Busking with Piano Accordion with MIDI Expander System

Street Entertaining with Piano Accordion in the beautiful Cathedral City of Hereford (England) at a Victorian Christmas Street Market.

I'm quite used to busking with automatic street organs (mechanical organs being my main hobby), but playing the accordion in this situation is still quite new! Indeed it's only two and a bit years since I first picked up an accordion (bought an old one at a car boot sale!), or any keyboard instrument for that matter, and being completely self-taught practice I had to fit around a busy university study schedule.

Anyway, despite the bitterly cold temperatures all day, I gave it my best shot, and have edited together this video from footage taken by my father for you all to enjoy in the warm comfort of indoors!

I've not long had this particular accordion (a couple of weeks), which is a beautiful Crucianelli 120-bass Italian Piano Accordion, this being the first time out. As well the lovely traditional musette sound from the internal reeds in the usual way, the instrument now has a brand new MIDI system fitted, which through use of a Roland accordion expander enables hundreds of sounds to be synthesised in real time to add great variety to the music produced. One can also turn off the actual treble and/or bass reeds to have purely electronic sounds for melody, chords or bass, or naturally use as a traditional acoustic instrument with no electronics at all, so the possibilities are endless. (see my other videos for one giving a quick demo of the electronics on this accordion).

Note the mains electricity to power my accordion electronics, MIDI expander and amplifier was all coming from a quite remarkable 'Powerchest' unit, housed in the rugged aluminium flight case to the left me. These Powerchest devices, usually made in more domestic 'black box' enclosures, are made for the domestic market to ensure continuity of supply to all sorts of appliances around the home in the event of power cuts, faults or low voltage periods, though in this instance they are brilliant for using standard studio audio equipment for busking in the street in stand-alone form (the one unit lasted me all day!). For more info emails sales[at]powerchest[dot]com

The order of pieces I play on this video is as follows...

Gold & Silver Waltz (Franz Lehar) [Duet with Street Organ]

Gold & Silver [Accordion only] -- though this was more like 'Cold & Shivering Waltz'!!!

Serenade No. 13 (Carl Frei, you'd have to be a Dutch Street Organ fan to know this!)

The Birdie Song (aka 'The Chicken Dance' in the US)

How much is that Doggy in the Window

Under the Bridges of Paris

Oh Susanna

Santa Claus is Coming to Town (nice dance moves there by my stand-in assistant!)

Lara's Theme

Swannee River

Camptown Races

Memory (from 'Cats')

Hope you enjoy listening as much as I do playing!

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Piano
• Accordion
• Player
• Accordian
• Accordeon
• Akordeon
• Akkordeon
• Street
• Organ
• Busker
• Hereford
• Nick
• Williams
• Christmas
• MIDI

[TheJon1959]

HI NICK ME AGAIN YOUR STILL MY FAVOURITE DO YOU DO WEDDINGS. DO YOU KNOW ANY ORANGE SONGS NEVER MIND THAT 197 CELESTE SOUNDS LIKE A HASBEEN  JC

[TheJon1959]

HI NICK ME AGAIN YOUR STILL MY FAVOURITE DO YOU DO WEDDINGS. DO YOU KNOW ANY ORANGE SONGS JC

[Mandolin1944]

Very nice!  Wonderful & entertaining video!

[TheJon1959]

HI NICK WHAT A PLAYER WELL DONE. BEST REGARDS JON

[197celeste]

God Bless, you look like a really nice guy but need a few lessons hun. I am an experienced player and oh all those mistakes are hurting my ears

[doc21hansen]

Nick . . you never cease to amaze me every time I see you on the internet. DOC / Orem, Utah USA

[josie526]

Sounding very good; nice performance.  Thanks for posting!

Greets from N. Canada

[BigRedpg51]

Hello Nick,

I often find myself in situations where I have to play my MIDI accordion in the park, on a bus trip, etc., and one of these PowerChest's would come in mighty handy! How may I go about purchasing one?

[gerogero2006]

Bravo! Great! By the way of accordion, this marvellous musical instrument. If you want, please see what Brazilians and Argentinians are doing. Search for these videos:

1 - Marcelo e Voninho

2 - Tio Mederico- Dvd Os Serranos 40 anos- Sempre Gaúchos

3 - CHANGO SPASIUK EN FORMOSA KILOMETRO 11 -10/10/2009 (4)

[HavazikFerric]

It does sound very fun eh?