Biography of Chubby Checker

He taught America how to twist. Not just the kids, who always learned the latest steps, but everyone -- from society matrons and jetsetters to the proverbial man in the street. Rock & roll was becoming complacent when Chubby Checker came along in 1960 with his note-for-note remake of Hank Ballard and the Midnighters' "The Twist" and got it moving again. The husky Philadelphia lad, known as Ernest Evans until Dick Clark's wife decided he resembled Fats Domino, had already waxed a few 45s for the local Parkway label, including a novelty called "The Class" that found him imitating Fats, Elvis, and even the Chipmunks. But it was "The Twist," a #1 hit not once but twice (in 1960 and 1961), that made him an international celebrity.Checker quickly became the nation's leading dance specialist, introducing "The Hucklebuck," "The Fly," "Pony Time," and "Limbo Rock" to the gyrating masses and successfully recycling his initial routine into "Let's Twist Again" and "Slow Twistin'." While racking up monster sales figures for Parkway, Checker starred in a couple of quickie exploitation films, Twist Around the Clock and Don't Knock the Twist, later trying his hand at folk songs when the twist fad finally began to fade.The British Invasion led to some lean years for Checker although he got a little revenge by charting with a cover of the Beatles tune "Back in the U.S.S.R." in 1969. But he continued to put on a high-energy show that inevitably led to that classic million-seller -- and Chubby Checker proved every time out that he was still the king of the Twist. ~ Bill Dahl