Blame it on Lawrence Welk. For years, the accordion has had to carry the burden of being terminally unhip, when in fact it’s shockingly versatile. For one thing, it’s just about the only keyboard instrument that breathes, giving it a much more vocal sound than the piano, organ, or synthesizer. And in its more complex manifestations, it can cover seven octaves or more, making it essentially an orchestra you can sling over your shoulder. Far from being stodgy, it’s downright wonderful—and Dutch musicians Renée Bekkers and Pieternel Berkers figured that out at a very young age.

“We both started with the recorder, because that’s obligatory,” reports Bekkers, speaking to the Straight from Amsterdam. “After two years you can choose another instrument, and there was a piano, a violin, a guitar, and accordions. We both liked the accordions most.

“When you play on the accordion, you just push one button, and there’s this chord,” she continues. “It feels quite fast that you’re playing really full music.”

Further proof of the accordion’s charm is that this early infatuation has only grown stronger with time. As TOEAC, Bekkers and Berkers are one of the world’s leading accordion duos, and when they make their MusicFest Vancouver debut they intend to show that their chosen instrument has limitless potential.

At the same time, however, they aim to entertain. This is somewhat unusual in such virtuosic performers, but the two musicians recognize that they’re starting at a disadvantage.

“People think that the accordion is an old-fashioned instrument for old people, it’s true,” Bekkers admits. “But I think it’s changing now—and we’re trying to make that change. When we play concerts people are always surprised: ”˜Oh, I didn’t know that you could do that!’ So it’s really nice that you can surprise people, and I think it’s harder to surprise people with, for example, the piano.”

The key to holding an audience’s attention, Bekkers explains, is to choose music that tells a story. She cites Modest Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, which she and Berkers have arranged for their duo, as a piece that has a strong visual component. Just as compelling, although much more modern, is the intricate and whimsical View From a Dutch Train, by their compatriot Jacob ter Veldhuis.

“People really like that music, and still it’s kind of complicated to understand,” she notes. “But it gets you from the beginning.”

Ter Veldhuis’s work has gotten such a strong reaction that TOEAC will also perform his Body of Your Dreams, a pointed look at dieting, complete with samples from American weight-loss commercials. Even further into the realm of performance art is Zbigniew Bargielski’s Conversation With a Shadow, which is as much a piece of theatre as a musical composition. It’s an area that Bekkers and Berkers are increasingly interested in exploring, up to a point.

“We’re trying to do more of that—but not with everything, of course,” says Bekkers, laughing. “That would be some kind of circus!”

TOEAC plays Christ Church Cathedral on Saturday (August 6).