Re: Accordian History

[DrRMF2700 <DrRMF2700...>]

 Anyhow I heard on NPR( national public radio US)
> that the accordian was banned in Nazi era.
> True or false, if you would know,  and any source for such info?
Robert Fogel

"False. It was never banned completely, even though some people wanted
to.

The following appears in Henry Doktorski's book "The Classical Squeezebox,"
the quote is  by Christoph Wagner, the author of Das Akkordeon: Eine Wilde
Karrierre.

Wagner continued, "when the Nazis came to power, the growth of the 
accordion slowed down.  The propagandists claimed that the accordion was 
a 'nigger jazz instrument' for its close connection with modern American 
dance music.  The Nazis tried to stop accordion bands from playing 
classical music which for them was an 'abuse of the music of our great 
masters.'  The president of the reichsmusikkammer -- the highest 
institution controlling music in the Third Reich -- declared that 'now is 
the time to build a dam against the flooding of our musical life by the 
accordion.'" 
  The decision to eliminate the accordion from Germany was never 
enforced, however, because the Hohner company made a convincing appeal to 
the government.  Hohner argued that the accordion was a genuine, 
legitimate instrument and had a large repertoire of authentic German folk 
music.  In addition, they claimed, if the accordion were banned, hundreds 
and thousands of German music teachers and workers in Hohner factories 
would lose their livelihoods."


(see http://trfn.clpgh.org/free-reed/history.html)

Jeroen Nijhof

---------------------- jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org ---------------------+