Building An Accordion

Accordions were developed in the early 19th century and is a portable box-shaped musical instrument. It is hand-held bellows-driven and is a member of the free-reed aerophone family, and sometimes referred to as a squeezebox. The person playing an accordion is called an accordionist. The accordion is played by compressing or expanding a bellows while pressing buttons or keys, causing valves, called pallets, to open. The opened pallets allow air to flow across strips of brass or steel, called reeds, that vibrate to produce sound inside the body. The accordion is sometimes considered a one-man-band because it needs no accompanying instrument. The accordionist plays the melody on the keys and the accompaniment bass on pre-set cord buttons on the left side of the instrument.