These are the top ten most pivotal moments in Texas music history

There are numerous moments in which Texas music had the world’s attention.

As part of KUTX and Texas Standard’s Texas 250 project, we rounded up ten of those moments, in particular.

Check them out below, and make sure you reach out to us and let us know which Texas songs you think belong in our Texas-themed July 4th party! (And here is the final Spotify playlist of the Texas 250!)

Feb. 26, 1995: Selena at the Houston Astrodome

A record-breaking 66,994 fans packed the Astrodome watch a performance from native daughter Selena as part of the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. This was to be her final concert there and became her last televised performance — immortalizing the Queen of Tejano in her iconic purple jumpsuit.

Known today as Selena Live! The Last Concert, the legendary 1995 show featured a 55-minute setlist of her biggest hits. She performed without any water breaks, singing entirely live while wearing 6-inch heels on a rotating stage. The concert was televised live on Univision.

Tragically, this was the last major televised performance of her career, as she was murdered just over a month later on March 31, 1995. The performance was later released as a live album and concert film and is available to stream on various platforms.

Jan. 1978: The Sex Pistols tour Texas

Manager Malcom McLaren had decided to avoid an east coast tour for the first foray of his band, The Sex Pistols, to America and instead take the band on a two-week, seven-show tour of primarily the southern United States.

This inevitably created a big spectacle and maximum friction. Sid Vicious’ drug use was in full bloom and the band was greeted with a hostile press and antagonistic audience.

On Jan. 8, the band landed in San Antonio for the first of their two Texas shows. Randy’s Rodeo was the venue and the crowd was a mix of hostile country fans and folks there out of sheer curiosity. It was an odd and volatile environment.

The second Texas show happened at the Longhorn Ballroom in Dallas — traditionally the home of such acts at Bob Wills and Merle Haggard, so the booking was a left turn to say the least. It was another combustible environment, with at least one physical altercation between the band and fans of traditional country music.

The tour was the last for the original lineup of the Sex Pistols, with the band calling it quits at the end of the tour.

April 13, 1958: Van Cliburn ‘conquers Russia’

It’s the height of the Cold War, and 23-year-old Kilgore, Texas, native Van Cliburn won the first International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow.

The Soviet Union had just launched Sputnik and this contest was designed to further demonstrate Soviet cultural superiority. When it was time to announce a winner, the judges asked permission of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev to give first prize to an American.

Van Cliburn. https://catalog.archives.gov/id/7839961, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

“Is he the best?” Khrushchev asked. “Then give him the prize!”

Cliburn returned home to a ticker-tape parade in New York City, the only time the honor has been bestowed on a musician.

The cover of Time magazine proclaimed him “The Texan Who Conquered Russia,” later saying that the “long-legged” pianist “had overnight become the object of the most explosive single outpouring of popular acclaim ever accorded a U.S. musician.”

Van Cliburn became instantly famous, launching a historic career that included the first Grammy for classical music, the first classical album to go triple platinum, and record-breaking concert ticket sales at venues like New York’s Carnegie Hall and Madison Square Garden, Chicago’s Grant Park, and Los Angeles’ Hollywood Bowl.

Cliburn also performed for every President of the United States — from Harry Truman to Barack Obama — not to mention royalty and heads of state from around the world.

Sept. 28, 1991: Pantera at the Monsters of Rock festival

Tushino Airfield in Moscow: The Monsters of Rock festival was a free concert that drew a huge crowd, with estimates of up to 1.6 million fans in attendance. Despite being an opening act for AC/DC and Metallica, Dallas metal outfit Pantera delivered a ferocious, career-defining set.

Held during the chaotic final days of the Soviet Union, and just weeks after the failed August Coup, the festival was essentially a celebration of newfound freedom.

Fans, starved of Western heavy metal for decades, flooded the airfield. The crowd was so massive that Soviet military forces were deployed to hold back the ocean of people.

Having primarily played in small bars and clubs in Texas, the band was suddenly thrown onto a gigantic stage in front of a massive crowd. Despite the nerves, the band played a blistering, high-energy set that stole the show.

The show featured classics from their Cowboys from Hell album, including a crushing rendition of “Domination” that is widely considered one of the heaviest moments in metal history.

The Soviet Union would officially fall just 3 months later. Draw what you will from that.

Fourth of July Weekend, 1996: DJ Screw drops ‘June 27th’

Robert Earl Davis Jr, better known as DJ Screw, releases the June 27th freestyle tape.

DJ Screw was never on a major label and usually recorded in his home studio in true DIY fashion.

He pioneered the “chopped and screwed” music technique. This unique sound was created by dramatically slowing down tempos and then rhythmically “chopping” and repeating beats.

On June 27, his friends and collaborators — known as the Screwed Up Click: Big Moe, Key-C, Yungstar, Big Pokey, and Haircut Joe — freestyled over a slowed-down version of the sampled beat from “Da Streets Ain’t Right” by hip-hop duo Kriss Kross.

Screw released the tape a few days later over Fourth of July weekend. It immediately made its way across Galveston beach parties, spurred lines around the block of Screw’s house — the only place you could get a copy — and went on to be the best-selling of his mixtapes.

Screw’s music created a new sound in Southern hip-hop, solidified Houston’s place in wider the hip-hop culture and made June 27 an unofficial holiday in Houston. The legacy of this single mixtape tape lives on today most notably with fellow Houstonians Travis Scott and Megan Thee Stallion.

Feb. 3, 1959: The Day the Music Died

The “Winter Dance Party” tour across the American Midwest was underway featuring Buddy Holly and the Crickets — his band consisting of Waylon Jennings, Tommy Allsup, and Carl Bunch.

Buddy Holly. Public domain image, via Wikimedia Commons

Also on the tour were rising artists Richie Valens, “The Big Bopper” J.P. Richardson from Dallas, Frankie Sardo and vocal group Dion and the Belmonts.

The journeys between venues on the tour were long and the tour buses lacked proper heating, with some performers coming down with the flu and even frostbite. After a show in Clear Lake, Iowa, and frustrated by the conditions on the tour buses, Holly chose to charter a plane to reach their next venue in Moorhead, Minn.

The Big Bopper, suffering from the flu, swapped places with Waylon Jennings, taking his seat on the plane, while Tommy Allsup lost his seat to Richie Valens on a coin toss.

Shortly after takeoff, late at night and in poor, wintry weather conditions, the pilot lost control of the light airplane and crashed into a field, killing all four on board. This tragically momentous occasion will forever be known as The Day The Music Died.

March 1987: SXSW launches

What was expected to be a regional event with a couple hundred attendees quickly became a national — and then eventually, a global — event.

SXSW was originally a modest music festival and conference in Austin that grew into an international destination for not just music but film, tech, politics and occasionally, controversy.

Initially envisioned as an extension of the New York City music festival New Music Seminar, the idea was quickly abandoned and Austinites Roland Swenson, Louis Black, Nick Barbaro and Louis J Meyers created their own vision.

1994 was the first turning point for SXSW, with Johnny Cash as keynote speaker and performer and the festival expanding into film and new technologies. The aughts and 2010s brought a further explosion of attention to the once-humble Austin music festival.

The exponential growth of the fest mirrored Austin’s own rise and it is easily argued that the two are intertwined.

Many consider 2014 to be another a turning point for the festival. Lady Gaga was the keynote speaker and her collaboration with Doritos on a vending machine-shaped stage proved a bridge too far for many festivalgoers and Austinites. Additionally, a drunk driver struck and killed 4 festival pedestrians in the Red River district, changing the future layout and permitting of the festival.

SXSW wasn’t immune to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic either, causing a reset of the entire festival.

Despite such changes over the years, SXSW continues to be an economic driver for Austin and a space for global conversation around music, film and technology.

March 29, 2024: ‘Cowboy Carter’ is released

Growing up in Houston and regularly attending and performing at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, Beyonce was immersed in country music.

A project that took five years to complete, “Cowboy Carter” is a deep dive into Americana music, especially the overlooked contributions of Black artists.

The central concept behind the record is a radio broadcast that features the sounds of folk, hip-hop, rock and, of course, country, with Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton and Linda Martell acting as DJ’s.

Obviously, Beyonce was already a megastar at this point, but the emphasis on her home state and the music that influenced her represented a shift stylistically and was a bold statement on who could exist in what musical spaces. At the 67th Grammy Awards, Beyoncé became the first Black woman in 25 years to win Album of the Year and the first Black artist to win Best Country Album.

The single “Texas Hold ‘Em” was a global sensation and again put Beyonce’s Lone Star State heritage in the spotlight.

May 4, 1965: Sir Douglas Quintet on Hullabaloo

Just a month earlier, on April 2, the Sir Douglas Quintet’s single “She’s About A Mover” entered the Billboard charts.

Doug Sahm led the quintet, joined by Augie Meyers on Vox organ, Jack Barber, Frank Morin, and Johnny Perez. Their sound was a mix of San Antonio’s Chicano Soul and Tejano music along with rhythm and blues.

Since it was the height of Beatlemania, their producer Huey Meaux decided to lean in to that new sound. Meaux’s record business had taken a hit with the arrival of the British Invasion, and so he immersed himself in Beatles records over a two-day span, giving him a new direction to take the Sir Douglas Quintet.

He then called up Doug Sahm, told him to start growing his hair in a Beatle bob and write a song that sounded like it came from across the pond. They even dressed the part — in Mod suits and Chelsea boots — and didn’t talk between songs so the audience wouldn’t hear their Texas drawls. The Sir Douglas Quintet would come off as British lads.

The ruse didn’t last long, though. The quintet appeared on the NBC TV program Hullabaloo, hosted by fellow Texan Trini Lopez. On a stage that continued the feaux-British theme — a fabricated castle, models in knights’ armor, Sahm and the boys in full Merseybeat mode, Lopez came on after the song and told the audience, “But I have a surprise for you,” before unmasking the Sir Douglas Quintet as Texans.

“I bet we even fooled Lyndon,” Lopez quipped.

April 1972: Willie returns to Texas

The restrictions and conservatism of the Nashville record labels and recording houses made Willie Nelson decide he’d had enough. So he left music city and returned to his home state, landing in Austin.

The burgeoning hippie music scene at venues like the Armadillo World Headquarters reinvigorated Willie. His popularity in Austin soared as he honed his own unique sound and he was eager to play live gigs in Texas without violating his 26-week residency requirement for the Grand Ole Opry.

The move also spurred Willie to get out of his confining record contract with RCA, subsequently signing a much more lucrative deal with Columbia that granted him artistic freedom.

His friend Waylon Jennings would soon follow suit and thus began the outlaw country movement.

The outlaw country movement was a rebellion against the formulaic and polished Nashville sound. The artists were now free to experiment with different styles and song structures — mixing in rock, jazz and folk. Contemporaries Johnny Cash and Kris Kristofferson would soon be among their ranks and a new breed of country music took the nation by storm.

In 1976, Wanted! The Outlaws — the compilation album by Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Jessi Colter, and Tompall Glaser — was the first country album to go platinum. Outlaw country was here to stay.

The legacy lives on today with artists like Sturgill Simpson, Miranda Lambert and Chris Stapleton. All it took was for Willie to move to Austin.

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