Merengue Typica, the fastest accordion in the world? Susan Hutchinson's work

[AccordionUprising]

Susan Hutchinson is an academic whos been writing about and playing Merengue Typica from the Dominican Republic.

If you havent heard it, its tropical button-box dance music thats very fast indeed, doubled with sax and must be exhausting to dance to all night long!
Example:

I have to get her 2016 book:
Tigers of a Different Stripe: Performing Gender In Dominican Music
https://press.uchicago.edu/dam/ucp/books/jacket/978/02/26/40/9780226405469.jpg>
https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/T/bo24957241.html

Heres an article about her work:
The Feminist “Tigers” in Dominican Merengue Típico
https://www.aauw.org/2016/02/25/feminist-tigers/

And heres a bibliography of some more of her articles and stuff on Merengue Typica:https://merenguetipico.org/research/articles/

 

[AccordionUprising]

Reconsidering the title of that post. Merengue may not have the fastest players but the bpm of their tunes in general goes at a mighty clip. Remarkable doubling with the saxophone too.

Heres a vid with traditional instruments (no sax) including a mbira style box thumb-piano!


Wikipedia says: The bpm of the music has also transformed, originally between 130 and 140 [tempo], but today is sometimes sped up from 160 to 190 tempo.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merengue_típico

 

[maugein96]

Hi Bruce,

Always fascinating to discover new styles, and I loved the clip with the guys and girl with those straw hats. Just pick it up and play it is my style, and I'm just waiting for the hat. Reckon the drum would be my limit in that band.

The player is correct that you need to live and feel that sort of music. I've tried to play French musette for over 30 years and that element of everything falling into place naturally just isn't there. I have to work hard at being mediocre whereas if I had lived that music on a daily basis it would have been different. Even today I sometimes lapse into some Irish music that I shouldn't really be playing, as it is of a sectarian nature. However I know I'm putting more into it as the feet are tapping and I know the tunes off by heart, having heard them every other day in life when I was a kid. It's that subtle difference of having "lived" the music, even although I couldn't bring myself to play it, because of the religious and political connotations.

Thanks for reminding us the accordion is more than just worrying about whether you have all the right gear.