accordion.sg

Buying guides · 6 min read

How to choose an accordion

Picking an accordion means matching bass count, weight and reed quality to the player's body and repertoire. A plain guide to sizes, budgets and what to skip.

2026-05-06

Start with the player, not the instrument

An accordion hangs off your shoulders for the whole practice session, which makes it one of the few instruments where body size is a hard constraint rather than a preference. A box that is too big pushes the keyboard away from the right hand, tips the bass side out of reach, and teaches a hunched posture that takes years to unlearn. Before comparing brands, measure the player: shoulder width, arm length, and how much weight they can hold upright for forty minutes.

The rough guide most teachers use runs by age and frame. A child of six to eight does well on a 12- to 32-bass instrument of three or four kilos. Eight to eleven usually suits 48 or 60 bass. From about eleven, or for a small adult, 72 bass at six or seven kilos is a sensible landing point. Average adults go to 96 or 120 bass, which will weigh anywhere from eight to about thirteen kilos depending on how many reed ranks are inside.

The mistake is buying the instrument a student will grow into. A child who cannot reach the bass rows learns to compensate, and those compensations become habits. Smaller instruments hold value well enough to trade up, so buying correctly twice usually costs less than two years of bad technique.

Bass count is about repertoire, not status

The standard Stradella bass layout comes in fixed sizes: 8, 12, 24, 32, 48, 60, 72, 96 and 120 buttons. Each step adds more keys in the circle of fifths and, above 48, adds chord rows. What matters is not the headline number but which rows are present. A 48-bass usually gives you major, minor and seventh chords across enough keys for almost all teaching material through the early grades. A 72-bass adds the diminished row and comfortable access to flat keys. A 120-bass adds range at the extremes that a lot of players genuinely never use.

So the honest question is what the student will play in the next three years. Folk, pop, tango accompaniment and standard method books live comfortably within 48 to 72 bass. Classical transcriptions, musette in awkward keys, and anything written for the concert instrument want 96 or 120. Free-bass and converter instruments eventually enter the picture for conservatory work, but that is a later and much larger decision.

Treble range follows the same logic. A 26-key instrument is limiting past beginner level, 34 keys covers most of the repertoire, and 41 keys is the full concert range.

What you are actually paying for

Two accordions with identical specifications on paper can differ enormously in price, and the difference sits almost entirely in the reeds and the assembly. Machine-stamped reeds have looser tolerances, so they need more air to start speaking. That shows up as a sluggish response at quiet dynamics and a note that will not begin cleanly when you want it to whisper. Hand-finished reeds, where a technician has fitted each tongue to its slot, start instantly and hold tuning far longer.

The second cost centre is the bellows and the pallet work. An airtight bellows makes an instrument feel lighter than it is, because none of your effort leaks away. Sloppy pallet felts produce a faint hiss under every note and a keyboard that clacks. Neither appears on a specification sheet; both are obvious within a minute of playing.

A cassotto, the internal tone chamber that routes one or two reed ranks through a wooden channel before the grille, is the other big jump. It rounds the sound and removes the hard edge that makes cheap instruments tiring to hear. It also adds weight and cost. Students do not need it; anyone performing classical repertoire eventually wants it.

Budget tiers, plainly

At the bottom, entry instruments for children and hobby players give you a working box with machine reeds and simple registers. They will teach a beginner what they need for two or three years and will not reward practice much beyond that. In the middle sit serious student instruments: better reeds, reliable tuning, a bellows that stays tight. This is where most adult learners should aim.

At the top are concert instruments with hand-made reeds, cassotto, and case work built to survive travelling. Piano accordions we stock run from S$1,617 to S$4,677, which spans roughly that whole range from a capable first instrument to something a serious student can perform on without apology. Above that figure you are into custom orders and used professional instruments, where condition matters more than the label.

Used instruments can be excellent value, with one caveat: retuning and re-waxing cost real money, and a box that has sat in a cupboard for twenty years usually needs both. Have anything secondhand opened and checked before money changes hands.

How to try one properly

Play a long, quiet held note on a single middle register. If it takes a moment to speak or wavers at the start, the reeds are poor or the valves have curled. Then run a chromatic scale slowly and listen for any note that arrives late, first pushing and then pulling. Push and pull should sound identical on a piano accordion.

Squeeze the bellows closed with no key pressed and no air button. It should resist firmly and hold. Press each register switch and listen for a clean change, not a scrape. Shake the instrument gently; a rattle usually means a reed plate has come loose from its wax.

Finally, put it on and sit with it for five minutes without playing. Plenty of instruments that feel fine for thirty seconds feel wrong at five, and that is the number that matters. If you want a second opinion, any decent teacher will listen to a candidate instrument with you; we do this regularly at A&G Academy before a student commits.

Frequently asked

What size accordion should I buy for a 7-year-old?

Something in the 12 to 32 bass range, weighing three to four kilos, with a short 25 or 26 key treble side. The instrument should sit on the lap without the bass side sliding away. Children grow out of these in two or three years, so buying used and reselling is sensible here.

Is 120 bass overkill for a beginner adult?

Usually yes for the first year, but not always a mistake. A 120-bass instrument weighs more and costs more, and beginners use maybe a third of the buttons. If you are certain you will continue and can handle the weight comfortably, buying it once avoids a trade-up. If either is uncertain, start at 72 or 96.

Should I buy a used accordion or a new one?

Used is good value if a technician has checked it. The costs that catch people out are retuning and re-waxing, both of which an instrument that has been stored badly will need, and together they can approach the price difference. A used instrument that has been played and serviced regularly is usually the better buy.

Keep reading

Buying guidesDiscovering the world of bowed string instrumentsBuying guidesAccordion lessons and buying options in SingaporeBuying guidesSeven mistakes people make buying an accordion

Published 2026-05-06 by A&G Academy · Accordion Singapore

Learning or buying in Singapore?

A&G Academy teaches accordion, bayan and double bass, and sells the instruments we teach on. Ask us anything — we'd rather talk you out of the wrong instrument than sell you one.

Ask on WhatsApp See instruments