25 Polkas & Waltzes By 25 Nebraska Bands

From the back cover - "This album was expressly designed to give the unknown polka bands and trios an opportunity to be exposed throughout the nation rather than just in the state of Nebraska. It is interesting to note that all of the recording on this album was done in a single twelve hour period of time at the City Auditorium in Columbus, Nebraska, by the Rene Recording Company. Each group should be commended for their untiring efforts of promoting polka music on a year-round basis. Many of the groups continuously perform and donate their services free of charge time after time for the sheer enjoyment of happy polka music. Nebraska Polka Days originated in 1967 in Columbus, Nebraska. Big Joe Siedlik during that year had seen almost every community in the state of Nebraska having a Centennial celebration. It indeed saddened him to think that Columbus was not holding their Centennial celebration. So he acted on it, and the idea caught on fast. Soon plans were being laid for the first Nebraska Polka Days. Twenty-eight bands participated in that first year's polka celebration, and since then the number has increased to fifty. In 1970 Nebraska Polka Days was moved to the beautiful Peony Park Ballroom in Omaha, Nebraska, which has been prasied to be the most beautiful ballroom in the world today. This was Big Joe's way of elevating the polka to its highest plateau in the music field, as the people who enjoy Nebraska polkas and who have promoted it in the years past deserved the best - and the best they have had at the beautiful Peony Park. Nebraska Polka Days is usually held the second weekend after Labor Day. Nebraska Polka Days always features the greats in Nebraska polka bands as well as the newcomers, and especially any newly organized teen-age polka bands. Nebraska Polka Days to this date is the only polka festival in the nation that features a bandstand show on Sunday afternoon that's second only to Lawrence Welk's TV show. Nebraska citizens certainly appreciate the untiring efforts of Big Joe and they thank him by wearing their nationality costumes. It is nothing unusual to see two, three, or maybe four thousand citizens wearing these colorful costumes of every nationality imaginable. The friendship of the citizens of the state of Nebraska and the true hospitality is equaled by no other state. For a wonderful time and for meeting new, true friends, Nebraska Polka Days are for you. And so that you might be able to enjoy and reminisce your experiences for years to come, put this album on your turntable for over fifty minutes of pleasant dancing polkas and waltzes.