Well, a rerun of the Lawrence Welk Show just popped up on the local PBS station. When the camera pans the audience, it consists almost entirely of senior citizens; not those in their 60s, but the even more elderly walker and cane crowd. Since the show really appealed to the elderly, it must have some nostalgic value; that the style of music played was popular in their youth. However, the big band music and crooners of the 1940s only has a passing resemblance to what Welk plays; also, in the 1970s, those who would have grown up with big band music and crooners being prominent in their youth would have been in their 40s and 50s; much younger than Welk’s audience.
So, was there ever a time when Lawrence Welk-type music was considered popular among the nation’s youth? If not, why does the music they play have such great appeal among the “get off my lawn” crowd?
Not among most young people. There are young people today, remember, who prefer . . . well, whoever the modern equivalent to Mr. Welk is, to Nelly or Fergie or Wallis Simpson, or whoever is in the Top Ten this week.
Lawrence Welk, I might add, is not popular among all old people, either–my 85-year-old mother hates him and would much rather listen to the Beatles, Glenn Miller, or Vivaldi!
You could draw parallels between Welk and, say, Norah Jones or late career Rod Stewart or Anne Murray, people who make albums dedicated to a previous generation’s music.
Back in the 70s, when I was a teenager, I was always surprised that Welk could find so many young dancer types for his show. I wondered, “Don’t these guys know there was a revolution and they should have long hair and peace medallions? Did the Rock n Roll movement pass these kids by?” In retrospect, these were all very attractive young people actively pursuing careers in music and dance, inherently cooler than anything I was doing at the time, even with those hideous clothes and all those bubbles.
Welk knew what he was doing. There are pockets in the midwest where Polka and “champagne” music are intensely popular no matter what’s playing in NYC and LA.
I can’t speak for anybody else of that generation, but I know many (most?) musicians of that era thought he was a joke. My grandfather, who was in his early 50’s when he died in the late 1970s was also a swing band leader. He and his musician buddies always derived great pleasure from mocking the music and fashions of the TV show. Yet, according to my grandmother, he never missed an episode. There were just too many golden opportunities to rant or snark. I have to admit these sessions were pretty entertaining even though I was too young to understand most of his comments.
The swing era big bands did attract a large following among young people – it was the music of their day, as 60s music was of mine, and disco of a later generation. But Welk and Guy Lombardo made good solid careers out of playing mellowed-down versions of popular music – sort of the Bobby Goldsboros of their day.
He appealed to midwestern polka-centric senior citizens, and those who liked vaudvilleish style dancing and skits, and in the 60’s and early 70’s that was a sizeable senior cohort.
I think Polycarp has it exactly right. Welk played mellowed-down versions of various kinds of music that were popular with different generations. The result was a light sound that would appeal to the very old, not so much the young. I’m sure he adapted Beatle music and other '60s compositions to his style along the way, but always in a regressive, midwesternized way.
Lawrence Welk was popular back in the day. Was it just a midwest thing? It would be interesting to know the nielsen ratings were. The show was popular with a large swath of people precisely because of what it was not - no smashing the instruments, setting them on fire in a drug induced fog, lyrics about killing dad and boning mom, etc. etc.
For the old people in the crowd, though - did they just like the music because it was soft, slow and relaxed, or were they actually nostalgic for it, as if there was a time when in their youth, polka and champagne music was the pop music of the day?
It might be noted that Lawrence Welk placed many singles on the Billboard charts during the '50s and '60s, including “Calcutta,” which went to #1 in 1961. That said, I maintain that he & his band weren’t reviving any particular retro pop form, but rather concocting a sound that suggested to people in its simplicity an imaginary lost romantic time, happier than today. It was all fantasy, in other words.
Yes, I think it was (popular among young people). I watched Welk back in the early-mid 50’s. If you wanted to “watch” music being played and singers singing, there was Welk, Mitch Miller, Hit Parade, and later, the musical guests on Ed Sullivan. We also had locally produced country music shows.
The appeal of Welk was that he played songs you knew. You could sing along, for real or in your head. It looked like they were all having a good time, and it was infectious. The Lennon Sisters were cute, and we liked watching the dancers.
My mom told me about going to see Welk when he toured. He was about the biggest thing to hit rural Iowa in the 40’s. No Benny Goodman or she would have gone to see him too.
But thank God for American Bandstand. We kids dumped Welk like a hot potato when Dick Clark showed up on the tee-vee.
It certainly wasn’t fantasy, by any stretch. In those days, with only “the big three” television stations - my grandparents would say something like “We’ve got to go now, Lawrence Welk is on at 8, you know” so they could rush right home in time to watch. No tapes, DVD’s or Tivo then, of course. I’m not sure why PBS runs it now - it’s interesting to watch in hindsight - the big poofy hairdos, and wondering if any of the various bandmembers show evidence of possible leftist subversion or tell-tale red eyes from surreptitious cannabis use, because of, or in spite of, Larry.
I caught one of these shows…from, I think, 1969…and it was hilarious. There was a version of “Hey Jude” with strings. Nobody could possibly have been nostalgic for that because only Lawrence Welk could have imagined it. (This was before the Mormon Tabernacle Choir recorded their very own version of “Satisfaction.” I know they did because I heard it at the dentist’s office.)
The funniest thing in that particular show, though, was the romantic duet. I think they always had one. On this particular show, the song was “Release Me.” It was quite funny to watch not one but two people staring into each others’ eyes and singing soulfully, “Please, release me, let me go…cause I don’t love you any more…” Yeah, nothing says romance like a mutually desired divorce…
I’ve mentioned this before in another Welk thread.
A black fellow did a tap dance to some Polish song, and, as he left the stage, Welk said that he was a credit to his race. :eek:
I read somewhere about an episode of the Welk show where some dancers did an intricate routine, and when it was over, meaning to compliment them on their fine dancing, he exclaimed words to the effect of, “boy, those two really know how to cut the cheese!”
I honestly don’t remember whether this part got on the air, or whether it was an outtake, but the band apparently broke up laughing.