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I am easily amused. Cool song.

The owner of a landmark Milwaukee polka bar said the business will be open Friday night, following a Thursday night shooting that killed a would-be robber. Andy Kochanski, who owns Kochanski's Concertina Beer Hall at 1920 S. 37th St. on the city's south side, told reporters Friday that three armed men tried to rob the establishment while he and two customers were inside. He fired at the robbers, killing one of them. "I did what I had to do to protect myself and my customers," Kochanski told WTMJ-TV early Friday. Milwaukee police confirmed Friday afternoon that three suspects tried to...

I hope your church is celebrating the Reformation this Wednesday in some joyous, contentful way. If so, surely you'll be singing....

When I was ein younger man I studied canon law; though Erfurt was a challenge it was just to please my pa. Then came the storm, the lightning struck; I called upon Saint Anne: I shaved my head, I took my vows – an Augustinian. Refrain: Papal bulls, indulgences and transubstantiation: speak your mind against them and face excommunication. Nail your theses to the door, let’s start a reformation, papal bulls, indulgences and transubstantiation. When Tetzel came near Wittenberg, St Peter’s profits soared, so I wrote a little message for the All Saints’ bulletin board; ‘you cannot purchase merit for...

HAZLETON – Jan Lewan is reinventing himself as a polka rapper. Fresh out of prison and set to begin repaying his debt to the people he swindled, the area polka legend said he was exposed to rap music while behind bars and took a liking to the art. He admits it took a little while for him to get used to the genre, but he finally started liking it when he realized he could tell a story, along with the uplifting melody. “My rap will be a melody of polka. It is something different and something I hope polka people...

After 24 years, polka has had its last dance at the Grammys. The Recording Academy, which bestows the Grammy Awards, announced late on Wednesday that the polka category would be eliminated, saying in a statement that it had been cut “to ensure the awards process remains representative of the current musical landscape.” To many in the polka world, that read as a kind of industry code meaning that their genre — once capable of supporting artists with million-selling hits, but long since relegated to micro-niche status — had slipped off the mainstream radar entirely. “It’s devastating,” said Carl Finch of...

Republican Congressman Greg Walden, who once owned a classic rock radio station in Oregon, put the Fairness Doctrine in perfect perspective when he said it’s “the musical equivalent” of “every time we’d play a classic rock song we’d have to play a polka.” And here, for your entertainment pleasure, are two videos showing you exactly how that would work.

Polka not overlooked at Grammys Music style still popular in Minnesota, elsewhere at Masses and festivals by Joseph Young Visitor Staff Writer ST. CLOUD -- Is polka music popular among Minnesota Catholics? Is the pope Polish? Polkas dot the central Minnesota landscape. Catholic masses celebrate polka Masses under God's cerulean roof and participate in more secular polka celebrations at open-air festivals and in ballrooms. Those Polka "dots" seem to be growing larger -- and not only in Minnesota -- according to a person who should know, Eddie Blazonczyk Jr., band leader of Chicago-based Eddie Blazonczyk's Versatones. The Visitor interviewed Blazonczyk...

It quickly became clear to the undercover agents in the crowd at Little Switzerland that there was more forbidden fruit than lederhosen at the German-style beer hall in Sonoma. Just the fact that the rap group 2 Live Crew was performing instead of the club's regular polka band was suspicious. The scantily clad girls dancing suggestively on stage to raunchy lyrics might have been enough to trigger some kind of enforcement, even without the partial nudity. Then the bananas came out.

The woman in the yellow shirt stood up and told of her life-long struggle against being fat, a fight that she had clearly lost. She was enormous. 'Every time I dieted I ended up larger,' she said as she broke into tears, 'If I were anorexic or bulimic, I would get sympathy. It is so frustrating.' She was applauded by 100 other very fat men and women. 'Here, you are in an island of sanity,' said Professor Paul Campos, author of The Obesity Myth and speaker at this annual meeting of the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance (Naafa) -...

Band leader John Stanky has tried everything in more than 50 years in the polka music business. Stanky and the Coal Miners have performed Irish polkas, Italian polkas, Russian polkas, even rock 'n' roll polkas. Add hip-hop to the list of experiments. Stanky and local songwriter/producer Jim Donnelly have joined to record "Stanky's Hip-Hop Polka." Funny as it seems, the song just might work. "People say 'That's not what I expected, I really like that,' " Donnelly said. "That's a big compliment. It's our goal of still introducing his music, mixed with something newer a younger audience will like." Stanky's...

An attack on Jan Lewan while he slept in a prison cell has an attorney for the former polka entertainer criticizing Delaware officials responsible for his safety. An inmate cut Lewan, 61, across the neck and on the back with a razor at the Delaware Correctional Center in Smyrna, said attorney David Glassberg of Hazleton. Glassberg identified Lewan's assailant as Keith Garner. According to The News Journal in Wilmington, Del., Garner is serving a life sentence for rape. Glassberg questioned the decision by prison officials to assign Garner to a cell with Lewan, who is serving a sentence for securities...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The elderly parents of parody musician "Weird Al" Yankovic have died of apparent carbon monoxide poisoning at their home outside San Diego, the county medical examiner's office said. Nick Yankovic, 86, and his 81-year-old wife, Mary, were discovered on Friday by family members at their Fallbrook, California, residence. It was unclear how long they had been dead. A fire was still burning in the fireplace and authorities said that the home had filled with toxic fumes because the chimney flue was closed. Their son, Al Yankovic, known as "Weird Al," could not immediately be reached for...

SCRANTON - He had just pleaded guilty to felony charges that could send him to prison for up to 10 years, but polka king Jan Lewan's spirits seemed high as he left a federal courtroom Tuesday. "Yes, merry Christmas," Lewan said when asked by a reporter if he had anything to say about his plea to bilking hundreds of investors out of at least $1 million. Four of his investment scam victims who attended the brief hearing were not nearly as jovial. "I know the money is lost. The satisfaction is he will be going to jail," said one victim,...