TV REVIEWS : A Tribute to Lawrence Welk, the Institution

“Wundaful! Wundaful!” There he is, right at the top of “From the Heart: A Tribute to Lawrence Welk and the American Dream”--the North Dakota farm boy who became one of the most remarkable icons in television history.

The program (on Sunday at 5:30 p.m. on KCET-TV Channel 28 and at 6 p.m. on KVCR-TV Channel 24) features Barbara Mandrell hosting a virtual nonstop lineup of Welk stars in a live performance taped at Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry House.

But the real star unquestionably is Welk himself, whose image appears in a wide-ranging collection of black-and-white photos, film clips, kinescopes and videotapes from his 50-year show business career. Known first as an accordionist and a bandleader (there’s a photo of one of his tour buses bearing the legend “Lawrence Welk and His Hawaiian Fruit Gum Orchestra”), Welk, who died last May, became a national institution after he began his 30-plus years of television on KTLA-TV Channel 5 in 1951.

Followers of his shows (which have continued to be rebroadcast on public TV since 1987) will be pleased to update their acquaintance with the Lennon Sisters, Floyd Cramer, the Jordanaires, Pete Fountain and Norma Zimmer, the Champagne Lady.

Most of the appearances are short and to the point, with familiar Welk regulars such as Mary Lou Metzger, Jack Imel, Ron Anderson, Gail Farrell, Jim Roberts, Joe Feeney, Ken Delo and Ava Barber, among others, singing and dancing effectively.

Accordionist Myron Floren recalls his boss with a flashy rendition of “The Carnival of Venice,” honky-tonk pianist Jo Ann Castle manages to make a seven-foot Baldwin sound like a battered bar piano and Arthur Duncan does a tap dance specialty.

A few of the performers--especially Anacani (singing “Memory” from “Cats”), Ralna English (with “You Are the Wind Beneath My Wings”) and the Lennons (who continue to produce lovely vocal harmonies)--have matured into first-rate entertainers.

Like the Welk programs, the tribute is a celebration of the bandleader’s unshakable belief in his vision of America. If that vision sometimes has the feeling of a Readers Digest condensed version of a Disneyland Main Street, it clearly hasn’t bothered his millions of still-loyal fans.