Listening to the music you want to play, played on the instrument you want to learn, can motivate you (as in, “I want to do that!”) at the same time that it brightens your day, and careful listening can help you learn, too. Assuming you have the hardware and the internet connection, you can type the name of your favorite tune + concertina and/or + accordion into a search bar and, among the hodgepodge of weird results, you’re likely to get many that provide good listening and cost you only the time it takes to filter out the dross.
If you prefer a CD you can hold in your hand, our related site, The Button Box, Inc., sells a representative selection of free-reed-centric recordings, and if you go to a concert, performers often have CDs they’re happy to sell to you on the spot. The middle path takes you to recordings you can hear and/or buy online, either from retailers or from individual musicians.
Our evolving lists on the “Listening” subpages aren’t intended to be exhaustive. Our intent instead is to offer some direction for the early stages of your exploration, for which reason we have mostly stayed away from YouTube, which is both a wonderful resource and a seductive entanglement that you engage with at your own risk.
Introduction to Concertinas and Accordions 