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A SHORT HISTORY

History of bellows instruments

Accordions, concertinas, and bandoneons share reeds set in motion by air from a bellows. From European workshops, they traveled to homes, dance halls, and musical traditions around the world. This timeline follows both changes to the instruments and the people who gave them new roles in local music.

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INSTRUMENT FAMILY TREE

How the instruments branched

DOCUMENTED MILESTONES

From invention to local traditions

18th century

19th century

20th century

  • Early 20th century
    Country / regionChina

    The accordion spreads in China

    In the first half of the twentieth century, the accordion became part of musical life in China. A history lecture at the Central Conservatory of Music recalled its role in performances that rallied audiences during the national liberation movement.

    Source: 中央音乐学院 · 中国手风琴发展史讲座
  • By 1903
    Country / regionUnited Kingdom · Scotland

    A melodeon performance is sold on wax cylinder

    Scottish player and record maker Peter Wyper recorded his melodeon playing on wax cylinders and sold them locally. A trade journal described one of his accordion records in August 1903. These surviving reports show how a local playing style began to reach listeners beyond the performance itself; an earlier accordion recording has not been ruled out.

    Source: Box and Fiddle Archive · Peter and Daniel Wyper
  • 1907
    Country / regionRussia

    The bayan takes shape in St Petersburg

    St Petersburg maker Pyotr Sterligov built a four-row chromatic accordion for player Yakov Orlansky-Titarenko. The name bayan had been used earlier, but became associated with this Russian chromatic-button instrument.

    Illustration of Russian bayan
    Russian bayan · Related source
    Source: Kirillo-Belozersky Museum · Musical Instruments Catalogue
  • 1910s
    Country / regionArgentina · Buenos Aires

    The bandoneon takes root in tango orchestras

    From 1910, quartets featuring the bandoneon helped form the first orquestas típicas, tango ensembles built for dancing. As these orchestras spread, the bandoneon became one of the sounds most closely associated with tango.

    Source: Buenos Aires Ciudad · Orquesta Típica
  • 1920s
    Country / regionUnited States · Louisiana

    The accordion settles into Cajun music

    Accordions were documented in Louisiana by 1871, but Cajun musicians adopted them gradually. German-made one-row button accordions became popular in the early 1900s. C- and D-key models imported in the 1920s worked well with fiddles and helped make the accordion a leading dance instrument.

    Source: Louisiana Folklife · Malcolm Comeaux
  • 1924
    Country / regionArgentina · Buenos Aires

    Two bandoneons in a new tango sextet

    Julio de Caro's sextet brought Pedro Maffia and Luis Petruccelli together on bandoneons with violins, piano, and bass. Their arrangements marked a turning point in Argentine instrumental tango.

    Source: Argentina Secretaría de Cultura · Julio de Caro
  • 1920s
    Country / regionFrance

    The accordion reshapes Parisian bal musette

    Italian immigrants brought accordions into Parisian dance music, where they displaced the Auvergnat bagpipe known as the musette. Waltzes, tango musette, and other dances made the accordion a familiar sound of the bal musette.

    Source: Musée de la musique, Philharmonie de Paris · Accordéon diatonique
  • 1931–32
    Country / regionJapan

    TOMBO begins making accordions in Japan

    TOMBO began making and selling diatonic button accordions in 1931. The following year it released its first piano-keyboard model, the Lyrico. In Japan, makers were beginning to produce both diatonic and piano-keyboard accordions themselves.

    Illustration of Diatonic button accordion
    Diatonic button accordion · Related source
    Source: トンボ楽器製作所 · 沿革
  • 1935
    Country / regionRussia

    Shuya's workshops become a factory

    Workshops making garmons in Shuya were brought together as the Shuya Accordion Factory. Its decorated instruments carried the region's craft into factory production.

    Source: ARTEFACT · Shuya garmon museum record
  • 1936
    Country / regionUnited States · San Antonio, Texas

    Accordion and bajo sexto recorded together in Texas

    On 21 October in San Antonio, button accordionist Narciso Martínez and bajo sexto player Santiago Almeida recorded “La Chicharronera.” It is among the earliest known conjunto records with this pairing: the accordion carries the melody while the 12-string bajo sexto supplies bass and rhythm. The record preserves a sound that became characteristic of Texas-Mexican conjunto music.

    Source: Library of Congress · La Chicharronera
  • 1937–43
    Country / regionChina · Shanghai / Yan'an

    Accordions accompany wartime performances in China

    Qiao Suying's survey notes that small harmonica and accordion concerts continued in Shanghai and other cities after war broke out in 1937. It also describes accordion use in Yan'an's New Yangge Movement from 1943. The instrument also had a place in public cultural performances during the war.

    Source: 乔苏颖 · 浅谈手风琴在中国的发展（《音乐时空》2013年第17期）
  • 1938
    Country / regionFrance

    Gus Viseur records Swing cocktail

    On 20 October in Paris, Gus Viseur recorded Swing cocktail on accordion with three guitarists and a double bassist. The session documents an accordion in a swing ensemble. By the late 1930s, the instrument had a documented place in Parisian swing as well as dance music.

    Source: Bibliothèque nationale de France · Swing accordéon recording catalogue
  • 1942
    Country / regionItaly · Stradella

    Dallapè patents a converter bass mechanism

    In Stradella, the Dallapè firm patented a converter for the accordion's left-hand bass mechanism. It allowed the same button manual to switch between standard Stradella bass accompaniment and free bass, in which buttons play individual notes. The design broadened the left hand's role from preset accompaniment to individual notes.

    Source: Lombardia Beni Culturali · Museo della Fisarmonica Mariano Dallapè
  • Late 1940s
    Country / regionBrazil · Northeast

    The sanfona gives baião a national audience

    Luiz Gonzaga's baião brought music from Brazil's Northeast to listeners across the country. The combination of sanfona (accordion), zabumba drum, and triangle became a familiar sound of Northeastern music.

    Source: Biblioteca Nacional do Brasil · Luiz Gonzaga, o rei do Baião
  • After World War II
    Country / regionUnited States · Louisiana

    Louisiana makers build their own accordions

    Wartime disruption of German imports made accordions scarce. Local players repaired instruments and began making one-row accordions in Louisiana; Sidney Brown was among the makers who shaped the postwar Cajun accordion tradition.

    Source: Louisiana Folklife · Malcolm Comeaux
  • 1947
    Country / regionJapan

    Accordions for school ensembles

    TOMBO's history records a Japanese ensemble accordion made without left-hand bass buttons. Models in different registers let players divide parts across a school ensemble.

    Illustration of School ensemble accordion (illustration)
    School ensemble accordion (illustration) · Related source
    Source: トンボ楽器製作所 · 沿革
  • 1950s–70s
    Country / regionChina

    The accordion reaches workplaces, troupes and schools

    Qiao Suying's account describes accordions in military and workplace cultural troupes, amateur performances and school music in the decades after 1949. Their portability and ability to carry melody with accompaniment helped make the instrument familiar beyond concert halls.

    Source: 乔苏颖 · 浅谈手风琴在中国的发展（《音乐时空》2013年第17期）
  • 1951–52
    Country / regionChina · Shanghai

    Baile begins making accordions in Shanghai

    Shanghai Baile Musical Instrument Company raised funds to set up a factory in 1951 and made its own-brand accordions in 1952. An instrument numbered 13 from that first batch was displayed at a Jiading history exhibition in 2023. The surviving early instrument gives a concrete trace of accordion making under a Chinese brand.

    Source: 上海嘉定 · 百乐手风琴历史展
  • 1952
    Country / regionChina · Chongqing

    Accordion making in Chongqing

    According to records discussed by musicians and historians at Chongqing Normal University, a local instrument repair workshop copied a Japanese accordion and made an 18-bass model in 1952. This shows accordion making taking shape in a local workshop outside Shanghai.

    Source: 重庆师范大学音乐学院 · 手风琴史学交流会
  • 1950s
    Country / regionUnited States · Louisiana

    Clifton Chenier brings the piano accordion to zydeco

    In Louisiana's Black Creole music, Clifton Chenier blended local dance traditions with blues and R&B. He made his first recordings on piano accordion in the early 1950s; later recordings brought zydeco to audiences beyond the region.

    Source: Smithsonian Folkways · Arhoolie Records: Cajun and Zydeco
  • 1950s
    Country / regionArgentina · Buenos Aires

    Piazzolla opens a new path for the bandoneon

    Bandoneonist Astor Piazzolla developed nuevo tango after studying composition in Paris. He brought counterpoint, contemporary harmonies, and jazz influences into tango, widening the instrument's expressive role.

    Source: Argentina Secretaría de Cultura · Astor Piazzolla
  • Mid-1950s
    Country / regionIreland → United States · New York

    Paddy O'Brien's B/C accordion playing in New York

    Accordionist Paddy O'Brien moved from County Tipperary to New York in the mid-1950s. His inventive playing on a two-row B/C button accordion gained a following in the city's Irish music community and influenced traditional playing.

    Source: Irish Traditional Music Archive · Paddy O’Brien (Tipperary) Compositions
  • 1957
    Country / regionUnited States

    Left-hand buttons switch between chords and single notes

    A US patent application described a mechanism that changed the accordion's left-hand chord buttons to sound individual notes. The same button manual could serve both chord accompaniment and free-bass playing. The design aimed to let players move between accompaniment and melodic left-hand parts on one instrument.

    Source: US Patent 2,979,980 · Movable convertor for the bass mechanism of an accordion
  • 1958
    Country / regionChina · Tianjin

    Accordion studies at Tianjin Conservatory

    Tianjin Conservatory of Music established an accordion major within its piano department in 1958. Formal training became another part of the instrument's development in China.

    Source: 中国文化和旅游部 · 天津国际手风琴艺术节
  • 1958
    Country / regionDenmark

    An orchestral work for accordion soloist

    Ole Schmidt wrote Symfonisk Fantasi og Allegro for accordion and orchestra in close collaboration with the soloist Mogens Ellegaard. The work gave the accordion a solo role alongside an orchestra.

    Source: Wise Music Classical · Symfonisk Fantasi og Allegro
  • 1960s
    Country / regionUnited Kingdom and elsewhere

    A concertina folk revival

    The concertina's popularity had declined in the early twentieth century. The folk revival of the 1960s brought renewed interest in the instrument. The revival gave a declining instrument a renewed place in folk performance.

    Illustration of Concertina
    Concertina · Related source
    Source: Horniman Museum and Gardens
  • 1965
    Country / regionItaly → United Kingdom

    Farfisa files an electronic accordion patent

    Italian manufacturer Farfisa filed a UK patent application for an electronic accordion. Its description places circuit boards and tuning coils inside the bellows. The application was published in 1968. The application records an early attempt to combine electronic circuitry with the familiar bellows structure.

    Source: Farfisa · UK patent application GB1101154A
  • 1966
    Country / regionItaly → United Kingdom

    Transicord is advertised in Britain

    A Farfisa advertisement in the 4 June issue of Melody Maker presented the Transicord as an electronic organ for accordion players. It looked and played like an accordion and could be connected to an amplifier. Electronic bellows instruments were now being promoted to players as products, beyond their appearance in patent applications.

    Source: Melody Maker · Farfisa advertisement (4 June 1966)
  • 1967
    Country / regionUnited Kingdom

    A new duet keyboard: the Hayden system

    Brian Hayden devised a new duet concertina keyboard layout, adding another way to arrange notes for melody and accompaniment. Makers were still seeking new ways to divide melody and accompaniment between the hands in the late twentieth century.

    Source: International Concertina Association · Concertina History
  • 1967
    Country / regionJapan

    TOMBO releases an electronic accordion

    TOMBO's history says it developed, manufactured, and released what it calls Japan's first domestically made electronic accordion in 1967. The pictured model is identified as the DALC (DS-32). Electronic approaches to the accordion had also entered Japanese domestic manufacture.

    Source: トンボ楽器製作所 · 沿革
  • 1971
    Country / regionDenmark

    Accordion studies begin at the Royal Danish Academy

    The Royal Danish Academy of Music began offering accordion studies. The course gave performers a lasting place to study concert repertoire and train professionally at the conservatory.

    Source: The Royal Danish Academy of Music · 50 years of accordion education
  • 1978
    Country / regionSoviet Union

    Gubaidulina composes De profundis for solo bayan

    Sofia Gubaidulina composed De profundis for solo bayan and dedicated it to Friedrich Lips. Lips gave the first performance in Moscow on 8 April 1980. It is an example of a contemporary composer choosing the bayan for a dedicated solo work.

    Source: IRCAM · De profundis (1978)
  • Early 1980s
    Country / regionChina · Tianjin

    Free-bass study grows through exchange in Tianjin

    At Tianjin Conservatory, Wang Yuping invited visiting accordionists, including Mie Miki, for concerts and master classes. He also introduced free-bass accordion teaching into conservatory training, widening the repertoire available to Chinese students.

    Source: 中央音乐学院 · 首届国际手风琴艺术节学术活动
  • 1991
    Country / regionFrance

    Galliano releases New Musette

    Richard Galliano released the album New Musette with guitar, bass, and drums. He revisited French musette through jazz rhythms and harmonies, giving the accordion another place in contemporary ensemble music.

    Source: Deutsche Grammophon · Richard Galliano biography

21st century

  • 2004
    Country / regionChina · Beijing

    Accordion major at the Central Conservatory

    Accordionist Cao Xiaoqing founded an undergraduate accordion major at Beijing's Central Conservatory of Music in 2004. The conservatory added an accordion program at its attached secondary school the following year. After accordion study developed in cities such as Tianjin, it also gained an undergraduate place at Beijing's Central Conservatory.

    Source: 中央音乐学院 · 国际手风琴艺术节
  • 2004
    Country / regionJapan / Italy

    A digital accordion keeps the bellows

    Roland announced its V-Accordion FR-7 in 2004. Its digital sound engine offers selectable accordion and orchestral timbres while the player still shapes expression with the bellows.

    Illustration of Digital accordion
    Digital accordion · Related source
    Source: Roland・2004年ニュースリリース
  • 2011
    Country / regionChina · Shanghai

    Shanghai hosts the 64th Coupe Mondiale

    The 64th Coupe Mondiale accordion competition took place in Shanghai. Chinese organizers brought international contestants and judges together there, reflecting the growing exchange between China's accordion community and musicians abroad.

    Source: 中央音乐学院 · 首届国际手风琴艺术节学术活动
  • 2013
    Country / regionJapan

    Digital bellows respond to the notes being played

    Roland introduced the FR-8x and FR-8xb V-Accordions. Their Dynamic Bellows Behavior changes the bellows' air resistance according to the selected register and the number of notes played, extending the expressive control of the digital accordion.

    Source: Roland · 2013 FR-8x announcement
  • 2015
    Country / regionColombia · Caribbean coast

    Traditional vallenato enters UNESCO's urgent safeguarding list

    Traditional vallenato of Colombia's Greater Magdalena region, played with accordion, caja drum, and guacharaca, was inscribed on UNESCO's List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding. The urgent-safeguarding listing also drew attention to the risks facing the tradition's transmission.

    Source: UNESCO · Traditional Vallenato music of the Greater Magdalena region
  • 2020
    Country / regionArgentina · Corrientes Province

    Chamamé enters UNESCO's intangible cultural heritage list

    Chamamé, a music and dance tradition practised mainly in Argentina's Corrientes Province, was inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Its instruments include the two-row diatonic button accordion and the bandoneon.

    Source: UNESCO · Chamamé
  • 2020–23
    Country / regionUruguay

    Uruguay passes on bandoneon playing and repair

    A Uruguay-based safeguarding project created free bandoneon classes in four regions and opportunities for young people to learn instrument repair and making. It addressed the shortage of players, teachers, and luthiers.

    Source: UNESCO · The Bandoneon: sound of Tango
  • 2021
    Country / regionBrazil

    Traditional forró is recognized as Brazilian cultural heritage

    Brazil registered the traditional forms of forró as national intangible cultural heritage. The recognition includes the music, dance, and knowledge passed between generations, with the sanfona among its emblematic instruments.

    Source: IPHAN · Matrizes tradicionais do forró
  • 2022
    Country / regionArgentina · Buenos Aires Province

    An electronic bandoneon prototype in Argentina

    Researchers at the National University of Quilmes presented Alfa, an electronic bandoneon prototype with buttons and a bellows. Sensors detect the player's actions and turn them into digital performance data. It remained a research prototype at the time of the report. The prototype tests a way to carry the bandoneon's familiar physical controls into a digital instrument.

    Source: Universidad Nacional de Quilmes · Bandoneón 2.0
  • 2024
    Country / regionJapan / Italy

    KORG announces the FISA SUPREMA digital accordion

    KORG announced the FISA SUPREMA digital accordion, developed jointly by KORG in Japan and Dexibell in Italy. The instrument uses Dexibell's T2L sound technology.

    Source: Dexibell · Fisa Suprema (2024)
  • 2025
    Country / regionArgentina · Córdoba

    Cuarteto enters UNESCO's intangible cultural heritage list

    Cuarteto, the music, dance and lyrics of Córdoba, Argentina, was inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Early ensembles featured piano, violin, accordion and double bass, with a singer leading the performance.

    Source: UNESCO · Cuarteto: music, dance and lyrics in the city of Córdoba, Argentina

References

Articles consulted