Accordionist dazzles audience with classics at Lacey library

Accordion maestro Mario Cianflone began a lifelong love affair with music at age 9, when his father won a bare-bones version of the instrument in a poker match.

Today, Cianflone tours the country to entertain small audiences with a dazzling command of classical music colored by old European traditions.

Cianflone played for about 25 people Saturday at the Lacey Timberland Library in an event sponsored by Friends of the Lacey Library. Highlights included flawless renditions of “Besame Mucho,” the famous Argentinian tango song “La Cumparsita,” “Under Paris Skies” and a German waltz that would fit any Oktoberfest party. Several people in the audience swayed or tapped their toes amid the relaxing ambiance.

But part of Saturday’s show focused on the intricacies of the box-shaped accordion and its piano-style keys that play melodies in tandem with an array of black buttons for the bass notes. Rows of reeds inside the accordion will produce sound when air flows across them, sort of like a harmonica.

Cianflone, who lives part time in Aberdeen and Minnesota, was born in Italy and grew up in Winnipeg, Canada. He moved to the United States to study the accordion at the University of Minnesota and eventually became a U.S. citizen. He has earned advanced degrees in music theory and composition.

And to think it all started when his father won that hand of poker.

“I was in the third grade and he just brought this thing home and said ‘here, have fun with it,” Cianflone recalled.

But what’s the key to inspiring young musicians to master the squeezebox?

“You’ve got to inspire them by playing,” he said.

His manager, Cat Linsley, books his gigs and secures grant money to keep him playing at libraries as well as Italian community events nationwide. She is working on finding more performance opportunities in the Puget Sound region. So far, the next local show will be Nov. 5 in Aberdeen.

“He’s really a modern-day Mozart,” she said. “He’s a prodigy.”

This story was originally published April 9, 2016 at 5:27 PM with the headline "Accordionist dazzles audience with classics at Lacey library."