Bruce’s Accordion New Year’s Report: Radio Show, Festival, Accordion History Book

Jenny Conlee and the folks of Black Prairie (some part-time Decemberists) recorded a lovely “Auld Lang Syne” to promote MyMusicRX and the Children’s Cancer Association. It has some swell nyckleharpa from Annalisa Tornfelt. We’ve got to do a nyckleharpa show on Accordion Noir one of these days.

Accordion Noir Radio/Festival update, also progress on my book. We have this list of accomplishments and things to look forward to.

• This Website got 15,000 views this year. More than a thousand a month.  Hello reader!
• Accordion Noir Radio get about 400 downloads of every weekly episode of the show, plus uncountable (unfortunately) radio listeners. It’s way down from the thousands we’d build up when the accordionnoir.org site was working. Also, our stats are not nearly as good as they were back then. Sigh; new year’s projects again. Some of which get done this year!

Accordion Doings in these parts (over the last few years):

• Accordion Noir radio show now begins eighth year of weekly broadcast.
• Managed to raise more than our $1,000 radio station fundraising goal this year without knowing exactly how we did it or who all the donations came from. (Celebrate the new Co-op Radio fundraising database below.)
• Have annual Accordion Noir Festival six years running (long enough to get grants and international guests!)
• The Festival seems to have paid for itself this year! Yippee!
• Get friends to help do things like the  Festival, yea Katheryn! and the Vancouver Squeezebox Circle, thank you Alan!

In progress (2014?):

• Use new Co-op Radio fundraising database to boost the radio show’s outreach.
• Program a Tuba show and a steel guitar show for the Co-op Radio fund-drives. (Next year, nyckelharpa.)
• Get http://www.AccordionNoir.org podcast site working again?
• More international and far-away guests to Accordion Noir Festival?

On my Accordion Uprising book project:

• This year I finished the First draft of my book on the history of the accordion.
• It took about three years.
• 216,143 words
• Organized into 288 little sections (like, “Alan and John Lomax Sidebar,” or “World War II Accordions.”) These will join together to form longer chapters.
• 621 Pages in this draft. Whew.

In May 2013 I started the 2nd draft of book. This will result in a draft I can share with fact-checkers skilled in various fields (jazz, country, ethnic music) who will hopefully find many errors I can fix to make the book super-excellent.  (Watch how much proof-reading helps compared to these posts!)

So far:

• 73 Sections done (from “(the year) 1829,” to “Polka: the Other American Roots Music”)
• 25,998 words
• 78 pages

I am organizing to get the second draft done this year:
Then have my well bribed experts fact-check, and incorporate those changes into the uber-draft.
Final proofread of book, ready to publish.

Meanwhile we watch to see if the publishing industry still exists, and act accordingly.  Self-publishing is probably in order.  I’m keeping my eye on that as we go.

 

Hope you all have a great 2014!