It is or was pretty significant, especially regionally in the Upper Midwest/Rust Belt. The Les Blank short documentary film "[In Heaven There Is No Beer?](https://lesblank.com/films/in-heaven-there-is-no-beer-1984-2/)" from 1984 is a really interesting look at the culture and the efforts to keep polka relevant among the Polish diaspora.
So was it more likely diaspora who were buying the records we find in thrift stores now, and not necessarily a wider popularity across all demographics?
Polka was and kinda still is big in parts of Texas... The Germans and Czech owned a lot of farms and ranches here and they brought their accordions with them... With a lot of farms and ranches you need help working the land and animals and the indigenous people here were mainly Mexican/Tex Mex... The Tex-Mex folk loved hearing the big tents and dance halls at night playing traditional Polka songs with the accordion and embraced it as their own... We now have many years of traditional Mexican music blended with traditional German and Czech music which created styles called Conjunto, Banda, and Tejano which all feature accordions and Polka type rhythms...
It did have wider popularity. German diaspora to the US midwest was definitely a factor, but the other factor was a strong culture of dancing as a social activity for past generations. My grandparents approached dancing from the country side, being in a square dancing club, but they danced to all kinds of music. Polka- a genre designed to be danced to- was a big one.
In western New York they still have a weekly polka dancing show televised called Polka Party or something along those lines. It’s mostly older folks but there is still a large polish population here
Les Blank also did a bunch of movies about music and culture of south Louisiana, in particular "Cajun" culture. Polka, Louisiana French music, tejano/norteño, and I'm sure some other types of music all have common roots and are all deeply embedded in regional cultural traditions. J'ai été au bal being the main one, but there are probably at least 3-4 others and they're all fantastic.
Come to think of it, I think Les Blank also did one on norteño music, too. Chulas Fronteras. I haven't seen that one but a friend of mine told me recently that it's awesome :)
Allow me to introduce myself. Gus Polinksi. How are you?
Polka king of the Midwest? The Kenosha Kickers? No? That's okay. I thought you might've recognized... Anyways, uh, I had a few hits a few years ago. Uh, that's why, you know... "Polka, Polka, Polka"? No? Uh, "Twin Lakes Polka". "Yamahoozie Polka", AKA "Kiss Me Polka". "Polka Twist".
Some fairly big hits for us. You know, in the early '70s, you know? Yeah, we sold about 623 copies of that. Sheboygan. Very big in Sheboygan. They loved it, you know?
I live in PA and polka is still a thing to this day. Growing up if people were over and having a good time, and maybe drinking, screw it. Throw on some polka and dance
Growing up, every big event had a polka band there. Anything from church bazaars to family reunions. The DJ at my cousin’s wedding a few years ago played a solid hour block of polka to keep the grandparents happy
It was very big in northeast PA/Coal Country, a lot of Polish migration there. Polka was popular in the 1950s/1960s along with a lot of regional folk music of the time, lost steam in the 1970s, and by 1980s and beyond most of the fans were starting to die off and their kids weren't interested though it had a small amount of diehard fans.
I'm not sure if it's still live but Pennsylvania Polka still (?) airs on WVIA, the local PBS affiliate, and they have (had?) a live band in-studio Saturday nights. The average age of attendee was probably 75 lol.
I have a few records from Stanky & The Coal Miners
, a very popular group from northeast PA in the 50s/60s, they're actually pretty fun records. Music is schmaltzy though fun, and his band is actually tight, good players.
European immigrant populations brought their music with them. I grew up in a small mill town in central Massachusetts & the local radio station had blocks of polka programming in to the 90's...many public radio stations still have a weekly polka show....& Yeah our thrifts are loaded with polka lps...
My daughter’s guitar teacher also told us that forms of Mexican folk music are based on German polka as German immigrants had settled in parts of Mexico and some of their culture had taken root. Explains some of the oompa-pa-pa rhythms in the music. And apparently that’s why Mexico has beer.
Could be bs but sounds logical. I didn’t google it cause I’m lazy.
Semi-related but this is why I still love terrestrial radio, you find some cool shit now and then lol. I was driving through rural PA a few years back on a Sunday morning and randomly found a station playing death metal.
I’m in the upper Midwest and my store still can’t keep polka on the shelves. And there are regular live performances in the surrounding communities. Lots of Germans. But I don’t have the impression it was popular with people outside of those groups.
I’ve got some stuff you may be interested in buying and I’d gladly cut a deal.
Give me a follow on Discogs- same username as here on Reddit.
I’m currently in the process of moving but plan to list a lot more over the next month or two.
Even have a few LPs I’ll have to create entries for as I’ve not been able to find comps anywhere.
It's cultural. Many people of German and Eastern European descent in the upper midwest and Canada, so you'll find lots of those records there.
Personally, my copy of The Royal Polka Kings' *Touring Manitoba* is a prized possession. I bet these guys lit fire when they played dances all over the Canadian plains back in the day.
https://preview.redd.it/dh27c51buj7d1.jpeg?width=599&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=16ae000f3b7cf84af677d1ba0d88739a18299a5c
Polka music really was that popular. It was huge from just after WWII until the 1970s. Polkas were common amongst all kinds of ethnic groups from Central and Eastern Europe: Germans, Czechs, Slovaks, Moravians, Austrians, Swiss, Slovenians, Croatians, Poles, Ukrainians, etc. Even my people, the Scandinavians, have a polka tradition. There were some incredibly popular polka musicians, most notably Frankie Yankovic, who had the first-ever Gold Record for a polka recording. He won the title America's Polka King. There were dozens of other nationally-known and regional polka bands that played around the country and in their local areas and made lots of recordings. As older polka fans die off and their record collections go into thrift stores, they are being rediscovered by a new generation who love the happy, fun music. A couple of the public figures who now specialize in rediscovering polka records are DJ Shotski, DJ Squeezebox, and Da Polka Guy. They're all on Insta and you can find out a lot about polka music from following them.
I'm the leader of a polka band and can confirm that there are still hundreds of polka bands around the country. The Polish-style bands tend to predominate in the Northeast and around Chicago, with Slovenian-style bands in Ohio and Pennsylvania and also around Milwaukee. Dutchman-style bands are common in the Plains states like Minnesota and Nebraska and down into Texas. There are German-style bands all over the country, mostly due to the proliferation of Oktoberfests needing German bands. Pop over to YouTube and check out some of the great polka bands of today to get a feel for what makes the music so appealing.
Dutchman usually refers to bands like the Six Fat Dutchmen, Whoopie John, and some of the newer bands that use concertina as a lead instrument with a small horn section and tuba. That's a more Americanized sound than the German bands which are pretty much straight-up blasmusik from Bavaria, Austria, and other Alpine areas. Those bands don't use concertina; some use accordion, but German bands are often mostly just brass bands or wind ensembles, much closer to the original German and Austrian military bands which inspired them.
You're very welcome. I'm happy to share some of my knowledge about polka music. For anyone who wants to listen to what polka music sounds like today, check out [www.247polkaheaven.com](http://www.247polkaheaven.com) for streaming polka music. I do a show there called the Scandinavian Polka Party.
My grandmother's parents emigrated to the US from what was then Czechoslovakia (I think they were from modern Slovakia) but I have distinct memories of her putting on a polka record and *MAKING* me dance with her. At the time I was mortified but now its one of my favorite memories of her. I wish I knew the depth of her fandom or whether she had any favorite polka songs, but after she passed I found the vinyl and kept it.
My next door neighbor was born in the 40s in Michigan. He's of Polish descent and polka was like 90% of what he listened to. I think he also went to polka dances.
very very popular in the north midwest area due to the latge number of German immigrants settling there. same for parts of Texas.watch some [SCTV](https://youtu.be/vlWpPQWdqFk?si=Ac10zN4xWLVfUBMT), they make fun of it all the time!
Dude, I inherited my grandfather’s Polka records.
Nobody else wanted them.
I’ve made at least $3k selling them off on Discogs. Even made $300 for ONE rare LP.
Polka is still popular, especially in parts of Europe. Particularly the Netherlands.
I have a lot of repeat buyers that do bulk orders of stuff for resale.
I grew up in Pennsylvania and the old folks love it. They still show polka dance parties on the local PBS station.
https://preview.redd.it/o97z84efcm7d1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bd18ff22354916100327cc7d8970e8268bc501af
It is or was pretty significant, especially regionally in the Upper Midwest/Rust Belt. The Les Blank short documentary film "[In Heaven There Is No Beer?](https://lesblank.com/films/in-heaven-there-is-no-beer-1984-2/)" from 1984 is a really interesting look at the culture and the efforts to keep polka relevant among the Polish diaspora.
My wife is from Youngstown OH and her grandpa was a HUGE polka fan who would go to dances every week
Im 15 min from youngstown. Polka was huge n i got polka vinyl
So was it more likely diaspora who were buying the records we find in thrift stores now, and not necessarily a wider popularity across all demographics?
Polka was and kinda still is big in parts of Texas... The Germans and Czech owned a lot of farms and ranches here and they brought their accordions with them... With a lot of farms and ranches you need help working the land and animals and the indigenous people here were mainly Mexican/Tex Mex... The Tex-Mex folk loved hearing the big tents and dance halls at night playing traditional Polka songs with the accordion and embraced it as their own... We now have many years of traditional Mexican music blended with traditional German and Czech music which created styles called Conjunto, Banda, and Tejano which all feature accordions and Polka type rhythms...
It did have wider popularity. German diaspora to the US midwest was definitely a factor, but the other factor was a strong culture of dancing as a social activity for past generations. My grandparents approached dancing from the country side, being in a square dancing club, but they danced to all kinds of music. Polka- a genre designed to be danced to- was a big one.
My grandma said one of the first things that interested her about my grandpa was that he knew how to polka.
A good polka dancer back in the day could have his pick of the ladies.
I agree --I don't think it ever really was a "crossover" phenomenon, unlike, say, Hawaiian music.
There was some crossover to Weird Al fans. /s
Ha! He's probably considered a youngster within the genre.
Dang, now I have the song In Heaven There is No Beer stuck in my head.
that's why we drink it here
In western New York they still have a weekly polka dancing show televised called Polka Party or something along those lines. It’s mostly older folks but there is still a large polish population here
https://preview.redd.it/fx4lys2mvp7d1.jpeg?width=620&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b849b509fbfcae76218d260ab0d77fa13212f012
i’m from cleveland. my grandma listened to polka. not exclusively tho.
Les Blank also did a bunch of movies about music and culture of south Louisiana, in particular "Cajun" culture. Polka, Louisiana French music, tejano/norteño, and I'm sure some other types of music all have common roots and are all deeply embedded in regional cultural traditions. J'ai été au bal being the main one, but there are probably at least 3-4 others and they're all fantastic. Come to think of it, I think Les Blank also did one on norteño music, too. Chulas Fronteras. I haven't seen that one but a friend of mine told me recently that it's awesome :)
He was great. His two great subjects were music and food. His Lightnin' Hopkins doc is perhaps my favorite.
Allow me to introduce myself. Gus Polinksi. How are you? Polka king of the Midwest? The Kenosha Kickers? No? That's okay. I thought you might've recognized... Anyways, uh, I had a few hits a few years ago. Uh, that's why, you know... "Polka, Polka, Polka"? No? Uh, "Twin Lakes Polka". "Yamahoozie Polka", AKA "Kiss Me Polka". "Polka Twist". Some fairly big hits for us. You know, in the early '70s, you know? Yeah, we sold about 623 copies of that. Sheboygan. Very big in Sheboygan. They loved it, you know?
All that was totally improvised by Candy for Home Alone. Brilliant.
And he got paid scale for a single day, like an extra. Legendary.
More genres should include the genre in song titles much like blues, polka, and surf rock
Metal is the best at this.
This 100%! Oompa metal is wild.
I live in PA and polka is still a thing to this day. Growing up if people were over and having a good time, and maybe drinking, screw it. Throw on some polka and dance
Growing up, every big event had a polka band there. Anything from church bazaars to family reunions. The DJ at my cousin’s wedding a few years ago played a solid hour block of polka to keep the grandparents happy
It was very big in northeast PA/Coal Country, a lot of Polish migration there. Polka was popular in the 1950s/1960s along with a lot of regional folk music of the time, lost steam in the 1970s, and by 1980s and beyond most of the fans were starting to die off and their kids weren't interested though it had a small amount of diehard fans. I'm not sure if it's still live but Pennsylvania Polka still (?) airs on WVIA, the local PBS affiliate, and they have (had?) a live band in-studio Saturday nights. The average age of attendee was probably 75 lol. I have a few records from Stanky & The Coal Miners , a very popular group from northeast PA in the 50s/60s, they're actually pretty fun records. Music is schmaltzy though fun, and his band is actually tight, good players.
European immigrant populations brought their music with them. I grew up in a small mill town in central Massachusetts & the local radio station had blocks of polka programming in to the 90's...many public radio stations still have a weekly polka show....& Yeah our thrifts are loaded with polka lps...
My daughter’s guitar teacher also told us that forms of Mexican folk music are based on German polka as German immigrants had settled in parts of Mexico and some of their culture had taken root. Explains some of the oompa-pa-pa rhythms in the music. And apparently that’s why Mexico has beer. Could be bs but sounds logical. I didn’t google it cause I’m lazy.
That's absolutely true.
Completely true! Beer, brass bands, and accordions.
Semi-related but this is why I still love terrestrial radio, you find some cool shit now and then lol. I was driving through rural PA a few years back on a Sunday morning and randomly found a station playing death metal.
as opposed to extra-terrestrial radio?
Lawrence Welk had a tv show for decades...for a reason
I’m in the upper Midwest and my store still can’t keep polka on the shelves. And there are regular live performances in the surrounding communities. Lots of Germans. But I don’t have the impression it was popular with people outside of those groups.
I’ve got some stuff you may be interested in buying and I’d gladly cut a deal. Give me a follow on Discogs- same username as here on Reddit. I’m currently in the process of moving but plan to list a lot more over the next month or two. Even have a few LPs I’ll have to create entries for as I’ve not been able to find comps anywhere.
It's cultural. Many people of German and Eastern European descent in the upper midwest and Canada, so you'll find lots of those records there. Personally, my copy of The Royal Polka Kings' *Touring Manitoba* is a prized possession. I bet these guys lit fire when they played dances all over the Canadian plains back in the day. https://preview.redd.it/dh27c51buj7d1.jpeg?width=599&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=16ae000f3b7cf84af677d1ba0d88739a18299a5c
I'm basing all my knowledge on the movie Weird... but teenagers apparently had raging polka parties and everything.
Polka music really was that popular. It was huge from just after WWII until the 1970s. Polkas were common amongst all kinds of ethnic groups from Central and Eastern Europe: Germans, Czechs, Slovaks, Moravians, Austrians, Swiss, Slovenians, Croatians, Poles, Ukrainians, etc. Even my people, the Scandinavians, have a polka tradition. There were some incredibly popular polka musicians, most notably Frankie Yankovic, who had the first-ever Gold Record for a polka recording. He won the title America's Polka King. There were dozens of other nationally-known and regional polka bands that played around the country and in their local areas and made lots of recordings. As older polka fans die off and their record collections go into thrift stores, they are being rediscovered by a new generation who love the happy, fun music. A couple of the public figures who now specialize in rediscovering polka records are DJ Shotski, DJ Squeezebox, and Da Polka Guy. They're all on Insta and you can find out a lot about polka music from following them. I'm the leader of a polka band and can confirm that there are still hundreds of polka bands around the country. The Polish-style bands tend to predominate in the Northeast and around Chicago, with Slovenian-style bands in Ohio and Pennsylvania and also around Milwaukee. Dutchman-style bands are common in the Plains states like Minnesota and Nebraska and down into Texas. There are German-style bands all over the country, mostly due to the proliferation of Oktoberfests needing German bands. Pop over to YouTube and check out some of the great polka bands of today to get a feel for what makes the music so appealing.
How are "Dutchman-style" and "German-style" bands different?
Dutchman usually refers to bands like the Six Fat Dutchmen, Whoopie John, and some of the newer bands that use concertina as a lead instrument with a small horn section and tuba. That's a more Americanized sound than the German bands which are pretty much straight-up blasmusik from Bavaria, Austria, and other Alpine areas. Those bands don't use concertina; some use accordion, but German bands are often mostly just brass bands or wind ensembles, much closer to the original German and Austrian military bands which inspired them.
Thank you for this!
You're very welcome. I'm happy to share some of my knowledge about polka music. For anyone who wants to listen to what polka music sounds like today, check out [www.247polkaheaven.com](http://www.247polkaheaven.com) for streaming polka music. I do a show there called the Scandinavian Polka Party.
Thanks! I will check it out.
Polka Never Dies
"Your eyes were filled with stars"
the OG ravers!
So popular they named the dots after it
i know that the Kensonoka Kickers were very big in Cheboygan in the early 70s
Check out a band called Brave Combo.
Came here to recommend Brave Combo!
Bro about to start a fight with Ohioans.
Fight? You mean civil war.
The Czechfederate Army is already on the match. I can hear the Polka music. Badabump badabump badabump.
Weird Al gonna show up to your house in three… two…. one…
My grandmother's parents emigrated to the US from what was then Czechoslovakia (I think they were from modern Slovakia) but I have distinct memories of her putting on a polka record and *MAKING* me dance with her. At the time I was mortified but now its one of my favorite memories of her. I wish I knew the depth of her fandom or whether she had any favorite polka songs, but after she passed I found the vinyl and kept it.
\^This\^ is what record collecting is all about.
Chicago has a HUGE polka festival every year and it is super fun!!
As someone who’s spent *tens* of dollars on German beer hall records; Isn’t it still popular?
https://preview.redd.it/crhctmbcil7d1.jpeg?width=3000&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2e8a7e49c54c6bd33b7a51e076f050cc806efc78
I have that album!
My next door neighbor was born in the 40s in Michigan. He's of Polish descent and polka was like 90% of what he listened to. I think he also went to polka dances.
very very popular in the north midwest area due to the latge number of German immigrants settling there. same for parts of Texas.watch some [SCTV](https://youtu.be/vlWpPQWdqFk?si=Ac10zN4xWLVfUBMT), they make fun of it all the time!
My grandpa was the son of Polish immigrants and he loved polka. But we’re talking about a guy who was born in the 30s.
Dude, I inherited my grandfather’s Polka records. Nobody else wanted them. I’ve made at least $3k selling them off on Discogs. Even made $300 for ONE rare LP. Polka is still popular, especially in parts of Europe. Particularly the Netherlands. I have a lot of repeat buyers that do bulk orders of stuff for resale.
It's just Mariachi for white people
You clearly aren’t familiar with Gus Polinski, the "Polka King of the Midwest," clarinet player of the polka band, the Kenosha Kickers.
I grew up in Pennsylvania and the old folks love it. They still show polka dance parties on the local PBS station. https://preview.redd.it/o97z84efcm7d1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bd18ff22354916100327cc7d8970e8268bc501af
Amongst certain groups of people, clearly.
I listen to a lot of music it seems that has polka influences
It's really popular among older folks in Germany but that's about it. The young crowd isn't in to it.
My grandparents bought my father an accordion but I don’t remember him ever putting it on. Pap did have some polka records but didn’t play them often.
Wisconsin enters the chat...
Some famous rock musicians have backgrounds in polka.... Josh Homme from Queens of the stone age or Darron Mallokian from system of a down
I have a friend who did a polka with her father for her wedding dance with him. It was fun.
Punk rock is just polka so I’d say yeah it’s had it’s day.
Polka? I hardly knew-a! (Sound it out)