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http://www.accordions.com/news.aspx?d=11-Jan-2013&lang=es&s=6605
http://www.accordions.com/news.aspx?d=11-Jan-2013&lang=es&s=6605
11-Jan-2013
by Rob Howard
|
 An article from the Times of Malta.com:She fell in love with the musical instrument 50 years ago and has since set up her own accordion band, now the only one in Malta. Today, Marthese Busuttil Cassar believes she would lose her identity if the instrument suddenly vanished from her life. And her passion for it has also drawn husband Joe Busuttil into her musical world. The couple were the first to have an accordion accompaniment during their wedding and had to request special permission from the Archbishop to allow the 25 member accordion band into the church. Since they married in 1979, Mr Busuttil, now 58, has been repairing accordions, whose mechanism fascinates him. The accordion is versatile and can be carried anywhere. It does not need the accompaniment of another instrument, because the right hand plays the melody and the left accompanies with different chords. Above all it is a “happy instrument”, Mrs Busuttil Cassar says. She fell in love with it on a school outing to the Catholic Institute in Floriana, where the Santa Monica Accordion band, which has since been disbanded, was performing. She started learning the instrument at seven under the supervision of Sister Carmela Eastwood, furthered her studies under Sr Benjamina Portelli and eventually earned a Performer Diploma from the British College of Accordionists. She has been teaching the instrument for 32 years and set up her own 18-member Santa Maria Accordion Band 20 years ago. One of her students, Cleve Zammit, last year received the Sir James Anderton Award, which is presented to the student who obtains the highest mark in the British College of Accordionists’ Grade six practical examination. Mrs Busuttil Cassar comes from a family of musicians. Her brother teaches the piano and her father used to play the violin, while her grandfather Charles Cutajar played the clarinet until he was 80 years old. She speaks of her own chosen instrument endearingly: “I cannot imagine the world without music... I carry the accordion everywhere I go and cannot live without it”. The 56-year-old adds that the accordion also plays an important part in the traditional Christmas procession organised for the first time in the 1920s by Dun Gorg Preca. Although the tambourine and triangle joined the procession in some villages, some choirs were also accompanied by up to three accordionists. For more information email to Mrs Busuttil Cassar on mtbusuttil@yahoo.com |