One million steps - a tap dancing adventure: Marije Nie at TEDxDelft

Marije Nie is a musician with her feet, a dancing percussionist. Her tap dance style is the perfect symbiosis between music and dance. The rhythm dictates the movement and the movement determines the sound. She feels at home in many different kinds of music: jazz, improvisational music, world music, contemporary, classic music, experimental electronic music and dance. With her skills for improvisation and her passion for experimentation, she created her unique niche between composed and improvised music. At TEDxDelft she presents her tap dance adventure, the film One Million Steps.

(Tap dancing)

(Tap dancing)

(Child calls)

(Environmental sounds)

(Tap dancing)

(Man sings on cue with tap dancing)

(Man joins in clapping hands)

(People join in, calling)

(Applause)

Thank you.

This was a little -- the begining part
of my new movie "One Million Steps".

It's not finished yet.
We're still working really hard on it.

I've been doing a lot of steps
for you, just now

-- also in the movie.

And they are poetic steps,

creative steps.

I don't move from A to B.

I just stay in A

and really have --

-- fun there.

And when I look at what happens

when I'm tap dancing,

I realize

the sounds is what you hear,

what actually communicates
the rhythm and the music.

But all my activity

happens in between the sounds.

In between the beats.

In the silence.

(Tap dancing)

All my impulses,
my movements,

it happens before,
in the silence.

And it was funny, but

when started tap dancing,
I didn't notice I was fixated on the beat.

Really doing it.
Putting the sound there.

And when I realized
it happens in the silence,

this was a real breakthrough for me.

To learn that you throw
the beat in front of you

and then ... (Tap)

... it happens there.

We all take a lot of steps in our lives.

Someone actually
took the trouble to count them

and came to this incredible number

of 1.825.000 steps in a year

for every average human being.

So, you all do this.
Well done!

(Applause)

Big steps, small steps,
you don't really give them much thought.

They just take you from A to B

where you need to go.

And when you do them,
when you're walking

your body automatically
falls in a rhythm.

A pulse... (Clicks fingers)

And this saves you energy
and makes you go a long way

without having to think about every step.

(Walks)

I don't really have to take care

or think about what I'm doing right now.

But something happens when
you start playing with the silences

and the breaks, the pauses
in between your steps.

(Tap dances)

Suddenly this very normal thing of walking

becomes music and rhythm,

and for me

tap dancing in this way becomes walking poetry

You take the breaks, the silences
you make them very small or very large

and this is how you get this playful mode.

And somehow underneath - (Clicks fingers)
there's still the pulse.

But because I'm playing with these pauses

and stopping sometimes...

(Tap dances)

...and then I riff on this pulse of normality,

it becomes playful and
generates a lot of ideas.

So, this was a thing
that I was intrigued by:

silence...
pause...

... and how it becomes poetry.

And I was intrigued, together with my friend
Eva Stotz, from Berlin, a film maker,

and we thought: wouldn't it be great
to put these poetically walking feet

and confront them with
functionally walking feet in the big city,

just to see what happens when they meet.

These two modes,
can they inspire each other?

Maybe the poetic feet
can bring something loose

to the functionally, hastily
walking steps of normal life.

So we went to Istanbul

because we thought intuitively:
this is a great place,

lots of things are happening there
-- let's do it there.

And this would become the movie
"One Million Steps".

Something incredible happened, though.

The second time we were in Istanbul to film

was in June 2013.

And I don't know if you remember, but

Istanbul exploded at that moment.

Thousands of people stopped their daily lives,

their daily routines,

and went into the streets and just said "No.

Not any longer.

We need to create a break, a pause.

Because this machine
of the city, of the government

is just rolling too fast

and it's breaking us."

The incredible energy that happened there,
we were in the middle of it --

-- is very intense.
All these people just couldn't go on.

And what they did was very symbolic
and beautiful to me.

They built a barricade
around Taksim Square.

And "Taksim", by the way,
means "improvisation",

so it was strangely fitting.

Around Taksim Square,
where Gezi Park is --

this was the park that was threatened,

it was the issue that made everything explode --

they cordoned off this space.

And inside was a safe space,

a space outside of normality and functionality.

And there life was different.

They were not busy making ten points
for a new political program

or choosing a leader
that would speak for everyone. No.

They we using this space
as a silence, as a pause.

There was music, dancing...
and most importantly

-- sorry, I shouldn't say music is not important --

most importantly, people were talking.

And generating seeds for new ideas

because it was a place outside of normality,
outside of functionality.

I would like to show you
a fragment of the film.

We filmed in Gezi park.

It was one of the most intense moments
for me, on the barricades.

One side is protesters
the other side is police,

and we were in the middle, making music.

(Percussion)

(Joins in with tap dancing)

(People join in, clapping)

(Rhythm picks up)

(Whistles join in)

(Applause)

(Applause and cheering)

(Clapping and trumpet)

(Tap dancing cues in)

(People join in, singing 'Bella ciao')

(Applause, percussion and whistling)

Crowd chanting:
"Everywhere Taksim, everywhere resistance"

(Percussion, whistling and shouting
continue in background)

(Applause)

It was so incredible...

I always go back to this moment
when I see the movie, this part.

Silence. Pause. Poetry.

It's what happened in Gezi Park.

It's what's happening in my feet.

And with this talk

I would like to inspire you

to do this at home.

This was the theme [of the TEDx conference]
-- how to do it at home.

I see you in your kitchen tables,
making pauses and breaks...

But how do we do it?

I think the only thing I want to say about it,
because it's different for every person,

is the attention that you can put
on the silence, on the break.

It's not just relaxing, turning on
your television, and doing nothing.

It's actually a very powerful, full moment

when you're allowed to be
outside of functional steps.

The only thing I would like to make a case for

is to use these moments and value them.

Play, make music,
make poetry of your steps.

(Applause)