Someone had rented the banquet hall above the pool room in downtown Lewisburg for a dance party on a Saturday night in September 1960. I was a pretty good dancer back then. My Aunt Jodi had taught me how to “Jitterbug”, but when I got upstairs, I didn’t recognize what they were doing. It was something called The Twist, and they played Chubby Checker’s mega hit over and over. The girls looked great. They always do, but the boys looked like they just got off the short bus going to school.
I never danced that September night in 1960. Dancing – a couple joined by the hands and moving together – as I knew it had changed forever. The Twist swept the nation as Chubby Checker brought his new dance to an audience of over 10 million to the Ed Sullivan Show. Even old people were doing or trying to do the Twist. This odd dance, described as like using a towel to dry your behind led to others, each sillier that before. Chubby Checker followed up The Twist with “The Hucklebuck”, “The Fly”, “Dance the Mess Around”, “Pony Time”, and then “Let’s Twist Again” again. Other artists were quick to follow with songs and dances like “The Mashed Potato”, “The Fly”, “The Penguin”, “The Monkey”, “The Swim”, “Funky Chicken”, “The Bird” and many others. Each featured the so-called ability to dance without a partner, which is like playing baseball without a ball. It was useless to try to even keep up with new dances because by the time you may have learned one, there were three more dances that required arm-flapping, strutting, grunting or some sort of combination. Again, all the girls looked great while all the guys looked like dorks.
Finally, some sense came back into dancing and great music in the late 60’s with the Motown Sound and Sweet Soul Music. Soul Music had such an enticing rhythm that even white guys could look good. With Soul music, I was able to return to the Jitterbug or Shag as some called it and felt right at a home with a girl following my lead while Wilson Pickett, Otis Reading and the Four Tops delivered the sweetness.
Interestingly, Brigham Young University officially banned all the “Fad Dances” in 1966. I wish they had done that a lot earlier.