OBITUARIES

Myron Floren, 85; Accordion Player Featured on Welk Show

By Dennis McLellan - Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

July 24, 2005

Myron Floren, the accordion virtuoso who came to fame in the mid-1950s
as a regular on "The Lawrence Welk Show," the long-running weekly
musical program that brought "champagne music" into millions of
American homes, has died. He was 85.

Floren, who continued performing until the last few months, died of
cancer Saturday at his home in Rolling Hills Estates, according to
Margaret Heron, syndication manager for the Welk show.

Dubbed "The Happy Norwegian" for his perpetual grin, Floren joined
Welk's orchestra on the road in 1950. A year later, the orchestra made
its first appearance on KTLA-TV Channel 5, broadcast from the Aragon
Ballroom in Santa Monica.

Highly popular locally, the Welk program began its 27-year national
run on Saturday nights in 1955, first on ABC-TV for 16 years and then,
after the network deemed the show's audience "too old" and canceled
it, in syndication on more than 250 stations around the country — more
than had aired the show on ABC.

The wavy-haired, quiet-mannered Floren, the band's assistant
conductor, was one of the most popular members of Welk's large musical
"family," which included regulars such as singer-pianist Larry Hooper,
singer Joe Feeney, violinist Aladdin, honky-tonk pianist Jo Ann
Castle, dancers Bobby Burgess and Barbara Boyland, the Lennon Sisters
and Champagne Lady Norma Zimmer.

The show, whose early years coincided with the rise of rock 'n' roll,
was ridiculed by some at the time for being corny and square. And the
strait-laced Welk's German accent, "wunnerful, wonnerful" catchphrase
and bubble machine became comic fodder.

But the headline on a 1957 Look magazine cover story on the former
North Dakota farm boy proclaimed, "Nobody Loves Him Except the
Public." In fact, about 50 million Americans were tuning in to "The
Lawrence Welk Show" each week at the time.

"Lawrence knew what his audience wanted," Floren told the St. Louis
Post-Dispatch in 1997. "He said, 'Our show has to be so that mothers
all over the country will invite us into their homes.' "

The key to the show's remarkable staying power, Floren said, was that
it offered continual music played by highly skilled musicians.

"Lawrence had the sense to hire fine musicians in every chair," he
said. "It wasn't the corny band that people sometimes think."

At least not to polka lovers.

"I guess we did one practically every week," Floren once recalled. "I
even remember an instance where we were saluting Duke Ellington and
Lawrence added a polka just in case."

"The Lawrence Welk Show" ended in 1982; Welk died 10 years later at
age 89. But the old programs were repackaged and premiered on public
television in 1987. "The Lawrence Welk Show" continues to be seen on
280 public television stations a week.

After the show ceased production, Floren continued to travel 150,000
miles a year, playing special engagements and making appearances with
other Welk show performers.

The son of a grain farmer and the eldest of seven children, Floren was
born Nov. 5, 1919, in Webster, S.D. He fell in love with music at age
6.

"All the neighboring families would get together on Saturday nights,
roll back the rugs and do a little dancing," he recalled in a 1997
interview with the Los Angeles Times. "The thing that intrigued me was
this one neighbor who played a little button-box accordion. He played
Scandinavian and German waltzes and polkas, and I just sat there
watching him - completely fascinated."

His father bought him his first accordion a year later for $19.95. By
age 8, the self-taught Floren was entertaining at the Bay County Fair
in Webster.

After high school, he moved to Sioux Falls to attend Augustana
College. Although he wanted to major in music, he couldn't afford the
$25-a-semester piano rental, so he settled for an English major and
music minor. To help pay for room and board, he taught music part time
and played accordion on the local radio station.

Turned down for military service during World War II because of
childhood bouts with rheumatic fever that damaged his heart, Floren
joined the USO in 1944 and entertained American troops in Europe.

Back home in 1945, he married his wife, Berdyne, a former accordion
pupil. They moved to St. Louis, where Floren joined a country group
called the Buckeye Four, which performed on the Mutual Radio Network
and on local TV.

Floren was still with the group in 1950 when he and his wife
celebrated her birthday by going to a St. Louis ballroom where the
Welk orchestra was playing. Floren had met the accordion-playing
bandleader in South Dakota, and Welk invited him on stage to play.

He played a few numbers, including "Twelfth Street Rag" and "Lady of
Spain," and the crowd response was so enthusiastic that Welk offered
him a job at intermission.

As Floren frequently recalled, Welk's manager at the time told the
bandleader, "Lawrence, this is a bad idea to hire an accordion player,
especially one that plays better than you."

"And Lawrence, God bless him, says, 'Sam, that's the only kind of
people I hire - the ones that play better than I do,' " Floren
recalled.

In the 1997 Times interview, Floren remembered the time the Lawrence
Welk Orchestra played for a crowd of 21,000 people at Madison Square
Garden in the '70s.

"You could feel the electricity in the air," he recalled. "Lawrence
and I were looking out at this crowd from the stage, and he leans over
to me and says, 'Isn't it wonderful what can happen in this country to
a couple of farmers from the Dakotas?' "

Floren never tired of playing the accordion for an audience.

"I'm going to keep squeezing this thing," he once said, "until nobody
calls anymore."

Floren is survived by his wife, five daughters and seven
grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

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