The Shmenges: The Last Polka

1944 and Europe is a battlefield the Nazis under Adolf Hitler have marched through France Amsterdam Poland and left in their wake a trail of devastation and ruin with the exception of Switzerland only one other country retained its neutrality the small independent state of glue tonyia located as the loot onehans put it on the dark side of the balkans here in this land totally devoid of trees life goes on happily for the schminke family it is in this pastoral environment of complete contentment and peace that Yash and Stan schminke spent their formative years although the boys were too young to work they were even at the age of 7 driven by a burning ambition to be something and fueled by the infinite amount of attention afforded them by their parents they found themselves in the role of performers a role unbeknownst to them that would take the name of Meggie to ethereal heights to greatness beyond their wildest dreams never seen them in person wouldn't have missed it for the world the Spookies plated our wedding so you can see there's a sentimental attachment there they Kings about a abdicating I think I have every record this Frankie's put out I've never seen them live this concert tonight will be one of the most memorable nights of my life it's sad to see them go we've been in line 18 hours we leave our husbands at home baby Tel Aviv on Bologna it's in the fridge there is bread you want to eat you know we're together we gonna see ashes fell before coming into the office are you fully stopped at the Lumpy's which is a small lutonium bakery across the street and I would have coffee and raisin surprise well which is a large lump of dough sometimes you find the raisin in it then sometimes not that was the surprise I sitting at my usual table one day when who walks in the door but Josh and Stan well to make a long story short they go to the counter they place their order and tell the waitress to carry their boss and coffee over to my table and they sit down did I find the reason in my surprise Bob and I say I did and they said that they hope they would find the reason in their surprise boss it was you know small talk I am as close to them as anyone and to this day I'll never know why they retired maybe it's personal problems maybe problems with their family a strain on their marriage we hope so anyway to make a long story short as they asked me did I know around here a place it was a good place to go fishing I think to myself I know your son Stan many years and they don't even eat fish why did they retire can I be honest with you I don't care and it's not because I'm bitter they're comfortable financially I don't know it's gotta be the question of the year to make a long story short I say to them the ocean Stan how you find time to go fishing with your schedule and they said to me what schedule and I realized and it hit me these two legends were hanging up their lederhosen and calling it quits that concert to me will always be one of the big highlights of my life to have all our friends and family there made it all so special and to play our hip turns for the last time with the heavy wonders band it was almost a moving experience when people ask me where as myself retired so suddenly you know they tell them I say no comment you know that cracks him up all the dye stain is right you know because it doesn't matter why we retired that's nobody's business but the thing is we have fun along the way that's the important thing that we have some laughs and some good times and some bad time or some bad times but more good times oh yes more of them the music business has been good to us we've made lots of money oh yeah lots of money you know we were able to pay our port our homes and it you know I got a house just a few doors down from from the trees into it but it's a nice house I don't know if it is my sister it's just as nice thanks cuz yours is a great place yeah but the thing now that we have the time to spend with our families and do other things that we didn't have the time to do before like spending time with the families yeah that's one that's fun working back over our last risk rear what with the fame and the man in the group is the town in America total Italians with such humble beginnings make it to the top because I'll tell you back in Lithonia we didn't have too much just music cabbages the schmemmys career started at the age of 7 when they began honing an act which for the first time included music they were perfecting a homemade sound modeled after their first musical influence Lionel Hampton these instruments were called gelt keys which in English means jars and they were like the Exile aful you see back in Lithonia the only records we could get for the Lionel Hampton records don't ask me why so all the kids would play the gang of kids so they could be like Lionel help then his exile affirmed and you see the kids that got to be the best on the girl Keys would go on the on Diwali of to children were the mainstay of Lou Tony and vaudeville and to good Kalki's players commanded top price and top billing because young Yosh couldn't hit a jar without smashing it the schmick e's were at a disadvantage they had to find something for yash to do while his brother Stan dazzled the audience on the Kalki's a variation on the Cossack dance was Yoshi's first attempt to save the act they would have achieved mild success at best had it not been for one thing his name was the amazing Rolo he played the gelt keys and did the Cossack dance at the same time he was very popular but this day we've never seen anything quite like it the schmemmys would try it again Stan and Joe Lee was an act that was finished before it started it never got off the ground professor schminke and his school of sardines was reviewed by one lutonium critic as an act with no future finally in the spring of 1945 Yasha and Stan premiered their new Act which took loot Tony and vaudeville by storm Stan schminke and Houdini's ghost it was a hit and it catapulted the schmemmys to top billing on the circuit but fate read its ugly head three months later lutonium was brought into the war against the Nazis the military needed jars in the summer of 1945 all glass jars in the country was seized crippling vaudeville in latonia and along with it the dream of Fame and success for Kel Keys performers like Stan schminke and many others I was managing this Resort Hotel outside Belding in Lithonia it was 1952 and our headline act that canceled at the last minute the amazing Rolla was his name and he was a virtual one-man show very popular well it was heavy tourist season I didn't know what to do I needed a show all of a sudden these two young teenagers show up they couldn't have been more than 15 they call themselves Stan shrine game and Houdini's ghost one of them played the console Tina while the other one hung upside down and tried to escape from a straitjacket I put them on that night and the crowd loved them they were a smash but toward the end of the show the Rope holding Houdini snapped and he fell right on his head it was terrible we thought he was dead so in order to make the fall look like part of the Act Stan continued to play the concertina you know really selling it while we rushed Josh off the stage and to the hospital the following day I took up to Yosh an old instrument that I'd found lying around the house and told him this should be far less dangerous unless of course for some reason you can't find your mouth and poke yourself in the eye with it and that was the beginning of the schwanke brothers as we now know them it's foreigners but evening ladies and gentlemen well we have someone that we tell if it foreigners on our show tonight it's a big agent at one time but he was blackballed by the Hollywood community for what they labeled unethical business practices anyways he had this amateur show on the radio and these foreigners used to come on you know for nothing for no money and compete for the top prize which was exclusive representation by the colonel himself and considering that most of these immigrants couldn't hardly speak English that was a damn good prize because despite what the Hollywood community had to say about him my husband was the best agent in the business a real smart man and the schminke brothers whom I'm sure it just gotten off the boat they appeared on where these shows whatever the name I want to sign you to exclusive representation how about that it was their first taste of big-time showbiz they won the top prize that night and let's face it coming from a family of cabbage Pickers it had to be the biggest night of their life they signed the contract the next day he took them out he wined them he dined them he showed them the town he was real good to those boys they even played at our wedding which I thought was real nice of them considering the colonel was taking a lot of heat for it seeing as I was just 14 at the time but they did it because they liked the guy he got them a lot of work and they were with him until he's untimely and mysterious death which I'm not gonna talk about here so don't even ask good yeah it was a harmful yeah but you get your back end is much better I think so nothing worth money most agents would charge their percent commission but the colonel he charged seventy five percent commission in the rest of our money he looked after if it wasn't until after he's somewhat mysterious death that we realized we didn't have no money left no because he robbed us blind is what he did and then we didn't know what the hell to do because he was our agent we didn't know it was our agent and you need an edge you got to have an agent in some agents a vengeance oh yeah there but it wasn't until after his mysterious death that we realized why do we need an agent to lose our money first we can lose it ourselves that's right you know because if we had our own agency we don't have to pay the seventy five percent commission we could charge ourselves the fifty percent commission is wrong so that's what we did we became our own agents and getting the work was a lot easier especially in the TV it strikes and spares remember champion run from the 110 pins Java for three games of that as a question of course we speak of rocket into pound per cc Carthage in Europe that this week you are going to be the champion Tara don't you evil powers get the spark for spelling the word different than they can win $5,000 striker despair in the lucky frame and what is the lucky friend today ah lucky frame was a big selling point for it the show and since we are just local you know back then that was a lot of money and being the producers we would have to put up the $5,000 so that's where the music came in and this is it the lucky frame number seven is rocket image can get the strikers pair you know in the $5,000 prize look at the concentration thousand he first encountered Yosh and Stan when we were all still with Colonel Tom : and after Colonel Tom died well it was very sad sudden and mysterious death as you know I continue to be represented by his wife Vicki who at the time was 15 a wonderful girl but very advanced for her age in well you know the kind of ways I mean she had been there and back and anyway I was happy with her she looked after me in many ways and I remember one time Josh and Stein came to show of mine that the AL Sahara which is a falafel place and they have wonderful baba ghanoush and carrot rose they're fresh and they said to me do you want us to represent you for 50% Commission and I at the time was paying Vicky 75 and she 75 percent and she was busy with her running her new escort service so I went with the ash and stand at the time for 50 percent and I've been with them ever since and they they look after me we're good friends and they do everything for me to do everything from the costume through to the charts which is why I can sing and he can back me up so well because the music is done by their people I love it so much someday I'd like to do something major with this music maybe I film I don't know I'll be nice to get the right music come on can't you see that I am NOT what's that why don't you tell me what she said you to get back to the road again thank you thank you very much standby we're on the air in three two one good evening the long awaited arrival of the Smeg EES finally happened today is Oktoberfest officially got underway I'm Gord Marco and I'll have a complete report on that duck Knox will have news on the international scene Lisa Barlow with the goings-on at City Hall John Phipps with the Business Report Darrell Shore with tonight's Crime Stoppers feature Mickey Gelman with the world of sports uncle Walter with tonight's weather Susan Trumbull with the buyer and sellers report Doug Peale with our community at large segment Joan Dow with the Dow Jones Earl Glover with tonight's focus on youth segments and entertainment editor bitsy do the two very special guests the band marshals in this year's Oktoberfest polka Meister's Yash and Stan's Mickey but first opening ceremonies for this year's Oktoberfest officially got underway today the arrival of its guests of honor isn't that kind of you thank you so much for saying that yeah it's been a dream of ours since we were kids oh yeah in the world of polka music you literally have to be inducted into the Polka Hall of Fame before you know you have the respect of your peers there are no polka Awards no Academy Awards or country and cowboy awards or TV Choice Awards and to make a long story short to be chosen to be guests of honor at Oktoberfest the largest polka fest in the world outside the original in Munich this this is the highest honor you can get in the field well in case you've just tuned in our guest today Yash and Stan's minge of course this year's honorary guests at the Oktoberfest parade in our phone lines are open five five five 7176 let me ask you guys something how does it feel to be famous I mean I myself have some degree of notoriety here on the Ted Wellington show on ckm and beautiful downtown Kitchener but I'm talking about the capital F kind of family I want to live forever kind of Fame that the two of you have achieved over the years how does it feel and more important than that has it changed your lives that's that's a good clear that is a good question I don't think we've been asked that one before now that's a good question you're not that and let me just say to you that in all honesty but you know I don't think that that this is affected me the success thing has affected me at all you know others other side of it you know I think that I I'm just a normal ordinary person like you like you you know that wasn't I don't think that our lives have changed so much that you know I think that we've made some music that that has made us lots of money honest but I don't think that I feel like we're just um okay guys well let me read a little bit of bio that I've got here on YouTube normal guys over a career that has so far spanned 30 years the schwanke brothers have released 88 LPS count'em 88 they've had five hit singles including who stole the cabbage roll the millions seller that found the country's funny bone back in 1961 they've had seven television shows the last of which the happy Wanderers polka hour is still on the air they owned a talent agency a travel agency a chain of cabbage roll and coffee wagons I mean you guys have just about done it all okay let's go to line two happy Oktoberfest you're on the air well you know I always say that two heads are better than one so I'd have to say that we're both the brains of here I'd say yes thanks for your call and pay tribute this time because without them we wouldn't standing up here today the source of our bank managers I'm just another joke our wives you are we oughtta start on the polka variety hour with your son Stan it was our first professional job and in the beginning we were intimated by them because they were the schminke brothers they were big stars and we were young and vulnerable but the source of the Ennis talent and they wanted us to appear weekly with them which we did for two years three microphones for three lovely ladies the lemon tree a swing he's recorded five albums with the lemon twins and was at a time of course when the sh mangies were at a peak they were at the height of their popularity at least as far as their record sales were concerned they were putting out all about one album a month in fact there was a time when schminke albums took up this entire rack I mean was all schwanke right from the air right to the back wall next to Perry Como I had more of their records in stock than the top 50 groups put together but the albums they recorded with the lemon twins it's a hotcakes I couldn't order them in fast enough I was unbelievable of course the rumor that they were romantically involved in Hertz sales either was a scandal that's what it was those who happily married men were constantly being seen with these women and they didn't exactly go out of their way to avoid public places and it was this more than anything that distressed those of us who knew them well and not only that there were three of them three women and two men that was also distressing and it was a terrible time for their poor wives who suspected an affair was going on but never ever raised the question of infidelity because uh lutonium wired is believed it was not their place to do so oh it's a crazy business come on there's a syndrome in this business it's so easy to get hooked on on the women or the pills or booze or drugs or dope in my case I it's food I can understand how Josh and Stan could get mixed up with the lemons they were attractive girls they could sing reasonably well and not to mention the publicity you get out of a scandal these days it's like a money-making machine when they were with them the four albums that they did with the lemons so so well but when the scandal died down the next album didn't sell so they drop them like a hot lemon so to speak Schwing is always 2 maybe 300,000 now that's not chicken feet but it's not superstar money and the problem is and always has been polka music a good sale is 5,000 copies platinum is maybe 7,500 I mean there was a time that shrinkies were putting out an album a month there were actually losing money they weren't making enough in profits that cover the cost of their next album I said look slow down we can't afford another hit but the idea is for two guys who care as much about money as the shrinkage though it was only recently that it finally sunk in that the big money in records is with the kids so many Jimmy 3 the big money is in rock and roll and if you can swing that corner of the market over the polka music bingo jackpot little children hate to swallow the aspirin son how do you give the aspirin study little children you put the aspirins in some ice cream and then you give the ice cream to the children so that's what I wanted to do with the polka music but jessebella put some hip music so that the polka music would be hip a soft but yeah you know my brother him his marled fashioned he didn't like that idea too much it took me months to convince him of the idea you know my brother stain is a damn fine accordion player but it doesn't have division effects in the business really to make the music hip it's a shame really for the children because they're missing not buying polka music they're missing out that no it's not the money so much I'm thinking of but it's just a shame you know Stan always says you know how do we get him to buy the party music how can there be hip how do you give the little small children to swallow the aspirator we told you from the beginning that we want to top in the show with the laser the laser sword fight we said that the week ago and the now you Dallas dress their last minute that we can't even do it listen there's 12,000 seats out there believe me these things are not gonna read I mean it's not like they're real lasers divisional impact those things just won't read I mean look at them their toys yeah you guys are going for a look that you can't afford if you want a light show then give them a light show but we can't get you what you want by tonight you can't possible it's not gonna happen these cuts we moved back there already 15 yards from the stage now but there is no there's not enough room for the dancing here we need my space wait a minute you want dancing air with 12,000 kids yeah you guys we got to have a dance floor what's the point in bringing the kids out if they can't fault that there's no room bring them back you know the indicia to reveal that you know this is a new image to show the hip nice of it I say we go with the bait shop tonight ain't gonna be a good one laser sure I seem to have forgotten what point I was trying to make the Plattsburgh concert the audacity of such an act was repugnant certainly to those of us in the polka business to do it for fun well that's one thing but the schmemmys were so intense about this new career move of this I believe they actually thought they were Michael Jackson that night will always be remembered as the Plattsburgh disaster it was a bad idea and those two guys are really lucky they weren't arrested for fraud they had the gall to put up on an arena marquee Michael Jackson's name in big bold print and from the street that's all you could see tonight only Michael Jackson the human I couldn't see the teensy letters above the name which said this SH Meng Jie's salute only a fly on the marquee could read that and it's no surprise the concert turned out the way it did it's important oh that's God's I didn't stop there okay everybody loosen up but we'll be right back we got a problem with the crowd I note we should have had more security for the crab cake I'll do it fellas it's not that well what is it then well you know there's an old axiom in show business that when there's more people on the stage or in the house it cancels show there's only certain people on this stage six so the end result was that the SH mangey Brothers popularity and prestige took a definite downward spiral and rightfully so no no to try and cash in on someone else's success was a gutsy thing for Josh and Stan to do you have to respect them for it they saw something that was good it was a trend it's what the people want and they ran and they did it you are it's not such a terrible thing it happens all the time in the business of show business the record sales went down the TV ratings dropped to make a long story short I think after the plattsburgh disaster the swanky's needed to do something positive for their image to get the people back on their side and I think the only thing they could have done to restore people's faith in them again was to retire it's a loss to the music business and the recording industry and whatever people think is the reason for their retirement is not the point the point is they will be missed so this thing I don't know when they retired some people say it was the Plattsburgh incident but if he asked me I I don't have a clue thank you very much the great thing this roster what a good time thank you so much we have a bomb you know thank you so much well this is it yes this is the last time Stan and I just want to say Todd you've good father came out here tonight to see us off to thank you for your support over the years though he stood by to lutonium boys who came over here with nothing and now you give us so much of yourself or indeed rich men for that that you stood by us in our bad times I think what years is trying to say but yeah she's trying to say I think can be summed up with our last song a very nice song the last you know people said to us is this the reason you're retired or is that the reason you're retired nobody to this day knows the reason why we retired there's only two people who know the real reason why we retired and that standing myself that's right if in fact we really are retiring which we are we are that's what does retirement really mean you know think about it that it doesn't mean that everything has to stop no not in that sense but people might think that this was our Hawks if we didn't retire which they would if it weren't for the fact that we are retired and have been for the last two weeks so it's and I just got to say it's been the best two weeks of my life good two weeks we've had lots of fun but you know how long can you sit around and do nothing yeah you get itchy toe to work and make the money and make the money so maybe we will come back one day soon we hope but for now no comment

Channel: SCTVnotonDVD

Views: 446,789

Keywords: shmenge, cabbage rolls and coffee, put down the duckie, sctv, lemon twins, linsk minyk, tuba solo, the happy wanderers

Id: wN_cyXBpMAc

Length: 53min 33sec (3213 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 08 2016