A rendition of “That’s Life” by Marin Nasturica, a world-renowned classical and jazz accordionist maestro who lives in Romania. Here, he plays a hybrid midi-accordion and accompanies singer Ms.Toma Mihaela Carmen in her own unique interpretation of this song that was made popular by Frank Sinatra. While Marin just chords along with the soundtrack arrangement forth from the midi instrument, I am struck about how he gets completely inside the music, and how carefully he listens and chords to the singer.
Here he is, accompanying the same singer with just plain accordion accompaniment:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DbWD3b_DBMe/
When the midi accordions first started being used, I balked, as my own “tuning” preferences are, and have been, for acoustic instruments in a live venue. I have a midi piano, and just can’t bring it to life. I much prefer the acoustic accordion. I have found, though, that in certain musical hands, some musicians can bring music to life, no matter what instruments get into their hands. And, I think that Marin is one of those blessed virtuouso musicians – a musician with dexterity across multiple dimensions, equally at ease as a soloist with virtuoso repertoire, and as an accompanist who can accompany any voice or instrument, and as a composer and arranger and improvisationist. He reads complex music scores as well as he performs music solely by ear and by improvisation. (Many musicians tend to be stronger in either one or the other modality.)
Over the years, in listening to everything he does, we have been repeatedly awed by how he stradles the complexity of music, across dimensions and styles. Example: His accompaniment of a singer with a midi accordion in the above clip of “That’s Life” as contrasted with his role as a soloist performing “Hora Staccato” with acoustic instruments: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6DbgyPRw3I&list=PL5673F22FD4112162&index=8
We have ALL of Marin Nasturica’s CDs – all of his jazz CDs, all of his classical CDs, all CDs with orchestra. This musician is an extraordinary gem in the music world, and one who has inspired our journey in music. (I am an accordion enthusiast, play the accordion myself, appreciate how difficult this instrument is to play well.)