“The music expressed was complex, sly, virtuosic, and deeply felt and imaginative.”
- Philadelphia Inquirer

The collaboration of avant-guarde virtuoso accordion player Guy Klucevsek and triple-threat Alan Bern of Brave Old World fame (composer, accordion player, pianist) has resulted in this refreshingly bright accordion duo. Creating works that span modern jazz, Eastern European motifs and colorful ethnic grooves, these master musicians take this unwieldy instrument to a whole new level of grace.

The duo’s newest release Notefalls was called “Absolutely beautiful and soul-stirring” in the CMJ New Music Report. A review by Stephen Eddis from allmusicguide.com says, “The number of classical accordion virtuosos is small, but Guy Klucevsek and Alan Bern are among its brightest lights. Both have strong classical credentials. Klucevsek has worked with groups and individuals as diverse as John Zorn, the Kronos Quartet, Anthony Braxton, Relâche, Pauline Oliveros, and Jubilant Sykes, and is also a composer. Bern holds a doctorate in composition from the Cincinnati Conservatory and directs the outstanding klezmer ensemble Brave Old World. Notefalls is their second joint CD, and it's obvious they are having a blast playing together. Their compositions have a loose-limbed, infectious charm and lack of pretense that's completely disarming. This is not trivial music; on close inspection it's often quite sophisticated, but it demonstrates the composers' willingness to drop all the filters usually attached to the "new music" label, and to write music that is unabashedly melodic and falls into easily recognizable patterns, and that's sometimes silly. Both composers' music is fearlessly eclectic, incorporating and transcending standard conventions such as marches, tangos, and blues. Both play keyboards as well as accordion, and the ensembles on the album range from two accordions to piano and accordion to piano, four-hands. The sound is full, warm, and intimate. The album should appeal to a variety of listeners, including fans of new music that's not afraid to be tonal, blues that aren't afraid of dissonance, klezmer that syncretistically blends with classical, and to plain old lovers of the accordion.”

From www.othermusic.com, a reviewer says about the 2001 Winter &Winter release, Accordance, “These two are at the absolute height of their profession. I can think of none more proficient, skillful, diverse and adept in the small accordion-playing world. Here, you get them in stereo: Bern in one channel, Klucevsek in the other. And when they both get boiling, it's hard to tell exactly how many accordions are in the room. Bern's compositions are greatly different from Klucevsek's. While Klucevsek, puckish, uses complex 'ethnic' riffs and melodies (or distills them), Bern derives his compositions from deep blues, the dark corner of the soul. This is especially obvious on 'Angel Blues', a remarkable bit of extreme soul wrung from such an unwieldy machine. 'Starting Over', the centerpiece, goes from near-stillness to a religious intensity: swelling plumes, billowing clouds of compounded notes make the two an absolute choir. Bern (from the klezmer group Brave Old World) also plays the piano, his compositions introspective and airy. I'm also guessing he uses this as an opportunity to make music not touched by klezmer's wild sadnesses and frenzies. Klucevsek's pieces are the jauntiest, though unforgivably titled with some of the worst puns ('Life, Liberty and Prosciutto Happiness' being the standout 'ugh'-inciter). Together, they sweep you up, carrying you on hard currents of sound. It rates very high among the best accordion CDs I've ever heard.”
 

“… the musicians render fluent unison choruses, heartfelt passages and probing lines amid a festive demeanor. The duo also digs deep from within as they interrogate each other’s mindset, resulting in intuitive interplay along with a noticeably focused predilection for pursuing the dynamic.” - Glenn Astarita, All About Jazz

“If you ever get a crack at hearing them live, sell whatever it takes to raise the funds to get there!” - Cliff Furnald, CMJ