Marche Breaks

In the first half of the 19th century Italy we find the first mention of the musical instrument named "accordion". The territory known as Italy today was then under the dominion of several different "powers". Sicily and the Neapolitan region were ruled by the Bourbons and Piedmont was ruled by the Savoy family, sovereigns of French extraction. Furthermore, while the Lombard and Venetian regions were under the power of the Austrians, the Vatican State, with the Pope as the supreme spiritual and political leader, backed by the continental powers, France and Austria, occupied most central territories. Therefore, although a certain degree of common cultural identity existed in the peninsula at this time, the customs and culture of various regions were strongly influenced by those foreign powers that ruled them.

The defeat in 1860 of the pontifical army at Castelfidardo by the Piedmontese troops, marked a fundamental move towards Italian unification.

Immediately after the annexing of the territory of Marche - particularly in Castelfidardo - we witness the birth of the first accordions and concertinas which were probably introduced to the Italians by French troops allied to the Papal State. These instruments were soon adapted to suit Italian taste.

After the unification, liberated at last from the foreign political domination of the last few centuries, Italians broke free from their former constraints and discovered a new sense of identity and love of life. The accordion, with its uncomplicated and cheerful sound, its ease of use and transportation, was the ideal instrument to adopt in opposition to the elitist and costly music of previous years.

Paolo Soprani, a farmhand from Castelfidardo, captured the mood of the time in the early 1860s and started what was to become the first industrial production of accordions. Earlier, 'pioneers' such as Giacomo Alunni from Nocera Umbra in 1850, Giovanni Cingolani from Recanati in 1856 and Lorenzo Ploner from Trieste in 1862, attempted to manufacture concertinas, but they only contributed to the statistics of the accordion's history, never managing to elevate the production of the instrument to an economic force to be reckoned with. The intuitive Signor Soprani, however, managed to revolutionize life in the Marche region, creating a new industry which in a short period of time succeeded in transforming the local economy from one based on agriculture, to an industrial one open to the international market.

A decisive role in the development of Soprani's new family business was played by the nearby town of Loreto, a religious, cultural and commercial centre, packed with visitors from far and wide. It may well have been in Loreto that Soprani bought the first Austrian or French accordion, and certainly the energetic nature of the town enabled him to promote and popularize the accordion. Thanks to excellent sales figures and the fact that orders were coming in from all over Italy, Soprani's brother Settimio, who until then had worked with his brother, decided to set up business alone and in 1872 opened his own workshop imitating Cesare Pancotti who in 1865 had started one of his own in Macerata.

Around the same time (1872), in Macerata, Augusto Borgani, driven by his passion for music and not content of just playing the trumpet in the town band, decided to undertake the production of musical instruments and set up a small workshop. His love for handicrafts, together with the attitude of a modern and farsighted entrepreneur, inspired Augusto challenging and innovating choices.

He also sent his son Arturo to USA to work at the Conn, in Indiana and learn more advanced means of production and techniques of manufacture. This precious experience overseas was transferred to the workshop that in this way could reach the highest quality standards.

During these years, the success and rise in popularity of the accordion in Italy was simply astonishing. So much so that the famous composer Giuseppe Verdi, - the president of the ministerial commission for the reform of musical conservatories during the 1870s - put forward a proposal for the study of the instrument to the Italian conservatory. Accordion production really took off at the end of the 19th century, as suggested by the data available from the time, and the number of employees within the industry, although data from this period was not always be reliable. The director of the regional exhibition of Marche's products in 1905, wrote that there were 500 workers within the accordion sector, although data from around this time speaks of 24 and 30 workers from the two largest production companies. Discrepancies of this nature can be explained by the fact that the fourteen official accordion factories used entire families within their labour force who worked from home. This enabled the accordion producers to remain competitive and increase flexibility in times of fluctuating demand. Significant data is given by the historian Olivelli who writes that in 1905, when "nothing was mass produced, but everything was handmade" Paolo Soprani produced a staggering 1200 accordions a month. During this time the majority of production was absorbed by the Italian market, as the official data explains that in 1907 only 690 accordion were exported. However, by 1913 the export figures had risen to 14365! Impressive data such as this can be explained by the important role played by the emigration of talented local artisans, workers and musicians who promoted their craft in accordion making within their adopted countries. They were aided in this by the high quality of the accordion made in Italy, which outclassed competition from France, Germany, Russia and Czechoslovakia.

Between 1899 and 1905, pioneers such as Americo Magliani, Enrico Guerrini, Pasquale Piatanesi, Francesco Serenelli, Adriano Picchietti, Paolo Guerrini and others managed to 'conquer' the overseas market such as those of the United States, Canada and South America. Enrico Guerrini and Colombo Piatanesi in San Francisco, and Egisto Pancotti in New York started overseas production units from the humble beginnings of workshops which originally only specialized in repairing accordion.

The industry of the Accordions has known different phases of decline as for example in the 1929 for the crash of the stock exchange in USA, during the second world war and for the musical tastes changement of the sixties

Between 1960 and 1963 seventeen closures took place. It was therefore inevitable that attempts had to be made to incorporate new technology to the accordion. In 1962, a Farfisa technical team led by Gianfelice Fugazza, with the collaboration of the accordion virtuoso Gervasio Marcosignori put the first transistors into the accordion. The outcome was the "Cordovox", an instrument with plenty of potential, not out of place with the modern music of the day. But to promote the accordion as a modern musical instrument, the industry would have needed a different strategy.

Today there is a renewed enthusiasm for the accordion, with increased attention to custom made high quality instruments rather than the emphasis being on mass production. The study of the instrument has been included in some Italian musical conservatories, while several workshops have started the skillful production of Bajan style accordions. Furthermore there has been an emphasis on the attention to musical literature, while the idea that the accordion is exclusively a solo instrument is gradually changing, thanks to influential artists such as Richard Galliano and Marc Perrone in France, Gianni Coscia in Italy and Peter Soave in the USA. The production of accordion has therefore found a niche that all those who operate in this sector should try to build on. There are sixty companies operating throughout Italy today - thirty of which are in Castelfidardo. These companies will only have a future if they can correctly interpret market demands, as Paolo Soprani did in 1863.

Beniamino Bugiolacchi

Director, International Museum of Accordion Castelfidardo