FORT WAYNE – In popular culture, there is no musical instrument – save the bagpipes, perhaps – more ridiculed than the accordion. In movies and on TV, no fat man dressed in lederhosen is complete without one; dorks just aren’t dorks without glasses and an accordion nearby.

How the accordion ended up with this reputation – and how it continues to linger on in both folk and popular music despite it – is up for debate. But let’s be honest. It’s the Beatles’ fault.

Dan Berger, an accordion player and member of the band Die Freudemacher, says the arrival of the Beatles in 1964 definitely influenced a decline in accordion playing. John played guitar. George played guitar. The guitar – not the accordion – became cool.

“Everyone went crazy for the Beatles,” Berger says. “They forgot how beautiful the accordion can be.”

A way to connect

Berger began playing the accordion in 1946 at age 16. At the time, he lived in a displaced persons camp in Austria, his family having fled Yugoslavia to avoid living under a Communist government. The only way to acquire an accordion at the time was on the black market, he says.

“My parents always wanted either my brother or me to play the accordion,” he says. “One day, my mother met a woman on a train who had an accordion to sell. She came home and said, ‘Who wants to play?’ I did.”

Transferring from camp to camp made learning the instrument difficult for Berger. He picked up six months of lessons here, a few duets with a violin or piano player there. Many times, he would listen to a song on the radio and try to re-create it on his own. By the time Berger boarded the boat to the United States in 1951, he was a fluent player, and the accordion became a way to connect with people.

“It was good for me to have the accordion on the boat,” he says. “Everyone wanted to be where I was.”

Berger remembers a time in Fort Wayne when there were more than two accordion schools and the instrument was a big seller at local music stores.

“Every little town had stores where they sold accordions,” he says. “Now, they are not as easy to find.”

‘New weird’

B&B Loan receives at least two or three accordions a year, an increase over the past 10 years, owner Jeffrey Gulley says. During the 1980s, accordions were a quick-selling item at the pawn shop, and then they seemed to fade away, he says.

“Years and years ago, we couldn’t wait to get one because it would sell immediately,” Gulley says. “Then it died off, and we didn’t see any for a while. With music and pawn shops, everything runs in cycles. Eventually, everything comes back around.”

This time, the people requesting and buying accordions are young, Gulley says.

“A lot of younger people are putting that sound back into their bands,” Gulley says. “Young musicians are who we primarily sell them to.”

Bjart Helms, a member of the local bands End Times Spasm Band and the Staggerers, cites the dark folk and “new weird America” music genres as inspiration for the accordion revival. Helms has played the accordion for 10 years, first learning about the instrument by acquiring his grandmother’s accordion.

“At the time, I was into Celtic music, which features a lot of accordion,” Helms says. “I was and still am a big fan of the Pogues. I think I got my first accordion with the intention of learning to play like (their accordion player).”

Helms is the accordionist for the Staggerers, a Celtic band known for their rowdy live performances and punk-rock ethos. Not so easy with a 20-pound instrument strapped to your chest.

“That’s the drawback,” he says. “I’ve worked in factories for months on end. I’ve taught seventh grade. Playing the accordion is the hardest job I’ve ever had. Two songs into it, and I’m covered in sweat.”

Helms aside, an increasing number of young people are re-evaluating the accordion, eschewing the stereotype of the accordion as a corny, annoying instrument and considering it a viable option for a modern sound, Helms says.

“Every generation gets mad about what’s on the radio,” he says. “So people are going back to roots music and picking up the accordion or the fiddle. I hope it’ll catch on again. Hopefully, what is going on in music right now will make it seem cool again. Cool won’t be defined by four white dudes with guitars. Because that’s been done to death.”

edowns@jg.net