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Wednesday, May 14,2008
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The Polka King
The Avalon Theatre remains dark,
Oriental Drugs and Goldman’s are gone. The last 10 years have been bad for
local landmarks. Art’s Concertina Bar was another symbol of Old Milwaukee that
was about to disappear. The city’s last remaining polka bar was rescued last
fall by a new owner, an energetic young St. Francis firefighter called Andy Kochanski. Now called Kochanski’s
Concertina Beer Hall, the bar is getting a gradual facelift while remaining
true to its purpose of preserving polka in a city where polka once was king.
There used to be more concertinas hanging on
the wall...
The old owner, Art Altenberg, left
five of them. There’ve been other changes. I’ve been scrubbing the walls! You
can see pictures of the line between clean and not clean on my website. The
mirrors are brand new. The place used to be very dark and I’ve painted it a
lighter color. The two high-definition TV sets are new. I was at the last
Christmas party Art had here. It fell on the night of a Packers’ game. A table
full of old ladies had to smuggle in a TV set! I said to myself, when this
place is mine, no way in hell will anybody have to smuggle in a TV to watch the
Packers!
So you were coming to the Concertina Bar as a
patron?
For about 10-12 years. A friend
brought me here on a whim. I loved its uniqueness. It’s a one-of-a-kind gem of
Milwaukee.
Did you imagine you’d ever own it?
Throughout my career of going to bars,
I’d always walk into a place and take everything in—putting it into the
perspective of what I’d do if I owned the place. But I didn’t want to own just
any bar. When I decided to take the plunge and acquire one, I looked at a
number of places but they would have been nightmares to fix up. Then I
remembered hearing that Art wanted to sell. I realized I could own the
Concertina Bar if I made a lot of deep sacrifices.
Was taking over as easy as you hoped?
I went into it thinking it would be a
turn-key situation. It didn’t turn out that way. It was lots of work! Without
the help of friends and family, I’d have been up the creek. I couldn’t have
done it myself and I couldn’t afford to pay the contractors.
What’s going on at the Beerhall?
Tuesday night is an acoustic open jam.
Wednesday is a polka open jam. Thursday is free dance lessons from 7-8 and then
different kinds of bands—surf, rockabilly, bluegrass. It’s a non-polka night to
bring in the Bay View hipsters and the young East Side crowd, so they
experience the place and want to come back another night to try out one of
those crazy polka bands. Friday-Saturday are polka nights. Sunday is another
polka open jam and, of course, Packer games when they’re on. Monday we’re
closed for now. There’s no cover.
What’s the polka scene like?
It’s not like it was in the day, which
is why I’m doing everything I can to expose younger people to polka music. It’s
primarily older people but there is a younger generation of polka fans and
musicians. I have to say I’ve never felt so much love and support as I’ve had
from the polka people.
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