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Saturday I played the accordion, probably for the last time in my life. I have been taking lessons for seventeen years, from the age of seven to the age of twenty-four, and for a long time I have also played in an orchestra. Tangos, Bach and Balkan Music. I always added “No Tears of Tears”. Especially as a teenager, I was shy about the street music image. In the thirteen years since you left the orchestra, you have hardly touched your instrument; The suitcase gathered dust in my parents’ attic. New interests, little time. But every time my mother suggested selling the accordion, I would say emphatically: Not now. Who knows if I will…
Now, in a cleaning tantrum, I did it anyway. Friday, in the app: “I sold your accordion on Marktplaats. Tomorrow someone from Belgium will pick it up.”
All things considered, it was their money and their livelihood. Nevertheless, I stood on my feet high on the sidewalk on Saturday morning. Melodramatically, I climbed the stairs. “I’m going to play now.” An hour and ten minutes before the arrival of the buyer.
As soon as you open the box, the familiar smell of leather shoulder straps will emerge. Wearing it, my fingers could feel their way into the keyboard and bass. Astor Piazzola Libertango. Adagio in G minor by Thomas Albinoni. Many memories. The countless times I’m on my bike to music school, hoping no one in my class will ever see me with that big of a backpack. Traveling with an orchestra to Osnabruck and Innsbruck, feeling happy while playing together. The time I worked through my heartbreak through play, and my teacher said in surprise, “Suddenly I could put emotion in it!”
You’ve forgotten how music can release feelings your brain can’t comprehend, like a bath of soda on a sliver.
My mother stood in the doorway despondent: “Shouldn’t we do it then?” But the guy will be there in twenty minutes, he said on the phone that he lived in Italy next to the factory where my accordion came from, he himself gave weekly concerts, and now he wants to perform with his son. If you were really interested in my accordion, I would give this one a second life.
Our farewell was like a divorce, precisely because we let the beautiful sides become visible again. Solidarity will be fear, not love.
Just before the man arrives, I catch the train back to Amsterdam. I walked across Museumplein, past the blooming linden to the bicycle tunnel under the Rijksmuseum, where the Ukrainian duo had just started playing. In the cellar acoustics, the accordion sounded like a pipe organ, overwhelming and intimate. Their faces betrayed no emotion, but what do I know of loss, of letting go, compared to these men? More and more people gathered around, it was as if the music had created a temporary home. “Nice, that street music,” said a passer-by. For the first time, I could nod proudly and in agreement.
Gemma Finnhuizen Biology Editor at NRC and writes a column here every Wednesday.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper on June 28, 2023.
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