Twist (dance)
dance inspired by rock and roll music; music genre associated with the dance
The twist is a dance that was inspired by rock and roll music. From 1959 to the early sixties it became a worldwide dance craze, enjoying immense popularity while drawing controversies from critics who felt it was too provocative. It inspired dances such as the Jerk, the Pony, the Watusi, the Mashed Potato, the Monkey, and the Funky Chicken, but none were as popular.
Having seen teenagers in Tampa, Florida, doing the dance, Hank Ballard wrote "The Twist", which became the B-side of Hank Ballard and the Midnighters' 1959 single "Teardrops on Your Letter". Dick Clark, having noticed the dance becoming popular among teenagers, recommended to Cameo Records that the more wholesome Chubby Checker rerecord the song, which was released in 1959 and became a number one hit in 1960. The dance became passé among teenagers as it became acceptable among adults and the song was re-released, becoming a number one hit again in 1962.
A world record was set in DeLand, Florida, on October 11, 2012, when Chubby Checker sang the song live and the crowd danced. An estimated 4,000 people twisted along with Checker, surpassing the previous Guinness World Record for most people twisting in the streets at once.
Steps
The twist is performed by standing with the feet approximately shoulder width apart. The torso may be squared to the knees and hips, or turned at an angle so one foot is farther forward than the other.
“Twist (dance)” enters the record as dance inspired by rock and roll music; music genre associated with the dance. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Twist, dance and inspired can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q387916. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1959, 1960, 1962 and 2012.
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This entry incorporates text from “Twist (dance)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.