! Keep it up!

This is one of the most beautiful videos you have ever put together, I wish I could express it better in words but thank you so much for sharing this.

Excellent video and very enjoyable.

Always love your videos!

Love to see this ❤

A wonderful video and as someone who started on acoustic guitar, then electric, then bass, then drums, then keys, then harmonica i can't say how much each has informed the other, and the only thing i needed to do was be comfortable becoming a beginner again and again (and yes, i almost bought an accordion years ago only to be scooped by a friend !) I do hope to try trumpet one day but finding a space to practice will be the challenge ... not the fear of becoming a beginner once more.

I love the accordion and free reed instruments in general. I hope you share more videos of your progress with this instrument

Your original piece is lovely!

Oh My God! I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE this. It makes me so happy! Thanks.