Never Too Old to Polka

Here’s a feel-good story for your weekend: a Monroe Times piece on Del Heins, a Wisconsin accordionist who’s been entertaining local audiences for more than 60 years. In the mid-1950s, he formed a polka band, the Heins Brothers Combo, with his two older brothers. After they passed away, he mostly played small gatherings and family celebrations but in the past few years, business has been booming. He plays the monthly fish fry at Turner Hall, a steady stream of gigs at senior centers in the Monroe area, and an assortment of polka masses and Cheese Days (this is Wisconsin, after all).

“I’ve never played somewhere where someone wasn’t tapping their toe or swaying to the music… I play these songs over and over and over, and people still enjoy them… It’s happy music… It makes me feel good, and it makes other people feed good.”

Further proof, indeed, that polka is happiness.