Twist - Definition and Overview

The twist was a rock and roll dance popular in the early 1960s. It was the first major international rock and roll dance style in which the couples did not touch each other while dancing.

The dance was first popularized by Hank Ballard and the Midnighters with his composition "The Twist" in 1958, but Ballard was no teen idol with his rowdy rhythm and blues ways and it was left to singer Chubby Checker to popularize the dance in 1960 with a hit cover of "The Twist".

Faced with explaining to the youthful audience how to do the dance, a member of his entourage came up with the following description:

"It's like putting out a cigarette with both feet, and wiping your bottom with a towel, to the beat of the music."

In 1961, at the height of the Twist craze, patrons at New York's hot Peppermint Lounge on West 45th Street were twisting to the music of the house band, a local group from Jersey, Joey Dee & the Starliters. Their house song "Peppermint Twist (Part 1)," became the number one song in the country for three weeks in January 1962. Sailors and hookers, hip gays and weekending Yalies danced alongside New York's social elite, including the Duke of Windsor, at the legendary Peppermint Lounge.

Quotations

• "Come on, baby, let's do the twist!" -- opening line of "The Twist"