Illustrator By Trade Spreads Joy Of Squeezebox

By KATIE CROWE
The Frederick News-Post

FREDERICK, Md. (AP) -- While obtaining a musical education degree from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Joan Grauman took a conducting class even though she had never musically led anyone before.

These days, the former piano player and well-known Frederick accordionist conducts the Potomac Accordion Ensemble, a group of about 10 dedicated accordionists, as well as the Washington Metropolitan Accordion Society's holiday orchestra. She has directed both groups for about seven years. Throughout that time, they have become more than her students. They are also her closest friends.

"When we rehearse, I conduct from my feet," Grauman, 57, said in a recent phone interview. "Rather than standing in front of them conducting, I stand and play alongside them. We really enjoy being together."

Grauman, an illustrator and logo designer by trade (she has been self-employed for most of her career), played piano until age 23, when she picked up one of her father's accordions and essentially taught herself; her father was an award-winning accordionist in his youth, Grauman said.

"At the time, I was playing in a Bulgarian gypsy band. The piano isn't used in a lot of ethnic music, and it's not very portable," she said. "Accordion is used in Israeli music, to Russian music to German-- and everything in between."

Mail-order niche market

At about the same time, Grauman made the switch to accordion, she started a small mail-order business with her husband called SqueezinArt. In the early 1990s while playing with the Bulgarian gypsy group, Grauman, also a once-international folk dancer, was asked to lead a free-reed instrument workshop, specifically focused on accordion and similar concertina instruments. The illustrator-by-trade then drew a poster showing the various types of accordions, which everyone liked.

"My husband suggested I put the poster illustration on a T-shirt and when it sold out in 24 hours, we knew there was a need for a designer who made items that were accordion-related," she said.

They started SqueezinArt in 1994, which Grauman said "sort of turned her life around from being a folk musician to a member of the accordion world." They sell clothing and accessories, jewelry and other novelty gifts-- all featuring Grauman's accordion artwork-- though their website is temporarily offline for maintenance.

Grauman will conduct the WMAS holiday orchestra Sunday at their annual holiday concert and potluck dinner at Sleepy Hollow United Methodist Church, the club's home base in Falls Church, Va. A few other people and groups will perform with the holiday orchestra and the Potomac Accordion Ensemble, including a quartet formed by one of the musicians in Grauman's ensemble.

Enthusiasts learning

Grauman began the ensemble at the request of a friend in WMAS with the intention of teaching fellow accordionists to learn more about the instrument and learn to play together, she said. Grauman said she most enjoys helping the ensemble's musicians become comfortable with the instrument and build their confidence. Most of them are older adults or former accordionists who haven't picked up the instrument in 35 to 45 years. Two of the members, she said,
didn't begin to play until they were 50 years old.

"One of the great things that has come out of this also is that we've had many members branch out in other directions," she said.

One such member is Yimeng Huang, 54, a McLean, Va., resident who has formed a quartet of friends, all originally from Beijing and Shanghi, who practice and play accordion together. They will perform at Sunday's holiday event.

Huang played the instrument as a teenager in Beijing, didn't touch or hear one for more than 30 years, and joined Grauman's ensemble in 2008 after a friend brought her to a WMAS event.

"It was exciting to see a whole room full of accordions. There was so many of them!" she said. "I bought one, picked it up
again as a hobby, and got hooked."

Her group -- a female friend from high school in China, and a man and woman from Shanghi, all in their 50s and 60s -- still call themselves amateurs and have played just at small gatherings so far.

"Accordions are a lot more prevalent (in China) than they are here, especially during that time when I was a teenager during the Cultural Revolution," she said. There was not much manufacturing going on, not a lot of people could afford a piano. You would hear or see an accordion on every street corner."

Huang and her group will also play at a Chinese Culture Gathering in Washington for the Chinese Cultural Festival in early 2012.

"Every time we play as a group, we see improvement," she said.

Information from: The Frederick (Md.) News-Post, http://www.fredericknewspost.com

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)