First Quote Added
April 10, 2026
Latest Quote Added
"The accordion fun? ....Sometimes. Not all the time. I find that it can be a frustrating instrument. The coordination involved is extraordinary and sometimes that coordination doesn't happen.... The use of the left hand and at the same time getting the dynamic range, the volume, is quite difficult. Other times it is fun if you're working with other musicians and you're doin' pieces that you really enjoy. It can really be fun!"
"There are instruments known as free-bass instruments, or sometimes called the bassetti, where you have totally complete single pitches, simply like you would in the right hand, and you form your own chords. And you have a greater range in the left hand, some three to four-and-a-half octaves."
"Since the accordion has so many attributes that are conducive to chamber music, it is particularly suitable for this medium of expression. In essence, the accordion has all of the prerequisites essential to small ensemble involvement: sustaining power, dynamic sensitivity, articulated response, timbre, and texture variance, and compatibility of sound with string and wind instruments."
"Seventy-five percent of everything done throughout your life is the result of habit. Think of it! The way you walk, the way you eat, the clothes you wear, the places you go and...last, but not least, the way you play your accordion."
"Being a complete instrument in itself it has no equal as an entertainment medium in the home, outdoors, or wherever people gather to enjoy good fellowship. During the past 15 years or so the accordion has risen to the top of the field as a best seller in the musical instrument market. At present, it threatens to replace the piano as the medium through which Junior or little sister are initiated to the delights and sometimes pains of a musical education."
Young though he was, his radiant energy produced such an impression of absolute reliability that Hedgewar made him the first sarkaryavah, or general secretary, of the RSS.
- Gopal Mukund Huddar
Largely because of the influence of communists in London, Huddar's conversion into an enthusiastic supporter of the fight against fascism was quick and smooth. The ease with which he crossed from one worldview to another betrays the fact that he had not properly understood the world he had grown in.
Huddar would have been 101 now had he been alive. But then centenaries are not celebrated only to register how old so and so would have been and when. They are usually celebrated to explore how much poorer our lives are without them. Maharashtrian public life is poorer without him. It is poorer for not having made the effort to recall an extraordinary life.
I regret I was not there to listen to Balaji Huddar's speech [...] No matter how many times you listen to him, his speeches are so delightful that you feel like listening to them again and again.
By the time he came out of Franco's prison, Huddar had relinquished many of his old ideas. He displayed a worldview completely different from that of the RSS, even though he continued to remain deferential to Hedgewar and maintained a personal relationship with him.