Bisonoric bandonion or bandoneon

The bisonoric bandoneon originates from the German concertina invented by C. F. Uhlig of Chemnitz in around 1835. Later, in 1849 at the Industrial Exhibition in Paris, C. Zimmerman of Saxony exhibited the Carlsfelder Konzertina. However, the instrument became closely associated with Heinrich Band, an instrument dealer from Krefeld who advertised the instrument or similar, which came to be known as bandonion. Whilst easy to think that the name is a fusion of the dealers surname "Band" and the word "accordion", it apparently comes from the name used to advertise the instrument "Band Union".

However, the button-board layouts evolved differently on each model giving rise to the Rheinische layout on Band's instruments, the Chemnitzer layout on Uhlig's and the Carlsfelder layout on Zimmerman's instruments. It is Band's instrument with an extended layout that became popular in South America, hence the name bandoneon, particularly in the Rio de Plata area of Argetina and Uruguay, and is the bisonoric bandoneon typically used in tango orchestras.

On first impression the bisonoric bandoneon keyboard layout seems chaotic and illogical, but is described by expert bandoneonists as intuitive as it is arranged in tonal areas and has the advantage that very braodly voiced chords can be comfortably played on just one hand. However, most agree in highlighting the great difficulty in learning four keyboard arrangements, as they are different on each hand depending on the bellows' direction and the left and right hand arrangements are completely different. The task of memorisation of scales patterns, chord shapes, arpeggios etc is huge as they are all different in each musical key.

The great difficulty in learning the bisonoric bandoneon keyboard gave rise to the creation of the unisonoric bandoneon and international chromatic system bandoneons. However, these models also have their own drawbacks.

Although bandonion, the original name comes from German and it is the Spanish spelling, bandoneon, with or without an accent, that is most commonly used in English texts. On this web site the Spanish spelling, bandoneon, will be used to refer to the traditional 71 button bandoneon, whether using the bisonoric Rheinische layout or the unisonoric Peguri layout.

Bisonoric bandoneon keyboard layout