Polka Vallenata (De los Alpes al Río Cesar)

In the 19th century, an instrument with a wandering soul was born in the German Alps: the accordion, a portable piano that has enlivened Bavarian festivities for more than two centuries and crossed the Atlantic to the Americas. It reached Colombia through the ports of La Guajira, where the minstrels of La Guajira, Cesar and Magdalena adopted it and made it their own — and so vallenato was born, the voice of Colombia's Caribbean coast.

Polka Vallenata is a fresh, irreverent and deeply musical look at the accordion's place in Colombian and European music. Are there echoes between German Volksmusik and vallenato? Can a German musician and a vallenato player understand and enjoy each other's music? Performers from both sides speak up — and dare to play each other's notes.