Armand Labrecque on the Significance of the Accordion
![Engraving from 1915 by Edmond-Joseph Massicotte, depicting an old-fashioned Quebec house party. Two dancing couples are surrounded by other partygoers seated on chairs. A fiddler plays in the background.](https://www.communitystories.ca/v2/accordeonistes-montmagny_accordionists/wp-content/uploads/sites/150/2022/07/Veillee-de-danse-MNBAQ.jpg)
Audio: Armand Labrecque interviewed by Camille Brochu. Archives of the Musée de l’accordéon. 1995.
Image: Une veillée d’autrefois by Edmond-Joseph Massicotte, 1915. Library and Archives Canada. Public domain.
Transcript:
Interviewer: Were there any other fiddlers in the area, besides your father?
Armand Labrecque: In the community? In the region?
Interviewer: When you were growing up?
Armand Labrecque: Yes, yes, yes.
Interviewer: Was it half and half? Half accordion, half fiddle?
Armand Labrecque: More or less. But in our part of town, there were more accordionists than fiddlers. Yes. People would drop by our house and my father’s friends played the fiddle. But really, it was a completely different crowd.
Interviewer: Two different repertoires that didn’t overlap?
Armand Labrecque: In any case, we tended to think of the fiddle as an old man’s instrument. I never picked up a fiddle, although there had always been one in the house. I just never picked it up.