The Harmoneon or concert accordion ( French: ''Harmonéon, accordeon de concert'') is a French

free reed aerophone A free reed aerophone is a musical instrument that produces sound as air flows past a vibrating reed in a frame. Air pressure is typically generated by breath or with a bellows. In the Hornbostel–Sachs system, it is number: 412.13 (a member o ...

, invented by

Pierre Monichon Pierre Monichon (24 October 1925 – 1 September 2006) was a France, French accordionist, Musicology, musicologist and inventor of the harmoneon (also concert accordion). He published several books on the history of the Accordion, and was a profe ...

in 1948, although he only

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...

ed the instrument four years later in 1952. It has been taught in musical conservatories since 1974.. The instrument has great similarity to both the duet concertina and

button accordion A button accordion is a type of accordion on which the melody-side keyboard consists of a series of buttons. This differs from the piano accordion, which has piano-style keys. Erich von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs categorize it as a free reed aerop ...

Background

As a young accordion teacher, the initial motivation of Pierre Monichon was to create his own fully fledged

concert A concert is a live music performance in front of an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, choir, or band. Concerts are held in a wide variety a ...

instrument, to be included in the same brigade of so-called "noble instruments"; the

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

, the

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

and so forth. Unbeknownst to Monichon, this idea was far from original. The local factory had been creating accordions with symmetrical keyboards, which was a first step towards the creation of the Harmoneon. The instrument was designed to be played with

symphony orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, ce ...

Keyboard System

The

Stradella bass system The Stradella Bass System (sometimes called ''standard bass'') is a buttonboard layout equipped on the bass side of many accordions, which uses columns of buttons arranged in a circle of fifths; this places the principal major chords of a key (I, ...

had long been controversial in the accordion world, as it was dissatisfactory to many

accordionist Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed i ...

s. This was for several reasons, mostly in that it restricted classical repertoire, and that it was not very ergonomical. Many other bassboard configurations had been tested, such as the 'bassette' system. Monichon proposed a new keyboard system, which eliminated prepared chords, with the aim to lighten the instrument's left hand, creating a more homogenous

timbre In music, timbre ( ), also known as tone color or tone quality (from psychoacoustics), is the perceived sound quality of a musical note, sound or musical tone, tone. Timbre distinguishes different types of sound production, such as choir voice ...

between the two keyboards. The new layout had the same fingering as the right hand, and was more ergonomic. A new system of keyboard layout had to be created, identicle to the keyboard in the right hand, which allowed for Fortunately, this system had already been created for instruments such as the Bayan, in the beginning of the 20th Century, The first harmoneon

prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototyp ...

by Giovanni Segalla were created in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

in 1948. Segalla was the

brother-in-law A sibling-in-law is the spouse of one's sibling, or the sibling of one's spouse, or the person who is married to the sibling of one's spouse.Cambridge Dictionaries Online.Family: non-blood relations. More commonly, a sibling-in-law is referred ...

of Bortolo Busato, an Italian

luthier A luthier ( ; AmE also ) is a craftsperson who builds or repairs string instruments that have a neck and a sound box. The word "luthier" is originally French and comes from the French word for lute. The term was originally used for makers o ...

specialising in

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

s who later created many Harmoneons. Busato made these instruments as a favour to Monichon, who was the accordion

teacher A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...

of his two

daughter A daughter is a female offspring; a girl or a woman in relation to her parents. Daughterhood is the state of being someone's daughter. The male counterpart is a son. Analogously the name is used in several areas to show relations between groups ...

s. Later on, harmoneons were added to the catalogues of accordion producers such as ''Bonifassi'', ''Atelier'', ''Cavagnolo'', and ''Maugein''. The instrument was played primarily in France, the Netherlands and in Germany. However, interest in the Harmoneon has been renewed in recent years.

Support

Numerous French composers wrote for the Harmoneon, particularly Alain Abbot. The first concert for the Harmonéon was performed by Monique Lecoq-Taupin, another student of Monichon's, in 1949. She performed

The Marriage of Figaro ''The Marriage of Figaro'' ( it, Le nozze di Figaro, links=no, ), K. 492, is a ''commedia per musica'' (opera buffa) in four acts composed in 1786 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with an Italian libretto written by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It premie ...

, by Mozart. In 1956 she formed the first Harmoneon duo with her husband, Charles Taupin, another student of Monichon. A Harmonean course is taught to this day at the

Conservatoire de Paris The Conservatoire de Paris (), also known as the Paris Conservatory, is a college of music and dance founded in 1795. Officially known as the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (CNSMDP), it is situated in the avenue ...

. The course was originally formed in 1968, taught bt Monichon and Taupin. As of 2022, it is taught by Frédéric Guérouet.

References

{{Reed aerophones Keyboard instruments Accordion