California Twirl

An online definition may be found here.

Bars: 2.

This figure involves a couple, standing side by side, with the woman to the right of the man and inside hands joined. They change places, and end facing the other way (with the same hands still joined. The man walks forward outside the woman in a semicircle turning right, while the woman twirls under their joined hands 180° to the left.

History

How the call evolved I do not know. Lloyd Shaw does not mention it in his Cowboy Dances from 1939.

CALLERLAB published the first standardized list of calls in 1975, and California Twirl was on that list.

Some dances which (probably) use this figure

• Dances for which I have animations

Note: This list may be incorrect or incomplete.

See Also

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My work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Most of the dances have more restrictive licensing, see my notes on copyright, the individual dance pages should mention when some rights are waived.