I first played the piano, and only after years of playing piano my eyes fell on the accordion. I never had an accordion teacher, but I learned a lot from people online. One of the nicest realisation in the beginning of my playing was that a lot of nice chords could be made with only the left hand on the accordion, leaving the right hand completely free for melody. That is a big difference with the piano, where you’ll need to make chords with the left and right hand together.
Blue accordion
You’ll have to get a lot into your system, but once you do, the left hand of the accordionist is ideal for songwriters, since you can form a harmonic base for songs with only the left hand. It’s almost as using an auto-harp, or a one-button band-in-a-keyboard preset, but it leaves you with a lot of dynamic and rhythmic and expressive possibilities still.
I love the left hand of the accordion!
I now share the sheet that helped me find al the possible chords, written by Steve Keen. The most ones I share here, but of course you could follow the link for a more detailed documentation. Let me know if you use different chords!
Chords created using 1 bass + 1 tiad
- C bass + D maj = D7/C – 7th in the bass.
- C bass + Eb maj = Cm7 – Use bass OR counterbass, easy reach to both.
- C bass + E maj = Cmaj7 (+5) – Good contemporary jazz chord.
- C bass + G maj = G/C – Good traditional folk style chord.
- C bass + Bb maj = Bb/C – James Taylor chord; acts like a sus chord .
- C bass + B maj = B/C – Jazz chord; use counterbass.
- C bass + D min = F6/C or Dm7/C
- C bass + Eb min = Cm7(b5) – The half-diminished 7th chord.
- C bass + E min = Cmaj7
- C bass + A min = C6 or Am/C – Nice voicing of an ordinary chord.
- C bass + Bb min = C7sus (b9) – Dave Grusin jazz chord; heard often in Baroque music
- C bass + G min = C9 (no3)
- C bass + G7 = G7/C – Common Baroque cadence chord.
- C bass + Bb7 = C9(+5) – No third.
- C bass + G dim 7 = C7 – A 4 part rendition of a C7 chord.
- C bass + Bb dim7 = C7(b9) – Missing the 3rd.
- C bass + F dim = Dm7(b5)/C or Fm6
Chords created using C-row triads + 1 counterbass
- C maj + A (cb) = Am7
- C maj + D (cb) = C/D or D11
- C min + A (cb) = Am7(b5)
- C7 + F#(cb) = F#7(b5) – A combination based on the so-called “tritone subsitution”.
- C dim + F#(cb) = F#dim7 – A true 4-part Diminished 7th chord.
Accordionistic | Accordion Blog 
Thx for that, been playing for a while now, I just found a neat site with nice jazz tunes for accordeon, there I discovered that you can make many more chords and do much more with left, your info will help me how to make them, much easyer then someone with their hands on YouTube.
Thx again.
Good luck with the endless chord possibilities!
Thanks for writing this awesome post. It has seriously helped me.
Good to hear Dennis!