Upbeat with Don Webster..Polka Varieties, Gene Carroll

[unionrdr]

Yup! polka varieties was Sunday waitin for dinner after church music in my house. Being Slovak,German,& Apache...Fond memories of when my parents were still alive & full of life.

[crazyromanian1]

Paul Wilcox looked like he was actually enjoying himself as MC of Polka Varieties.

[theatrevision]

Don Webster is alive and well and living in Hilton Head always doing vacations you can be apart of.

[Tunz909]

Is it true that Don Webster has passed away? Someone on a talk show mentioned this but I cannot verify. thanks for any info

[TimL2005]

@Tunz909 Don Webster is still very much alive and living in Florida, as far as I know, In fact, he just recently did a commercial for a Northeast Ohio eye clinic that has been airing locally in recent weeks..I will say this..If/When Don Passes (hopefully not anytime soon) It will definitely be big news not only in Cleveland, but because of "Upbeat: it should get some national attention as well..

[ponhaus]

who is the polka band at 5:56? they were on all the time. I can't read the name on the bass drum.

[LuckyDeb61]

@ponhaus I wouldn't be surprised if it was Frankie Yankovic, "America's Polka King". He always seemed tobe on television while I was growing up in Cleveland.

[kukral]

My dad upholstered all of Don Webster's furniture. Dad had the upholstery shop on Lansing and E. 65th.

[shell19491]

I lovded the UPBEAT SHOW WITH DON WEBSTER, but i hated the polka shows. I wanted to listen to rock and roll all day! And i couldnt wait til saturday, when American Bandstand came on.... Boy that was the life!!!

[stuka52]

Ben Orr of "The Cars" was in the original Upbeat house band.

[missohio83]

Wow I didn't know Cleveland had so many shows that were taped there! I wish I was around back then to see all that!

[rorygg1]

i used to watch upbeat every saturday afternoon. it was carried on channel 11 wtvd durham, nc a cbs affiliate. most of these performances seemed like lip sync to me. great show tho !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[sbarbu]

another great reason to have the rock hall in cleveland. I had forgotten all about upbeat, and didn't realize it played to a national market..

[csgal65]

WOW! I clearly remember coming home from church every Sunday, my mother laying out the cold cut spread and we'd all make sandwiches and gather in the family room to watch Gene Carroll then Polka Varieties. Great memories!

[sabrinamessenger61]

I remember that upbeat with Bobby Sherman! One of my first teen idol crushes back in the day lol

[TimL2005]

That would be the Gene Carroll Show

[jaydee624]

Ok, I rememeber a show on sundays, a musical show thart always closed with the same musical number:"sunday, Monday,or always". does this sound familar to anyone?

[Iron4343]

Around the 5:30 to 5:36 mark you can actually hear that song in the back ground (Ted's talking over it)

[lizajane54]

@jaydee624

it was the Gene Carroll Show:)

[fanofgrendel]

Upbeat was carried on over 100 other stations. That meant Webster had a chance to breakout like Dick Clark or Mike Douglas, but that didn't happen.

[TimL2005]

fanofgrendel:

Couple of cool stories: Don was actually offered a job by Dick Clark out in Hollywood at one point..Don's response was, I appreciate the offer, but what would I do? Youre the man out there..We're basically the same type of host..It wouldnt make sense...

AlsoL Dick Clark applied to Channel 5 around 1956 to basically take the "Bandstand" Concept locally to Cleveland..and was turned down flat.but within a year, WEWS was carrying "American Bandstand" Over ABC anyway...

[crazyromanian1]

@fanofgrendel I heard he had a chance to do so via Dick Clark but declined. He still had a great career and is still doing some commercials on Cleveland TV.

[tonisommers]

awesome, I have forgot about all of this

[dgendvil]

Kenny Rogers looked pretty different when we was with the First Edition, a country rock band in the late 60's.

[groundhog713]

Wow! I thought Channel 5 had no footage of Polka Varieties or Gene Carroll anymore, but Don Webster was cool....