Accordion Tribe

by Joslyn Layne & Dave LynchAccordion Tribe are an all-star group of the world-renowned accordionists who originally assembled for a brief project in the late '90s. American accordionist Guy Klucevsek brought together Sweden's Lars Hollmer (Samla Mammas Manna), Finland's Maria Kalaniemi, Austria's Otto Lechner, and Slovenia's Bratko Bibic (Begnagrad, Nimal). Each of the musicians contributed repertoire to the ensemble, drawing from the accordion's traditional role in European folk music but also introducing a contemporary and even avant-garde edge. They first convened in Gent, Belgium, for three days of rehearsals in May 1996, ending with a show in Vooruit. After a successful performance, the quintet did a three-week tour through Austria, Sweden, Finland, Slovenia, Germany, Switzerland, and Finland, recording the performances as they went. Lars Hollmer took the recordings and put together their self-titled 1997 release on Intuition Records.

In 1998, Klucevsek organized a likeminded quartet with Alan Bern, Amy Denio, and Pauline Oliveros; Accordion Tribe II had a two-week European tour that spring under the title Four Accordions of the Apocalypse. In late May of that year, the original Accordion Tribe regrouped for a performance that brought down the house at a new music festival in Quebec, the Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville. In the 2000s, Accordion Tribe have continued touring and recording, having released two additional CDs on the Intuition label, 2003's Sea of Reeds and 2006's Lunghorn Twist, both studio releases recorded at the Chickenhouse, Hollmer's studio in Uppsala, Sweden. A documentary of the quintet has also been filmed and released on DVD; titled Music Travels, it won the Schweizer Filmpreis (Swiss Film Prize) for Best Documentary in 2005, awarded at the Solothurn Film Festival in the Baroque city of Solothurn, north of Bern.