The Paolo Soprani Story (continued)

In 1864, with the help of his brothers, Paolo started an accordion workshop in the wine cellar of his own homestead, then later, needing more space, they moved to a small outhouse hoping to recruit some more workers. The first accordions were sold in the fairs and the markets of the nearby regions, especially in Loreto, directly from the efforts of the enterprising Paolo (he took his products there on horseback), and he was the first to leave the family group. He was familiar with the busy centre of Castelfidardo and opened a factory there in Piazzetta Garibaldi: that was in 1872. Earlier pioneers such as Giacomo Aluni in Umbria in 1850, Giacomo Cingolani of Recanati in1856 and Lorenzo Ploner from Trieste in 1862 started making concertinas, but they never became the economic force that Soprani was to achieve in Castelfidardo. In 1876 Mariano Dallape started to produce considerable quantities of accordions at Stradella, near Pavia, in 1886 Giovanni Chiusaroli at Recanati and Sante Crucianelli again at Castelfidardo in 1888 followed on. The last decade of the 19th century saw an extraordinary growth of new workshops including the Scandalli brothers at Camerano and Antonio Ranco at Vercelli, whose brands remain among the best today.

19th Century accordion workshop	1920s Soprani catalogue	Paolo Soprani factory workers, early 1900s.

Of Paolo's brothers, Settimio opened up a workshop in Via Cavour, Castelfidardo. Paschal, instead, moved to Recanati which remains today another major centre for accordion manufacture. The first true centre responsible for the spread of the instrument in Italy, was most likely, as I have said, Loreto, which was a meeting place of pilgrims, travellers and traders. The instrument was received with lively interest by the people and its sound cheered their spirits most of all at the popular festive dances, and so the accordion became established as a favourite instrument for traditional dance music. As soon it was distributed to other regions the demand multiplied. The accordion was introduced to Sardinia when Soprani visited that island, where he was received with great honours. They began to receive orders also from France and other countries, and in particular from the Americas where the sound of the exported Italian accordion created great nostalgia for the far-off homeland, just as the fiddle or pipes did for the Irish. Towards the end of the 19th century they began the export of the accordions to other continents.     NEXT >>