Accordion Anthology – Rob Howard

Accordion Anthology launched in June 2016 is now available from ZZ Music.  Packed with interesting articles and biographies from the historic to the most up to date.  Add this A4-sized tome to you growing collection of Rob Howard’s wonderful output.

Accordion Anthology (published in May 2016) is a variety of accordion related articles and biographies, written very much in the style and spirit of the four volume An A to Z of the Accordion series, but with the larger A4 size and attractive visual layout of Accordion: A Pictorial History. This book began life as An A to Z of the Accordion, Volume 5, then morphed into something else as a decision was taken to drop the A to Z formula and look for a fresh approach. The 4 volumes of the earlier series use 1000 entries, and finding valid entries for all 26 letters of the alphabet meant padding out the book with sub-standard material, hence the change of direction. Instead a themed approach has been adopted, and Accordion Anthology has six broad chapter headings: Getting to Know the Accordion, Accordions, Articles of General Interest, CD/DVD/Book Reviews, Biographical Writings, and Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.
The chapter headings include lots of articles and biographies, of varying lengths and topics, and the complete list of articles reads as follows: Getting to Know the Accordion; Making a start; Some Useful Contacts; Accordion Tips and Hints (written by Steve Roxton); Be a Better Player (by Rosemary Wright); Use of the Couplers (by James Sexton); Playing For Others (by Rosemary Wright); The Ken Hopkins Accordion Collection; Manfrini Accordions (Robert Rolston’s revival of a great manufacturing name); Evolution of the Accordion (by Colin, Alastair and Margaret Norton, of the Perthshire-based ScotlandAccordions.co.uk); Melodica, Accordina, Steirische Harmonica; The Accordion Concert; The accordion and pop music; Accordion Festivals; Accordion Dynasties; Northern Ireland Open Championships; Zuckerbrod & Peytsche; Tales & Trivia; More Tales & Trivia; Polka and the Accordion; Reviews (Gordon Pattullo CD ‘the accordion’, Joey Miskulin CD ‘The Other Side of the Fence’, Luke Daniels – CD ‘Tribute to William Hannah’, Will Pound & Eddy Jay – Cd ‘Ignite’, John Kirkpatrick – CD ‘The Dance of the Demon Daffodils’, Sharon Shannon – CD/DVD ‘In Galway’, Toralf Tollefsen – book ‘World Artist’); Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow… The Biographical Writings include (** indicates an autobiographical article): Amanda Robinson, André Verchuren, Brandon McPhee – Scotland’s latest star of the Shand Morino…, David Vernon** – Music and mirth in equal measures!!, Dawn Loombe – The Accordion and Music Therapy, Dermot Lyons, Eddie Hession, Finbarr Dwyer, Freeland Barbour** – How I came to play the accordion…, Gary Forrest, Bartosz Glowacki, Matthew MacLennan, A Tribute to Gervasio Marcosignori, Gordon Pattullo** – My life with the accordion…, Helen Maher, Helen Rich, Jack Emblow** – Looking back…, Jackie Hearst, Nathan Carter, Joe Cooley Remembered, John Jones MBE** tells about the day he went to Buckingham Palace…, John Leslie, Ksenija Sidorova, Kyiv Classic Accordion Duo, Kosmos Ensemble, Lars Ek, Igor Outkine, Leonard Brown, Malachy Cairns, Michael Coyne, Martynas, V. Marceau, Paul Chamberlain**, Pearl Fawcett-Adriano** – The accordion – my passport to an interesting life, Rob Howard’s ‘French Connection’** – The ‘Allo ‘Allo Experience and Renault Mégane: ‘Can a car change a town?’, Stewart Walker** – Journeys with an Accordion, William Hanna – A legend of Scottish dance music