Myron Floren

However, he insisted on serving his country by joining the USO, performing in Europe with notable stars such as Lily Pons and Marlene Dietrich. After the war, he returned home to South Dakota, where he married Berdyne Koerner in 1945. The couple eventually had five daughters and gained three sons-in-law and seven grandchildren.

In 1950, Floren, who was performing with a music group known as "The Buckeye Four", went to a dance at the Casa Loma Ballroom in St. Louis, Missouri at which the Lawrence Welk Orchestra was then playing. When the maestro recognized the accordion virtuoso in the audience, he invited him to play a number with his band. The number turned out to be "Lady of Spain", and from the overwhelming positive response from the audience, Lawrence hired Myron to be a permanent member of his band. "Lady of Spain" also became Floren's trademark song and he played it countless times on the Welk show.

Over the next thirty-two years, Floren became one of the most popular members of the band and the organization itself. It began with the band's migration to California, along with concert dates on the road, and exposure to television, first on local broadcasts from the Aragon Ballroom in Santa Monica, California and later on the ABC network in 1955. During the time The Lawrence Welk Show was on television, Floren was a featured solo performer and an assistant conductor. He also took over some of the maestro's announcing duties.

Floren was among the first class of inductees into the Scandinavian-American Hall of Fame in 1984 and inducted into the International Polka Music Hall of Fame in 1990. In 1992 at a General Assembly in Trossingen, Germany, the Confédération internationale des accordéonistes awarded Myron Floren their Merit Award in recognition of his outstanding contributions to the international accordion movement. In July 1996, the American Accordionists' Association honored Floren for his achievements.