Polka reunion: Broadway Grill to host ‘Back to the Friendly Tavern’
BY Anne Neville NEWS STAFF REPORTER
08/31/07
Buffalo News
The word is out across the country, wherever pockets of polka fans gather to dance and drink and reminisce: Larry and Scrubby are getting back together.
That would be Larry Trojak and Dave “Scrubby” Seweryniak, the vocal nucleus of the legendary Dynatones, the house band at the equally legendary Broadway Grill on the East Side.
“They haven’t been together for 20 years, and they are the best polka duet singers in the business,” said Bob Krawczyk of Cheektowaga. Krawczyk is a polka promoter and manager of the George F. Lamm Post American Legion Grove, where as many as 1,000 polka fans from all over the country are expected to converge this weekend to attend the first-ever Broadway Grill reunion, dubbed “Back to the Friendly Tavern.”
“To see them back together again, these people are coming from Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Connecticut, Massachusetts — anywhere there are polkas, that’s where they are coming from,” said Krawczyk. “We even have people coming from California — they got the word that Scrubby and Larry are getting back together, so here they come out of the woodwork.”
Trojak and Seweryniak will be joined by original Dynatones Dave “Nigel” Kurdziel on bass and Al Piatkowski on accordion. They’ll be accompanied by Tom Wanderlich on sax and clarinet and trumpet-players Tom Picciano and Mike Burka.
During its heyday in the 1970s and ’80s, “The Grill,” as it was known to polka-lovers from all over the region, offered regular weekend sessions played by the Dynatones, one of the most popular polka bands in the country.
“Irregardless of where they were from — out of town, Mass., Michigan, Vermont, New York, Philly, they thought this place here was the cat’s meow,” said Henry Mazurek, a former county legislator who owned the Broadway Grill from 1976 to 1987 and brought the Dynatones there. “It was the place to be, as small as it was.”
How small was it? “Seating capacity in the back was 120,” says Mazurek. “If you stood them up like pencils, you’d have room for more, but we needed to have room for dancing.”
Space will not be a problem at the Lamm Post Grove, 962 Wehrle Drive, Williamsville, where Krawczyk has ordered a large tent and pop and beer trucks to shelter and serve the customers.
Krawczyk was a regular at The Grill from the time he was 18 until it closed, and he
fondly recalls the “old scene.”
“You just parked and you could walk from corner to corner and everybody had music going,” he said, mentioning such old haunts as the Warsaw Inn, the Polish Village, the Polish Singing Circle and the Chopin Singing Society.
“There were numerous businesses close together, so people would walk from one entertainment venue to another,” said Mazurek, adding proudly, “There were a lot of places to go, but I was on Broadway.”
The original Dynatones era ended when Larry Trojak left to take a job in Minnesota. “They tried filling in with different people, and it worked for a while, but you lose that pizzazz,” said Mazurek. “You lose the chemistry.”
The chemistry of the Dynatones was best captured in an iconic recording called “Live Wire,” recorded live during a snowstorm on April 3, 1982, in the Weber Post on Abbott Road. The Lamm Post event Sunday will celebrate that anniversary as well.
“They said they are going to redo ‘Live Wire,’ play all the music from that session,” said Krawczyk, who, like most local polka fans, fondly remembers listening to his “Live Wire” cassette tape.
The Dynatones will begin playing at the start of the event at 3 p.m. A second Buffalo polka band, Phocus, will also play. “Phocus is hot right now,” said Krawczyk. “They just released a CD called ‘Blurred Vision.’ ”
The event will be a mini family reunion for Mazurek, whose daughter Kristy will fly in from Atlanta fo the event. Also attending will be Mazurek’s wife, Pat, son and daughter-in-law, Mark and Becky, and their three children. “My grandkids will be infused a little bit with some Polish tradition,” Mazurek said.
Mazurek is looking forward to socializing almost as much as enjoying the music. “I can’t wait to see some of my old friends,” he said. “I’m 64, and unfortunately many of them are passing now. St. Peter needs a houseman too.”
He predicts that the Broadway Grill and Dynatones reunion and ‘Live Wire’ anniversary “is going to be magnificent, it’s like seeing Halley’s comet. It’s going to be a happening. It’s not just the band itself, which is going to be dynamic in its own right, it’s the people around it who create that aura and atmosphere, the friendships, the camaraderie.”
The Broadway Grill and Dynatones reunion will run from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday 9/2 at the George F. Lamm Post American Legion Grove, 962 Wehrle Drive, Williamsville. Doors open at 2 p.m. Reserved tables are sold out. Advance tickets at $10 per person can be purchased at the U-Crest Music Center, 1268 George Urban Blvd., Depew, or reserved by calling Krawczyk at 837-3582. Admission at the door is $12 per person, those under 14 admitted free. Food will be sold from 2:30 to 6:30 p.m. while it lasts.
aneville@buffnews.com
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