The Cupertino Courier
News
Musician squeezes life into his music
By Cody Kraatz
Reno Di Bono says modern music cannot compare to the dynamism and subtlety of an accordion played right. A local accordion player for hire, he puts classical Italian music in the same league as jazz and classical symphonies, genres with similarly small audiences.
"I play nostalgic music, the music of the immigrant," says Di Bono, who often entertains at Italian families' wedding anniversaries and birthday parties. "It brings back memories of good things."
Di Bono studies his craft for hours each day, playing challenging jazz compositions, and considers his performance much more than a novelty. In fact, he quickly makes clear that he doesn't think much of zydeco, the Cajun-style Louisiana dance music that relies heavily on accordions.
His pride may come from his history. His grandparents met when they immigrated to the United States, and he grew up in Daly City. His father, 90, still plays the fisarmonica, as the squeezebox is called in Italian. He moved to Cupertino, a city with strong Italian roots, more than 40 years ago.
"I cling to the old culture of Italy through this," Di Bono says of his accordion. He emulates the classical Italian style of such big names as Louie Prima, Dean Martin, Luciano Pavarotti and Andrea Bocelli, and feels fortunate to sing in his grandparents' language.
"Italian is a musical language. Every word has a rhythm and lyrical beauty to it," he says, and then demonstrates with a series of random words that sounds like it could be a song. He says French is just as musical, and sometimes makes up French lyrics although he doesn't speak the language.
The accordion's capacity to build crescendos, fly through highs and lows and bridge octaves is closer to the abilities of the human voice than any other instrument, Di Bono says.
Italian accordion music may struggle to survive, even in Italy.
"The Italian youth are modernistic. They don't like these things," says Di Bono, who has traveled to Italy numerous times to visit his wife's family in Genoa.
He recalls watching a young Italian perform with nothing but a computer and a cigarette, and said he eventually found some live accordion performances to quench his thirst in the countryside.
Young people today like simple music, high on driving beats but low on subtlety, he says. Having taught history at Monta Vista High School for 33 years until retiring in 2002, he says he knows what he's talking about. He was still teaching when he started playing gigs in 1980, and used to play for his classes during a unit on local immigrants.
Much of his business comes from the nostalgic Italian niche market. Though Di Bono and his three-piece band donned lederhosen to play the Cupertino Octoberfest years ago, they are more commonly in Italian mode. They have two sets of costumes, calling themselves the Gondoliers or the Godfathers. It's not easy work.
"It's really intimidating. You don't know if they'll like the music," he says.
Di Bono developed a singing voice and a solo repertoire because sometimes his clients put him on the spot at a party and expect a 30-minute performance. He prefers to stroll and play in the background, walking by people and seeing if they'd like him to play for them. Accordion players often suffer from back pain, but Di Bono says he exercises a lot to prevent that.
He has several accordions of different weights and styles, some acoustic and some electric. Some were crafted years ago in Italy by renowned artisans. Many famous manufacturers went out of business decades ago, and experienced craftsmen are getting older now.
Accordions usually have buttons on one side and keys on the other that the musician presses as he or she squeezes the bellows together. Inside the body are a number of giant harmonicas with different-sized reeds, flat pieces of steel that vibrate when air is blown across them.
A quality accordion is a delicate product and takes an expert to repair. Di Bono has to look to Pennsylvania to find a good specialist. Starting at several thousand dollars, new accordions are not cheap. Finding one made by a master craftsman in Italy is even harder but well worth it, says Di Bono, and Castelfidardo in eastern Italy is the place to look.
"Handmade is the only way to go," he says.
