Texas Two-Step (1951)

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How's the digitized Dallas Morning News for "Texas Two Step"? Any DARE, OED  
entries in the works for this regional American dance step?
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Entry from August 06, 2006 
Texas Two-Step
 
The Texas two-step dance was popularized by the movie Urban Cowboy  (1980), 
but the dance has been around since at least the 1950s.  



_http://www.ehow.com/how_4285_texas-two-step.html_ 
(http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php?URL=http://www.ehow.com/how_4285_texas-two-step.html)  
How to  Do the Texas Two-Step 

The Texas two-step is danced with two quick  steps and two slow steps. 

Leader 
Steps: 
1.  Stand  with your feet together facing your partner.  
2.  Put your right  hand on your partner’s waist.  
3.  Put your left hand out to your  side with your arm slightly bent.  
4.  Gently grasp your partner’s  hand.  
5.  Wait for the music to start.  
6.  On the  first beat, step forward quickly with your left foot.  
7.  On the  second beat, step forward quickly with your right foot.  
8.  On  the third beat, step forward again with your left foot, but slowly.   
9.  Pause through the fourth beat.  
10.  On the fifth  beat, step forward slowly with your right foot.  
11.  Pause  through the sixth beat, then pull your left foot even with your 
right.   
12.  Repeat.  

Tips: 
Don’t pick up your feet much. You  want your feet to glide across the floor.  

Warnings: 
This isn’t  as easy as it looks. 

Follower 
Steps: 
1.  Place your  left hand on the leader’s right shoulder.  
2.  Bend your right  elbow and place the palm of your right hand lightly on 
his outstretched  palm.  
3.  Do the opposite of what your partner does. Move your  right foot back 
when the leader moves his left foot forward on the first  beat.  
4.  Continue following the directions for the leader, but  in reverse - 
stepping back with your left foot when he steps forward with his  right.  


_http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081696/plotsummary_ 
(http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php?URL=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081696/plotsummary)  
Plot  Summary for 
Urban Cowboy (1980) 
Bud Davis is a country boy  who moves to the city to visit his uncle. He 
starts hanging out at Gilley’s,  owned by Mickey Gilley himself. He takes a job at 
the refinery where his uncle  works. He also meets Sissy, a cowgirl, and they 
fall in love and suddenly get  married. And then their marriage is shattered 
when Bud sees Sissy allegedly  seeing con man Wes, who teaches her how to ride 
the mechanical bull...and plans  to rob Gilley’s. When a bull-riding contest 
is announced, Bud decides to sign  up. Can he win the contest and save his 
marriage to Sissy?  
Summary written by watzdabigdeal {watzdabigdeal at aol.com}  
5 August 1951, Santa Fe New Mexican, section B, pg. 2: 
Square  Dance Jamboree In 
Las Vegas Draws Champions 
(...) 
The  Lazy Eight set from Los Alamos, which just missed being the adult 
amateur  champions, will exhibit their fine teamwork featuring the Texas Two-Step 
style  


10 August 1951, Santa Fe New Mexican, pg. 3: 
...Texas  two-step in all their figures which gives them… 
(The text in this photo  caption is partly illegible. It’s again about the 
square dance jamboree and the  Lazy Eight of Los Alamos—ed.) 


21 May 1976, Las Cruces (NM)  Sun-News, “Shakespeare Goes Rock Ballet,” pg. 
24:  
HOUSTON  (UPI)—Choreographer James Clouser, for many years enchanted by 
Caliban in  Shakespeare’s “The Tempest,” pondered how the classic could be 
translated into  ballet. 

It was not until he came to Texas and experienced such earthy  dance routines 
as “The Cotton-Eyed Joe,” and the “Texas Two-Step” that he put it  all 
together in the rock ballet “Caliban.”  
20 June 1978, New York Times, “The Urban Cowboy, 1978 Style” by  William K. 
Stevens, pg. C1: 
If Texas chic is noticeable in New York, it is  positively pervasive in 
Houston. Cowboy hats and boots, Lone Star belt buckles  and Levis are in. Bankers 
and bank clerks, computer programmers and secretaries,  truck drivers and 
refinery workers flock to such spots as Gilley’s or Fool’s  Gold to drink beer out 
of long-necked bottles and dance the Cotton-eyed Joe or  Texas two-step, a 
controlled, old-fashioned country dance of considerable grace  and elegance. 


6 January 1980, Los Angeles Times “Travolta’s  Biggest Fan: His Director” by 
Roderick Mann, pg. P27: 
For this story (The  film Urban Cowboy—ed.) of the Texas oil-rig men who 
crowd into Gilley’s  Bar in Pasadena, near Houston, to impress themselves and 
their girlfriends by  riding the bar’s mechanical bull intrigued him hugely. 
(...) 
“There was  always a lot of dancing in the story—things like the Texas 
Two-Step and  Cotton-eyed Joe which they do on the floor of Gilley’s.” 


30 March  1980, Chicago Tribune, pg. 14: 
The two-step is danced at Gilley’s,  but the virtual anthem of the urban 
cowboy is a song and dance called  “Cotton-eyed Joe,” a square dance maneuver in 
which the participants link arms  and shout the refrain “Bull ----!” 
Posted by Barry Popik 
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