Interview with Armand Labrecque About How He Started Playing the Accordion

Black and white photograph of Armand Labrecque in 1991, when he was Director of the Carrefour mondial de l’accordéon.

Transcript:

Interviewer: OK, it’s February 4, 1995, and I’m with Armand Labrecque from Berthier, formerly of Montmagny. I’d like to talk about your earliest musical memories. At what age, more or less, did you hear music for the first time? I mean accordion music.

Armand Labrecque: As far as I can remember, I would have been about 5 or 6. My father played the fiddle. He even repaired fiddles. We still have a fiddle at home. It’s authentic. My father made it by hand. A lot of the time, he played the fiddle. For us, when he played the fiddle in those days, it was a religious experience. I don’t think we even had a radio. When I was that age, I remember, there was no television. We listened to my father play the fiddle. He wasn’t a great musician. Today, I can tell the difference. But back then, when I was just 6, I thought he was great. As for me, I always… let’s say I was drawn to it. But I never touched my father’s fiddle. I never held it in my hands. That came a lot later. After playing, he would hang up his fiddle. Anyway, I liked the accordion more than the fiddle. So, when I was about 10… there was a barber named Honoré Mercier who sold little accordions, like on the side. They were Pine Tree accordions. He called them trois sapins. My father asked me: “Would you like to play the accordion?” “Of course, I’d like that!” “Well then, I’ll buy you one!” He went for a haircut at the barber’s and, then, there he was with a brand-new accordion. A brand-new little Pine Tree accordion. He spent five dollars on it. That’s what they cost in those days.

Interviewer: So, had he [the barber] ordered it from a catalogue?

Armand Labrecque: I don’t know where he got them from. It’s like anyone who has something to sell. You don’t always know where they get it from. But he did have accordions for sale. There were always two or three out on the shelf. Anyway, I started trying to play. But I just couldn’t get the hang of it on my own. Anyway, the first tune I learned, it was my mother who showed me.