From the Front Page of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Friday, October 24, 1997

With his slicked-back hair, faded jeans and brown moccasins, he's the hottest thing on the squeeze box today. Mike Schneider has just turned 18, and, if the music gods smile down on him, he'll soon be inducted into the Wisconsin Polka Hall of Fame.

That's right. Polka. As in, "Grab your hair net, Wanda, we're going out steppin' tonight."

While his classmates at Whitefish Bay Dominican High School are jamming to Counting Crows and Jewel, Schneider is firing up his 18-pound Baldoni accordion and banging out a rousing rendition of "Vienna Forever" or "The Chicagoland Twirl." They are two of the 455 songs Schneider has taught himself to play by ear since he first picked up an accordion at the age of 6.

Schneider and his band are all the rage in polka circles around town, says John Pinter, director of public relations for the Wisconsin Polka Hall of Fame.

"Schneider is creating waves in the polka scene in Milwaukee," he says. Pinter credits Schneider with inspiring a "great resurgence of polka music, especially among the young people."

Many Catholics have framed pictures of the pope or John F. Kennedy hanging on their walls, but at the Schneiders' house in Brown Deer, it's polka king Frankie Yankovic, front and center. And with good reason. A Yankovic performance at a fair at Our Lady Queen of Peace Church some 12 years ago inspired Schneider's love affair with polka music.

"I liked what I heard," Schneider says. Music lessons soon followed, but, after a year and a half, Schneider, then a seasoned 8-year-old, opted to wing it, teaching himself to play by ear. "I can't read music," he confesses. Before long, he was teaming up with his father, Paul Schneider, who had played in a polka band as a young man, and drummer Dennis Wiskerchen to form the Mike Schneider Band. Mike Schneider fondly recalls his first gig.

"Grandma's Christmas party," he says with a smile. His big break came at the end of eighth grade when he played the Our Lady of Good Hope fair. From there, it was on to anniversaries and weddings and, eventually, the polka club scene.

His most frequently requested song is "Who the Hell is Johnny?" "At church fairs, we clean it up a bit and sing, 'Who the Heck is Johnny?'" he says. Adolescence may have proved to be a tempting time for many of his classmates. The lure of drinking and drugs and hanging out at the mall may have snared them. But Schneider has stuck with his beloved accordion and never looked back. Each day, he devotes at least 90 minutes to practicing.

He knows he's different from your average 18-year-old.

"It probably would have been better if I had been born around the same time that Frankie Yankovic was born," he says, somewhat wistfully. "Then, I could have had a really good career." He respects his friends' choice of music, even though he favors the sounds of Verne Meisner and Jerry Halkoski and Concertina Millie.

"I've never been one to run with the herd," he says. But he hasn't closed the book on polka music as the choice of a new generation. Schneider has a dream.

In his dream, he's wailing on his accordion at the Dominican High School open house. His friends hear the music, and they are swept away. "That could be a building block for getting interest in polka music going" he says. "My dad always says that things go full circle. I want to believe that."

Sit back and watch as Schneider cuts loose on his accordion. His fingers fly up and down the keyboard as the speakers blare, "Flying Machine," one of his favorites. His shoulders rock back and forth with the melody, his toes tap out the beat.

When he is playing it's as though everything else in the world is suspended in time. You can practically see the beer steins and dirndls and couples locked in embrace as they waltz away.

His style is Slovenian. He calls it "progressive polka," but concedes that's more or less a marketing ploy to get younger people whipped up about polka.

After he graduates next spring Schneider plans to go to a nearby college - he's not yet sure which one - so he can continue his career. He's already recorded two tapes, "First Impressions" and "Second Thoughts," and he's featured on a third, "Polkasound Potpourri," a collection of the area's best and brightest.

Hall of Fame award-winners will be announced Nov. 2.

The Mike Schneider Band Resume (Adobe PDF, 112 Kb)