Eastern European Folk Tunes for Accordion: 33 Traditional Pieces

This collection offers challenges to me as a low-intermediate at the accordion. But overcoming the challenge is half the fun in learning this instrument! I like the book because the author offers tips on the odd time signatures. Another cool thing are the small background stories that go with each song. The author presents a smattering of styles to the would be musician, so one can come to appreciate truly how wide the range styles go for all these tunes, in terms of their all being lumped together under the Eastern European moniker. The accompanying CD helps me find a melody I like, then I say That's the one I want to play! The only downside for me is the lack of finger numbering on the songs. You have to figure out what works for you. That's ok though, there's probably no absolute way of playing a song on accordion once one develops sufficient dexterity with the hands. But guidelines are nice for someone like me. Maybe a future edition of the book could offer fingerings suggestions. ☆☆☆☆☆

Loving this book! I am an intermediate level player and it’s nice that some of the pieces are easy enough to sightread while others are more challenging. And of course, as the accompanying CD demonstrates, even the simple can be made complex by experimenting with different ornamentation and tempos. Giving me great insights into this music, can definitely recommend!

Daughter loved it. Accompanying CD is inspiring.

Good selection of tunes. The level is around high beginner to advanced. CD is great!

Great! I love it and it came earlier than expected.

The title is badly chosen -- music outside of the Balkan peninsula is completely ignored by this book. I'm okay with the bad title though because Balkan music is so very cool. Beware... Balkan music is an acquired taste. It's quirky because it sometimes uses odd rhythms, and because it sometimes uses non-western scales.This is a fantastic book! It's arranged for accordion but would be fine for any C melody instrument. Culturally, the tune breakdown is 7 Macedonian tunes, 6 Bosnian, 5 Bulgarian, 5 Klezmer, and 1 or 2 each of Serbian, Albanian, Romanian & Hungarian. As well as common rhythms, a third of the tunes are in the rhythm called "lesnoto" (in 7/8, but parsed as 3+2+2), and there are 1 or 2 each of the more challenging rhythms (pajdushko 2+3, rachenitsa 2+2+3, kopanitsa 2+2+3+2+2). It's good to have several lesnotos so that once you master the rhythm on one the skill is transferable to the other ones. Having the CD is great for getting a feel for the tunes.My only complaint about the book is that, if you decide to buy the other book by this author in the Schott World Music series, you'll find that 5 of the songs are repeated. In general though, this whole series by Schott is great!

This book is great. I didn't notice it for a while because of the title "Eastern European" -- in fact, all of the songs are balkan and balkan/sephardic klezmer.The selections are great, including some that balkan folk music enthusiasts will recognize. Some songs are more difficult to play than others, but the relatively beginning intermediate player should be happy and even the beginner should find some of them accessible; the advanced player may be dissatisfied. A fair amount of selections in 5 and 7 for those who like that (and this book would be a good way to learn the balkan 5's and 7's if you are having are trouble), plenty in 2 or 4, none in even more 'complicated' meters.The charts are simple and well done. The accompanying CD is exactly what you want in such a thing: songs played well enough to be listenable on their own as music, but clearly enough that you can hear what she's doing, and even figure out the ornaments with some work.This is the balkan accordion chart book I had been looking for.

This is my favorite accordion book. The songs are fun to play and nice to listen to. The cd helps if you want to get the right rhythm or some inspiration. The book starts off with easy songs, and they get more difficult along the way. I play accordion for about 1yr and this book is just the right level of difficulty for me.

Having no experience of Eatern European folk music I bought this book, and am really intrigued by the music inside. There is a good mixture of music from different coutries; Hungary, Bosnia, Macedonia, Serbia etc, - and the music itself is fantastic. The tunes are presented on a treble clef, with a suggested bass pattern written in the bass clef.The range of difficulty is good, the early pieces are simple short tunes, and the later pieces are more taxing rhythmically - 7/8 and 11/8 - and lots of semi-quavers. What I really liked was that although beginners could play the tunes as written, I was fascinated to listen to the CD and then play the tunes with the ornamentation as performed.There is some really helpful info at the beginning and end, including technical stuff about scales and chords, some notes on ornamentation, and some historical and geographical background to the music.This book has been put together by someone who knows what they are talking about, rather than some accordion compilations which are rather cheesey and obvious. The author has a passion for this music.So 5/5 stars from me.

Fantastic book - I've hoped for a book like this for years. There is a great variety of tunes, arranged approximately in order of difficulty, and even the simplest sound good. The best part is the CD - the author plays the tunes with the ornamentation that is essential to make these tunes sound authentic; by slowing down the CD, it's finally possible to work out how to do this - perfect!

I love this book. As a relative beginner to the accordion it has been quite challenging. The music is terrific with minor tunes and changes of keys that characterises Eastern music.

Really enjoying working my way through these, as they include clear melodies and chords with suggested bass rhythms. Some of the tunes are quite haunting, and evoke a strong eastern mood. There is a jump in the complexity of the pieces early on so my progress through the book has slowed, but I'm sure I'll catch up. Also I have a smaller 48 bass accordion so one or two of the tunes use chords not available on my instrument.

thus again was another good book and very well illistrated the tunes are very good and each one different brilliant buy