In the premiere episode of 'Why We Dance,' host Mia Tate is interviewed by her friend, fellow siren, and accomplished actress Musetta Vander, while they explore why she dances and the profound impact of dance on her life.
Lights, Camera, Dance!
In the premiere episode of Why We Dance, actress Musetta Vander interviews the show’s host, Mia Tate—not to talk about dance, but to uncover what dance has rescued, restored, and revealed in Mia’s life and why she created this show.
Mia opens up about the seasons that nearly broke her—divorce, health scares, and the slow, quiet unraveling that happens when you drift away from your own body. What began to pull her back was a return to movement in Cuba, where music, community, and the island’s heartbeat reignited a part of her that had long been dormant.
Their conversation moves through:
The episode concludes with Mia reading a raw, intimate letter about why she dances—a moment that sets the emotional pulse for the stories still to unfold in the series.
It’s a conversation about healing, memory, and the human need to move.
Episode Timestamps:
(00:00) Introduction and Personal Struggles
(01:32) Welcome to Why We Dance
(04:02) Early Dance Memories
(05:34) Training and Breakthroughs
(08:50) Transition to Professional Dance
(13:19) From Dance to Documentary Filmmaking
(16:35) Healing Through Dance in Cuba
(21:57) The Universal Language of Dance
(30:11) Dancing with Kids and the Power of Music
(30:50) The Healing Power of Dance and Sound
(33:10) Reconnecting After a Long Time
(34:45) Memories from 'O Brother, Where Art Thou?'
(35:52) Audition Stories and Behind the Scenes
(44:10) The Concept of 'Why We Dance'
(53:24) Mia Tate's Letter: Why I Dance
Links & Resources:
[00:00:00] Musetta Vander: Something happened that made you pretty much change the trajectory of everything and made you want to create this show?
[00:00:11] Mia Tate: Yes. Let's see. Where do I even, okay, so well, I went through I, well, let's see. Life. And I went through some, I went through a challenging period, right? Um, uh, I was divorcing and I had a health scare, and I had to have surgery, and I was weak, and I was really, I was tired, and it was hard, and it was all, I mean like, oh, unraveling a life, you know, very hard.
[00:00:43] Mia Tate: It's so hard. You're, I mean, I have such gratitude for the life I had. And then so unraveling was. You know, it's, it's a tough part of life. So I just hadn't been dancing. I hadn't, I had turned that off. I had turned that part of myself off when I was kind of, uh, maybe holding my breath throughout life at that time.
[00:01:04] Mia Tate: White knuckling the American dream a little bit. So I, uh, I just remember going, I need to dance. And it was like this OH!.
[00:01:32] Mia Tate: Welcome to Why We Dance, where we talk about what moves you. I'm Mia Tate, and today is our first episode, and I'm joined by Musetta Vander, actress dancer, icon of fantasy and sci-fi. Well, thank you. Muta and I were sirens together in the Cohen Brothers film, O Brother, Where Art Thou? And I liked her immediately.
[00:02:01] Mia Tate: She has a realness and a wholeness about her, and I'm so happy that we're in touch and connected after our adventure in Mississippi. What an adventure. Total adventure. So when I decided to start this podcast with myself being on the chopping block first, as it were, I immediately thought, who would I have interview me? I wanted someone that knows me in the professional world, someone I respect and that I know gets it. And someone with great knowledge of dance,
[00:02:38] Musetta Vander: Aw, stop.
[00:02:39] Mia Tate: That's Musetta
[00:02:40] Musetta Vander: Stop, flattery. It's gonna get you everywhere.
[00:02:44] Mia Tate: Born in South Africa, she began her career as a classically trained dancer. The daughter of a ballet teacher, her childhood was filled with stage and dance performances.
[00:02:57] Mia Tate: Her incredible career has spanned several decades, many times, embracing the physicality that she understands so beautifully. Portraying such roles as Warriors, Queens, Femme Fatales. Have I forgotten anything?
[00:03:16] Musetta Vander: Wow. Well, thank you. I don't know how to follow that introduction. Thank you very much.
[00:03:21] Mia Tate: You've earned it, girl.
[00:03:21] Mia Tate: You've earned it.
[00:03:22] Musetta Vander: I'm very humbled by that. But uh, it's so wonderful to be able to be here, to have this opportunity because I really respect you as a creative person, as a friend, as an artist. You are super talented and I'm so excited to have everybody hear your story because it's gonna be life changing for so many people.
[00:03:41] Musetta Vander: And yes, I'm looking forward at the end of this conversation that we're gonna have, that everybody's gonna hear your personal letter. And, uh, it's gonna be incredible, so stay tuned because it's gonna blow your mind.
[00:03:56] Mia Tate: Thank you. Oh my, my gosh. I'm so happy you're here. You're here.
[00:03:59] Musetta Vander: Me too. So, okay, let's start at the very beginning.
[00:04:02] Musetta Vander: I think that's, that's where we wanna go is the very first memory you ever had of dancing when you were a child. How did it start for you? What made you wanna start dancing?
[00:04:12] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Okay. Well, I come from a dancer. My mom was a dancer and she was a Rockette and a Copa girl, June Taylor dancer. And so I grew up with stories.
[00:04:23] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Anytime I could pull 'em out of her, of her dancing career, I grew up with a bunch of uncles that were all of her dance partners and, um, I would play in the basement in her Bob Mackey costumes. And so I, I always had this, but we lived in Salt Lake City, Utah, you know, it was, it was kind of this other world.
[00:04:42] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: It was this kind of secret world that I knew about her a little bit that I loved. And then she came to me on the playground at Oakwood Elementary, and I'll never forget where I was standing, and she said to me, do you wanna take dance lessons? And, yeah. Yep. And then that was it. And it became. It was my childhood, you know, I was,
[00:05:05] Musetta Vander: it's incredible, right?
[00:05:06] Mia Tate: Yeah.
[00:05:06] Musetta Vander: What was your first, were you into ballet first or did you go into, what did you go into first? What's your first entry into it?
[00:05:12] Mia Tate: I did both. I did Ballet West Academy, so very strong ballet academy. And then I went to Butler dance, and that's where I did my jazz and, you know, kind of, um, did we do hip hop yet?
[00:05:25] Musetta Vander: No, I don't think in those days. Right.
[00:05:26] Mia Tate: Did we?
[00:05:27] Musetta Vander: No, I don't, I don't know. Maybe I, I don't know.
[00:05:29] Mia Tate: Um, yeah, but it was a lot.
[00:05:30] Musetta Vander: Since we were born yesterday, perhaps we were doing.
[00:05:33] Mia Tate: Right.
[00:05:33] Musetta Vander: Right. But you know, training as a dancer. Right. Was it, did you expect the kind of discipline you would need to be able to perform, like as a ballet dancer?
[00:05:42] Musetta Vander: Because it's challenging, right? Were were there any challenges that you thought were bigger than you thought it was going to be when you started training to be a dancer?
[00:05:52] Mia Tate: Yes. I think that basically every day after school I was at the ballet Academy and then I got on point.
[00:05:59] Musetta Vander: Yeah,not pleasant.
[00:06:01] Mia Tate: I don't think a woman invented that. I just want every camera to see me looking.
[00:06:05] Musetta Vander: I actually, I think it was a woman invented actually, yeah.
[00:06:08] Mia Tate: Horrible.
[00:06:08] Musetta Vander: I, I can't remember her name, but it was a woman who suddenly posed on point and from there on out everybody was like, it's do point.
[00:06:15] Mia Tate: I know. So Point was hard for me because of, um, I have big arches so I could, I would just fall over my toe shoes a lot.
[00:06:23] Mia Tate: Um, so I loved it, but then I was also moving into jazz and I kind of loved the freedom of that, but I did them side by side. Yeah. You know?
[00:06:32] Musetta Vander: Yeah. So, from there, when you progressed with the dancing, was there any kind of breakout moment for you while you were training and learning about things? 'cause you ended up with a scholarship, right?
[00:06:41] Musetta Vander: You were in Utah and you ended up with a scholarship, which is quite impressive to be able to get a scholarship, to be able to go to LA. And train with all these amazing dancers and teachers in la. But was there a breakout moment in between when you started training, before you entered and got into the professional side with the scholarship and everything that made you realize, this is what I wanna pursue for the rest of my life?
[00:07:03] Musetta Vander: Because I know when you're in school and you're studying and you're doing all these extracurricular activities, you are not quite sure what you wanna do yet. Was there a moment when you decided, this is what I like and this is what I wanna do and this is what I wanna pursue?
[00:07:16] Mia Tate: Always, it was always my, there was a little time where I wanted to be a bank teller.
[00:07:21] Musetta Vander: A, a bank teller.
[00:07:22] Mia Tate: Yes. I would go to the bank and at that point, nothing was online, so it was all these flyers. So my friends and I would gather all these flyers and then we'd go home and set up bank teller. But that was brief. Um, always the dream was a dancer. Yeah. I grew, I mean, that was, that was what I wanted, was to be a dancer.
[00:07:42] Mia Tate: And so I would dream dancing and, you know. Whether your toe shoes were bloody or you were exhausted, you know, it was just that, oh. So
[00:07:50] Musetta Vander: tell us a little bit, the struggle
[00:07:51] Mia Tate: was just delicious.
[00:07:53] Mia Tate: Tell us a little bit about how you got invited and ended up getting that scholarship to go into LA and to move into the next level of dance.
[00:08:00] Mia Tate: Well, we were talking, I have to share this because Muta and I were having a full podcast at my kitchen island yesterday. Yes. We wrapped and she, we finished talking. She goes, well, that was the podcast.
[00:08:11] Musetta Vander: That's true. It's true. We
[00:08:13] Mia Tate: had such a good time connecting. Yeah. This is all good to catch up.
[00:08:15] Musetta Vander: Yeah.
[00:08:15] Mia Tate: But um, I got a scholarship to Tremaine Dance Center.
[00:08:19] Mia Tate: Wear Musetta...
[00:08:21] Musetta Vander: highly competitive dance center. Yes.
[00:08:22] Mia Tate: Also danced. Yes, we've shared that. And um, that was, I had been kind of going to college all around and just trying to get closer and closer to LA to do what I really wanted, but trying to do my fallback, you know, for school. And when I got the scholarship, I just leaped, you know, I just, leapt, leaped, leapt.
[00:08:43] Mia Tate: Leapt. Okay.
[00:08:46] Musetta Vander: Grand jete into Hi Tremaine.
[00:08:48] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: High jeté into Tremaine.
[00:08:50] Musetta Vander: From there, when you started training with Tremaine and everything like that, what was your first entrance into like the professional world of dance, like in front of the camera, and how did you transition into that? Were there any breakout moments for you over there or things that you aspire to that you saw, I wanted to get into this or be like, that one, you know.
[00:09:09] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: So when you, when we did the scholarship, it's just day in and day out and you get really close to the people. I'm still in touch with them and I love them. And, um, so you're just kind of, you're studying and it's very intensive. I would say that kind of breakout moment is when you start going out into the world and auditioning when you get an agent right, and you feel like you've arrived.
[00:09:31] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: You start doing these auditions, which are brutal. Yeah. A dancers audition. Brutal. It's just like Chorus line. It's freaking brutal. Yeah. You have to put yourself out there in front of all the other dancers. Yep. You get cut in front of all your peers.
[00:09:45] Musetta Vander: Yep. And you see your competition. It's not like you wonder who was better or not.
[00:09:48] Musetta Vander: You can see, okay, that person's leg is right next to her ear and she can do a back bend, Cartwheel splits in the air.
[00:09:55] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Yeah. Yeah. And yeah. Okay. She's better or not. You know what I mean? I know. Yeah. It's, it, it's brutal. Very brutal. It's like dancers are tough. Yeah. It's a, so I would say that made me feel legit when I was going out, and then I was like, okay, maybe.
[00:10:09] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Yeah. This is the dream. This is, this is what I'm doing.
[00:10:12] Musetta Vander: So what was your first entrance into filmmaking as a dancer? How did you get that first job?
[00:10:17] Mia Tate: Well, um. Actually I got a job before, before we did ours. I was a, a showgirl in Antonio Banderas' Crazy in Alabama. It was his directorial debut. And um, and we wore Bob Mackey, which was really cool 'cause I was like, the little girl in me was like, this is, this is what I was playing with in the basement and now I'm wearing it.
[00:10:43] Mia Tate: And so that was the first. A professional dance job, like look big, you know?
[00:10:49] Musetta Vander: Right.
[00:10:49] Mia Tate: I had been doing, uh, then there was commercials, then there was music videos.
[00:10:53] Musetta Vander: Sure.
[00:10:54] Mia Tate: Um, but that was one that I was like, it felt like a bit of an arrival. And then was the question how to go into acting a bit or,
[00:11:02] Musetta Vander: yeah. Because from there you progressed. Well, we, we went, we, we, we did O Brother, Where Art Thou? and that was then, was that your next project as a dancer in a film or was it other things in between? I know we, you did music videos.
[00:11:12] Mia Tate: Right, right, right. Okay. Again, I'm gonna bring up my mom.
[00:11:15] Musetta Vander: Please do.
[00:11:15] Mia Tate: Okay. Because, um, her, when she was a dancer, her roommate was Mary Tyler Moore.
[00:11:21] Musetta Vander: Wow. I did not know that.
[00:11:22] Mia Tate: Yeah. She started as a dancer.
[00:11:24] Musetta Vander: Wow.
[00:11:24] Mia Tate: And they lived in New York together and. Um, my mom was doing jobs to pay the bills.
[00:11:32] Musetta Vander: Right.
[00:11:32] Mia Tate: You know, so she was a dancer working, and when she saw Mary Tyler Moore get married and had some more income and she was able to take acting lessons, she saw the difference of a career, like the longevity.
[00:11:44] Mia Tate: Then my mom got married and she left dance, and Mary Tyler Moore went on to this, you know, other form of storytelling into acting. So she came to me again and said. Um, I'll pay for six months worth of acting lessons for you to, you know, to extend this creative career of yours. And I loved acting. It
[00:12:06] Musetta Vander: was this LA or
[00:12:07] Mia Tate: now I'm in la Yeah,
[00:12:08] Musetta Vander: you're still in la?
[00:12:09] Mia Tate: I'm in la and went to Beverly Hills Playhouse and started training there and started moving into acting a bit, and then I would say the marriage of the dance and acting came with our project with O Brother because it was. For me, I think we talked about this. For me, it was a, um, acting call.
[00:12:30] Musetta Vander: Yeah.
[00:12:30] Mia Tate: But there was a lot of dancers there.
[00:12:31] Musetta Vander: Yeah. It wasn't acting call there. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:12:32] Mia Tate: And then that film had such a great response, and then that kind of moved me into more acting.
[00:12:38] Musetta Vander: How do you feel a dance has helped you with acting?
[00:12:41] Mia Tate: I mean. God, I can point out an actor who's a dancer. You know, there's a physicality.
[00:12:47] Musetta Vander: It is because it brings, it brings something to your performance. Right?
[00:12:50] Mia Tate: Right.
[00:12:50] Musetta Vander: 'Cause you have, you can use your body as your whole tool. Right. Right. So that feeling carries through every performance that you do.
[00:12:56] Mia Tate: Yeah. I mean, we're not just humans from here up. We're, you know, we're expressive beings. And if you understand your body and you kind of live in your body maybe a little more, it, I, I mean, every character was like, what's going on with her body?
[00:13:12] Musetta Vander: Then music and your love for music and dance, uh, led you to so many different places in your life. Eventually, you end up, tell us a story of what happened to you from your dance career, how you ended up making this incredible documentary that you made. Campesino, right?
[00:13:27] Mia Tate: Yes.
[00:13:27] Musetta Vander: Just incredible. You have to go see this documentary.
[00:13:31] Musetta Vander: It's absolutely beautifully shot. It's won. I don't know how many awards, how many? About
[00:13:36] Mia Tate: about seven.
[00:13:36] Musetta Vander: Seven. It's on Amazon Prime streaming. Just, I'm so proud of you for making that because it's so deep and so meaningful and so beautiful. And, uh, so how does, how did you end up from going from your dance all the way to becoming a documentary filmmaker?
[00:13:53] Musetta Vander: What was the transition that led you into this turning point and doing documentary film?
[00:14:00] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Um, well, I did move away. I kind of moved away from everything for a little bit. I became a mother and I have three beautiful, beautiful children. An 18-year-old and my Stella and then my twins, Axel and Lila that are 16.
[00:14:14] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: And that became, um, having a family became a bit of the focus. And, um, so I kind of had moved away. So when they were young, I moved away from it a bit. And then when I came back into it, I just understood production so well. So I would be, I would like, do I still wanna do, do I wanna do acting in that? But anytime I, when I would do acting roles.
[00:14:39] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I would just look at the business of it and the production of it and like I knew how to do that.
[00:14:44] Musetta Vander: Yeah.
[00:14:44] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: You know, and I didn't wanna keep like waiting for other people doing it kind of mediocre. Make Yeah.
[00:14:49] Musetta Vander: And hand you a job to create your own, you know, world. Exactly. And that's very important.
[00:14:53] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I did, I wanted to be in charge a little bit and so, and so I did a little bit of production work on narratives, but for me, I love people.
[00:15:04] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I love people's stories. I love when they honor you with that moment when they decide to tell you a deeper part of their story. So it was this natural progression for me to move into documentaries. And so I had been, um, my brother-in-law at the time had been taking photographs of Cuban tobacco farmers for I think 15 years sneaking into Cuba and Carl Ulrich and, um, beautiful photographs.
[00:15:34] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I would look at those faces and I always knew I'm gonna go get the stories behind those faces. That was a goal of mine, and as soon as Obama said he was going to lift the embargo, I wanted to go before that happened. So I took a crew, we went, we snuck through Mexico and we started filming Campesino and I, I just took Carl's proof sheets where I'd circled certain faces that I wanted their story, and then we went to Vinales and we went and found those faces and got their stories and it evolved into this documentary that was really a labor of love for me.
[00:16:09] Musetta Vander: Such a beautiful story, such a deep, profound story about, uh, the essence of life really, you know? Yeah. Just that base rhythm. True earthiness of who people really are and our source, you know, before we become all the things we've become later.
[00:16:26] Musetta Vander: Right. All back.
[00:16:26] Mia Tate: The basics of the things all outside of us.
[00:16:28] Musetta Vander: Yes, yes.
[00:16:29] Mia Tate: This is like the Campesinos Yeah. It was a grounding and I, I took that lesson in.
[00:16:34] Musetta Vander: Yeah. And then you came back here and home to this beautiful place you live here up in Idaho. And, uh, it was a turning point that happened for you, right?
[00:16:46] Musetta Vander: Something happened that made you. Pretty much change the trajectory of everything and made you want to create this show.
[00:16:57] Mia Tate: Yes. Let's see. Where do we even, okay, so well, I went through, I, um, let's see, life, and I went through some, I went through a challenging period. Um, uh, I was divorcing and I had a health scare and.
[00:17:18] Mia Tate: I had to have surgery and I was weak, and I was really, I was tired and it was hard, and it was all, I mean like, oh, unraveling a life, you know,
[00:17:29] Musetta Vander: very hard.
[00:17:30] Mia Tate: It's so hard. You're, I mean, I have such gratitude for the life I had, and then so unraveling was, you know, it's, it's a tough part of life. So I just hadn't been dancing.
[00:17:41] Mia Tate: I hadn't, I had turned that off. I had turned that part of myself off when I was kind of. Maybe holding my breath throughout life at that time, white knuckling the American dream a little bit. So I, uh, I just remember going, I need to dance. And it was like this.
[00:18:00] Mia Tate: Ha.
[00:18:02] Mia Tate: And so I turned to Cuba because I love that country.
[00:18:06] Mia Tate: And I went to Havana and enrolled in immersive salsa lessons and. Five to six hours a day I spent in this studio with Yali who owns the salsa studio. Salsa is in Havana, and my partner Renzel and I just came back to life.
[00:18:27] Musetta Vander: It's, is it the rhythm of the music that brings you back? Is it the place of Cuba itself was the rhythm of the music?
[00:18:33] Musetta Vander: What ignites you? What brings you back? 'cause I think in life we get, we get caught up in life and we become like armored or dull or dead or numb. From all the experiences we go through where we kind of forget who we are in our core and we lose our vibrancy, for lack of a better word. Right. Uh, because we so identified with all our problems that we have, and then something happens like a traumatic event and like in your case where everybody gets to some point that something snaps and you go, okay, I can't do this anymore.
[00:19:02] Musetta Vander: Something has to change. Yeah. And for you, that was Cuba calling you and the rhythm of Cuba. Yeah. Right. The music, the female.
[00:19:11] Mia Tate: Well, Cuba, I mean, I picked a country that was also really in need of healing. So it wasn't like I went to Cuba and I was like, woo-hoo. It was like, it was quieter. It was, it was deeper.
[00:19:24] Mia Tate: It was, um, kind of remembering. It was a, it was a great remembering of who I am, who we are. This, I've talked about this a lot, especially in conjunction with this podcast, just this primal heartbeat that we all share. It was tuning into that,
[00:19:41] Musetta Vander: connecting with Mother Earth, the people
[00:19:43] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: mm-hmm. The place, the people that they allowed me in and did this and, and so it was this quiet returning to me that I found in Cuba for sure.
[00:19:55] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Wow. Yeah. It was, it was, um, it was everything about that place I think I told it was, it was Renzell who only spoke. Two sentence English.
[00:20:05] Musetta Vander: I love what he said. please, please tell the audience what he said to you, which I think is so appropriate considering where you came from, how you ended up there.
[00:20:13] Musetta Vander: And then he gives you these two lines and he's broken English. Please tell them what they says. Oh yeah.
[00:20:18] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Well, by the way, I feel like I should be fair to Renzel. His English is incredible now, but uh, when I first went to him, he had two sentences and they were, first, you are not the boss. And I was like, I obviously was trying to lead an salsa.
[00:20:32] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I didn't know. And then his second sentence was, uh, don't think. And I was like, oh, I am not the boss. And don't think it felt so good. You know when those moments in life where you just release Yes. You just let go of that attachment. And so it was, it was profound. The lessons way beyond salsa.
[00:20:56] Musetta Vander: 'cause I think we are always trying to control everything.
[00:20:59] Musetta Vander: I mean, we are all trying to control the circumstances of our life. Because you don't wanna, there's so many things that can go outta balance. So trying to keep a tight lid on everything and make sure everything's okay, just surviving month to month, you know, it's all of that. And then you have your family, all the other things going on in your life, those words are so profound.
[00:21:20] Musetta Vander: Okay. You're not the boss, which is true because, you know, it's like we can make plans and it never goes according. It's like we make plans, God laughs kind of thing. You know what I mean? And then, you know, and, and don't think. Because our thinking, I think, is what gets us into trouble so much because we live in the past or we worrying about the future.
[00:21:39] Musetta Vander: So tie ties our energy back here with all the problems of the past, we constantly mulling over them. You know, I should have done this, or I could have done that, that better. Why did I say that? You know? Or whatever it is. Oh, you worrying about the future, like where am I gonna go? What am I gonna do? How am I gonna survive?
[00:21:55] Musetta Vander: Whatever that is. The concerns.
[00:21:57] Mia Tate: Right. And if we put ourselves, like if we, you and I rewind all the way back to Tremaine or something, dance is the great non thinker. You, I mean, I just go into complete presence
[00:22:10] Musetta Vander: exactly
[00:22:10] Mia Tate: when I dance. And I'll tell you when you're doing salsa. You have, you don't know what you're doing.
[00:22:16] Mia Tate: It's every time you think is when you mess up. Every time you go, wait, I don't really know salsa. And then you're like, uh.
[00:22:21] Musetta Vander: Exactly. You have to go back to the feeling, to the rhythm. You cannot think
[00:22:25] Mia Tate: trust that you're just gonna get there and full presence. And that for me, dance is full presence.
[00:22:31] Musetta Vander: Exactly.
[00:22:31] Musetta Vander: And it's such a healing modality because you have to use all of your senses. All your senses have to be involved when you're dancing. You go to your muscles, your, your, your thinking in the sense of it's instantaneously. It's in that moment. It's not like, oh, I gotta think of what's the step five steps down the line, or you're gonna mess.
[00:22:50] Musetta Vander: It's, what's the step that's happening right now? Right? Yeah. So it's all presence. It's all in the moment. And it's so good for your body because everything, it's in motion. It's constantly moving. The universe is constantly in motion. Right, right.
[00:23:02] Mia Tate: Oh my God, I talk about that in the letter. Yes. I mean, we are movement,
[00:23:06] Musetta Vander: like the proton electron neutrons, totally moving all the time.
[00:23:08] Musetta Vander: It's when things start stopping and slowing down that things stagnate and die. And I think it doesn't matter how big your movement is, it's that you must move your body because there's nothing in the universe that is stagnant and this is part of being healthy.
[00:23:23] Mia Tate: And then when you. When we get in, when we know that and we get in the flow, then it's less struggle, everything, right?
[00:23:31] Mia Tate: Like this, this podcast I'm thrilled about. It's been no struggle. You know? It just is flowing. Yeah.
[00:23:37] Musetta Vander: You know, and this is so true, and this is also with why we dance. Even if you physically can't, uh, have your body perform like you would like it to perform, let's say you have some kind of a impediment that doesn't allow you to move, like you would like to move.
[00:23:51] Musetta Vander: With your mind and feeling and being present in the rhythm. If you do the movements, even if you're dancing in your brain, it's still beneficial to your health. It still lifts your spirit. It raises that frequency and vibration in the body, and that is why we dance 'cause it elevates the spirit. It tingles in the cells.
[00:24:11] Musetta Vander: You feel good, you feel alive You forget all your problems. Right?
[00:24:15] Mia Tate: Right. I mean, have you ever been on a dance floor where people aren't smiling? You know, it's just, it's the natural, and I will say that we have some guests on this show that reimagine how one can dance with, I mean, no matter what obstacle they're facing.
[00:24:30] Mia Tate: And those stories are just like, humans are amazing.
[00:24:34] Musetta Vander: Amazing humans are so amazing.
[00:24:37] Musetta Vander: Yeah.
[00:24:39] Musetta Vander: Well, Mia, it's been an incredible, uh. Lesson and journey and think in life for you, for everybody, for you to be able to create this. So can you tell us a little bit about some of the other guests that you might be bringing in on the show coming down the line?
[00:24:53] Musetta Vander: Can you give people a little bit of a sneak peek of what it is? Where we gonna go with the show? Or is it something you wanna say for later?
[00:25:01] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Oh no, let me, I mean, there's so many, there's just stories. There's, you know, um, there's. A beautiful dancer who is in a wheelchair, and she has these poles and she lifts herself out of her chair with her poles, or does ariel with the wheelchair?
[00:25:17] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Um, I, there's a trans dancer who's changing the face of the pas de deux there's a, there's a nun. I have this woman I found in Italy who I hope to get, I haven't reached out to this one yet. She was a club dancer and then she, um, became a nun. Now she is in Rome and she's opened a dance studio dancing for God. And this isn't just like kumbaya.
[00:25:44] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: She's teaching hip hop
[00:25:45] Musetta Vander: WHAT! This I have to see..
[00:25:47] Mia Tate: I know, I know. A soldier who injuries taught himself to move again through line dancing. I mean, it crosses. What I love about this podcast is it crosses all the barriers of, you know, whatever, wherever we are, it crosses over culture or politic politics or, um.
[00:26:07] Mia Tate: It's the full gamut of the human experience. But here's the deal. There's a thread that I see in the varied stories. There is this thread that is universal and it comes from this understanding of something deeper. This, um, connecting to this first expression we ever used as humans. Why we dance? And that is what this is.
[00:26:35] Mia Tate: Such a celebration of humans and dance and movement. You know, it's, it's not just dancers, it's people who have used, used movement at a certain particular time in their life.
[00:26:45] Musetta Vander: Yeah. But it's so fundamental, and it's so true that you, you saying all of this, because if you looked back throughout all of history and all different cultures, they all have very Strong connections to dancing. So only in modern cultures that we've kind of, they've seen poo-pooed and shoot, shoot away. And you don't express yourself in that way. It's more controlled. You dance only at your party or when you go to a nightclub or if you're a professional dancer.
[00:27:10] Mia Tate: But it's, it's ongoing. Rhythm.
[00:27:13] Musetta Vander: Rhythm. It's that pulse of life that throbs through you. You know, it's like when you are, when I was, when my, I was a baby in my mom's belly. She was a opera singer as well. So she would listen to La bohème, the music of La bohème and there's a song called Musetta's Wall Song, and I never heard this song. Okay.
[00:27:32] Musetta Vander: I, I knew she had sung the opera, but as I was growing up, I always did ballet and all this stuff, but I never heard Musetta's Wall song. And one day she put it on 'cause she had the record player and she put it on and I instantly stopped and I recognized this music. And in my whole body I was like, because. I think when you, even when you in the belly of your mom and you hear that music, it's like her voice.
[00:27:57] Musetta Vander: It's that same thing I could, I recognized the music and I was like, what is that song? Just
[00:28:03] Mia Tate: How old were you?
[00:28:03] Musetta Vander: I don't remember. I'd say probably in my eight, eight years old. Seven, eight years old, you know, and I actually saw that with another friend of Mine's baby who, she had a favorite song that she played to when he was in her belly.
[00:28:15] Musetta Vander: And one day he was, she was still carrying him around. One day she played the song and he literally whipped his head around to see where the music was coming from. And that, that core rhythm, at that vibe, it's that pulse, that heartbeat pulse that runs in every song that runs through our blood. It's part of our essence, and that's what we dance.
[00:28:35] Mia Tate: And sometimes we kind of forget, right? You know, like I've seen more women come up to me with this whole salsa project and look at me kind of longingly. How does she know how to do that? And I can just, oh, they wanna dance. And I'm like, oh, come with me. We gotta dance.
[00:28:52] Musetta Vander: That's so beautiful because I think that dancing is a much easier way to start expressing yourself, especially if you've been, you know, because I teach acting and so I get a lot of students in and from all ages.
[00:29:03] Musetta Vander: Sometimes when they're very young, they have a instant connect you. They just understand like others come in and they're not sure or if, if, especially if a person is older and there's been a lot of damage. In their world and life, they're very armored, so they don't have connection to emotion and they don't wanna express themself and it's very hard for them.
[00:29:24] Musetta Vander: And sometimes I'll put music on and I'll have them just move to the music and just express them and that they, first, they're terrified of it, but then if they see other people doing it, they, they're okay with it and they start moving it, and then the person starts loosening up and it's just, dancing is just this thing that.
[00:29:42] Musetta Vander: You see with the other person in, in the rhythms kind of infectious and it reaches out and it allows you to let go and you start peeling the layers of the onion away. You, you start shedding all of that baggage if you can. Should shoulds or judgment. Yeah. Or could have. Would or should have, you know? Yeah.
[00:29:57] Musetta Vander: Yeah.
[00:29:58] Mia Tate: And then we dance.
[00:29:59] Musetta Vander: Then we dance. The beauty of it, right. That's why we dance.
[00:30:04] Mia Tate: That's why we dance.
[00:30:05] Musetta Vander: It's healing.
[00:30:06] Mia Tate: It is healing. It is healing. And just so alive.
[00:30:09] Musetta Vander: So alive.
[00:30:10] Mia Tate: Yeah.
[00:30:11] Musetta Vander: Do you, do your kids like to dance? Do you like to dance with your kids?
[00:30:14] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Um, yeah. I always danced with them when they were little.
[00:30:17] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Yeah. And still, my number one thing is speakers in every room, because if you just don't turn on the music, I mean, sometimes you'll forget, you know, if you don't like the candles, if you don't turn on the music. Yeah. You just, you don't give yourself the opportunity to kind of move into that space. So I always have music going.
[00:30:35] Musetta Vander: It's true because it's a mood changer. You can be in the worst mood ever and not wanna talk to any. Yeah. And you turn on a, a song, a happy song, your life energy, the frequency changes, and then you wanna move and you're like, oh, what am I worrying about? Why am I tying my energy up on this? I can't wait to hear your letter.
[00:30:52] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Oh, yes, the letter. Oh, yes, yes. It's something I love about this podcast. I'm asking each guest to end the episode with writing a letter. Why I dance? And, um, just one page. And then what I'll do is I'm gonna edit, um, archival footage or current footage. I'm gonna edit a montage of their movement while they read their letter, because I feel like podcasts are kind of moving into this visual area.
[00:31:20] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: And I wanna use the filmmaking that I love to kind of do a visual story as, as well as,
[00:31:25] Musetta Vander: you know. Well, you're so good at it. I, I think it's gonna be a, an. Beautiful, beautiful healing experience for everybody watching it, because I hope that it activates everybody's journey to dance again. You know, we should all be dancing.
[00:31:39] Musetta Vander: I think if we all danced, you know, around the fire, like in the old day, like rhythm, tapping our chest, shouting out, just getting it up, generating or you know, like in Qigong there's a lot of, uh, exercises you do in Qigong to heal the body. And by sound, you know, you exhale. Social sounds like the sound of the heart is.
[00:31:57] Musetta Vander: Towards the heart. So there's different sounds for every organ, right? So this when in the tribal days of old, they will, yeah. Well still today they will. They're chant, there's chanting, they're singing because these are healing the body. And it's the same with the music and the dancing.
[00:32:13] Mia Tate: All those healing that stuck spots all just, just, I would imagine Is that, can you see the stuck spots and how people move or with your training?
[00:32:20] Musetta Vander: No, I'm not clairvoyant, but I can feel energy. You know, and, uh, you can, you, you get over time, you get a really strong sense for, uh, when a person comes to you. I think it's also from the years of, I think when you're an artist or when you're in the entertainment business, you are kind of connected more to the more sensitive side of things maybe then the more inte then the more intellect, more emotional I should say.
[00:32:46] Musetta Vander: And so you feel things very strongly and, uh, I never am I wildest dreams, thought I would. Into the healing side of life.
[00:32:55] Mia Tate: That doesn't surprise me at all. You were already headed there Back in O, Brother day. You were already headed there. That's true. I was like, she's amazing.
[00:33:05] Musetta Vander: No, no. I can't do it. I'm not, I'm not.
[00:33:08] Musetta Vander: I'm just me. But, uh, you're amazing. But um, yeah, no, it's been a joy to reconnect with you. And you know what, and this is an interesting thing 'cause we haven't seen each other in how long? A long time. Okay.
[00:33:20] Mia Tate: We've, I mean, we've. Been in touch. Yes. But I mean to, we haven't seen each other.
[00:33:24] Musetta Vander: No. But to connect like we did.
[00:33:26] Musetta Vander: Yes. After such a long absence, it's just a instant connection. It's like we have the same rhythm.
[00:33:31] Mia Tate: Yes.
[00:33:32] Musetta Vander: You know, the same energy. And we, we like feed off of each other and, and it's, it's fun.
[00:33:37] Mia Tate: It's fun. I have to tell you, my son Axle, he was on the couch when you arrived at my house. Yeah. Beautiful.
[00:33:43] Musetta Vander: Very handsome.
[00:33:43] Mia Tate: And um, very handsome. And he told me last night that. He kind of thought when you came to the door, you know, that, um, it would be like, oh, it's so good to see you again, and Oh, hi. And he goes, and then it was like, ah,
[00:33:58] Musetta Vander: yes, no, we very expressive.
[00:34:00] Musetta Vander: You know, I think that's, I was just like, I know, right? You gotta connect heart to heart. I think it's when we start clouding the heart that we stop losing our rhythm.
[00:34:11] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Ooh,
[00:34:13] Musetta Vander: I
[00:34:13] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: heard that when we start clouding the heart, it's when we lose our rhythm.
[00:34:17] Musetta Vander: Yeah. If your heart is closed off Right, and our hearts do get closed off, you can no longer really hear the rhythm of anything around you.
[00:34:27] Musetta Vander: Whether that's people talking or whether it's music or,
[00:34:30] Mia Tate: or
[00:34:31] Musetta Vander: you don't wanna connect anymore.
[00:34:32] Mia Tate: The seasons moonlight, sunlight.
[00:34:34] Musetta Vander: Yeah. Yeah. And that's why dancing and music helps you open your heart again.
[00:34:39] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Yeah. Yeah, this is a heart open.
[00:34:42] Musetta Vander: It is a heart opener
[00:34:43] Mia Tate: podcast.
[00:34:44] Musetta Vander: Definitely. So one thing that was, that is still to this day very popular is the music from O' Brother Where Art Thou? it's just incredible music and, uh, a lot of people always ask about the experience, so I thought maybe we should talk about your experience in O Brother Where Art Thou? I talk let's. True. It's our experience. Let's talk about that and share your audition experience because you went in in a different time than I went in, so I'm sure people will be interested in hearing that.
[00:35:12] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Well, I will say that, um, the audition process, I've always laughed at that. I mean, not often are you called to a hotel room to audition
[00:35:21] Musetta Vander: It's true
[00:35:22] Mia Tate: for something legit, right? So which hotel was it? It was on Santa Monica.
[00:35:27] Musetta Vander: It was on the ocean, on the ocean, on Ocean Boulevard in Santa Monica.
[00:35:31] Mia Tate: Ocean Boulevard. I mean Santa Monica,
[00:35:33] Musetta Vander: I can't remember the hotel's name, but I can see it very clearly.
[00:35:35] Musetta Vander: And it was very weird. But because it was a Cohen Brothers, I thought, okay, I'll go because otherwise a hotel room. Really?
[00:35:42] Mia Tate: Yeah. Like that's like number one. What they tell you not to to do. Exactly.
[00:35:45] Musetta Vander: I was like, nah.
[00:35:47] Mia Tate: Look, Cohen Brothers, Coen brothers.
[00:35:48] Musetta Vander: I'd be a fly on the wall in that movie. But anyway, so anyway, so tell us how it went.
[00:35:52] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Oh, well, for me, let's see. How did it go? So we, we all were sitting, we were in one hotel room, you know, you'd wait for your call from one, is this the same with you? So you'd wait for your call, all the girls, and then you, you know, four of us got called in at a time and uh, they were in the other hotel room and you just kind of went in front of 'em.
[00:36:10] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I can't remember if they were sitting, sitting. They were sitting and I just remember them saying, Beckon the men, that was what they told me, the men. Simple. Just beck in the men. And um, I was like, all right. And so I just started moving and then all the girls in my group thought how I'm gonna becken the, the men.
[00:36:30] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: How I'm gonna becken the men is by having a towel fight because they gave us towels to like pretend we were washing. And so. The girls started being like and like hitting each other with the towel and I was like, that's definitely not beckoning the men. So I just tried to like turn my, be my body away from the shenanigans of the towel, fight over here and just continue with what I got.
[00:36:55] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: You know? It was like this ethereal,
[00:36:57] Musetta Vander: you know how to becken the man, mythological. She barely knows how to back in the man.
[00:37:02] Mia Tate: Well, I don't,
[00:37:03] Musetta Vander: you got the job honey.
[00:37:06] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I did get the job. So tell me about you.
[00:37:09] Musetta Vander: You know, I, it was interesting 'cause I remember, I think we also walked in like four, four people at a time and I knew Bill and Jackie, the choreographers Bill and Jackie Landrum, uh, from before.
[00:37:18] Musetta Vander: So I was comfortable with them. The Cohen brothers are there, and I think they played music, right? They played the music. I'm not sure they played the music. I remember the towel.
[00:37:26] Mia Tate: There was more. There was producers in there too, weren't there?
[00:37:28] Musetta Vander: I think there were four people. There's a full room. Yeah. You know when, I mean, when you're in that zone, I don't see anybody.
[00:37:33] Musetta Vander: I'm like, so when they played the music and you had to wash, do whatever you had do with your towel, I just, it said Beck in the men and
[00:37:43] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: back in the men
[00:37:43] Musetta Vander: there was be Landrum who was the choreographer. So I was like, okay, you, you. I'm coming for you. And I just walked right over to him, beckoning the man doing my dance.
[00:37:54] Musetta Vander: And I remember sitting right on his lap and his wife was like, oh my gosh. And everybody started laughing anyway.
[00:38:01] Mia Tate: Nailed it.
[00:38:02] Musetta Vander: Well, you said, Beckon the man. How far do you want me to go? So it was, it was really funny. It was really humorous. I don't think I would've done that if I didn't know Bill and Jackie.
[00:38:13] Mia Tate: That's fantastic. Again, with the physical, when you're just in your body. Any audition I ever had where I just put it in my body, those are the ones I bought.
[00:38:21] Musetta Vander: It's also the music, you know, you, I'm listening to the music, so the music is just like, it just takes you away and I'm just like, I'm just one with that music and I'm just gonna do what the music's telling me to do.
[00:38:31] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Did you have tons of people always asking you if we were the singers of it? Yes. I was like, oh, it felt I felt so bad. Me too. Letting them down. Wish know even though. Yeah, I know, right? Amazing.
[00:38:42] Musetta Vander: Really amazing. They're like, oh, why didn't you sing? I'm like, well, I don't think it's gonna sound the same, but I don't wanna destroy the image out.
[00:38:51] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: But Emmylou Harris, Allison Kraus, and uh, Jillian Welsh. That's right. Oh, they're so good. So good. They're just,
[00:38:59] Musetta Vander: it was amazing. I think. I think so.
[00:39:01] Mia Tate: We had to lip sync that we did,
[00:39:03] Musetta Vander: although they wanted us to really sing, so we looked like we were singing, you know, of course they didn't use our voices, but it just so that the vocal chords actually looked like there was, we were doing the thing properly.
[00:39:14] Musetta Vander: Uh, and I, I remember a, a, a specific moment in there because they had built the rocks for the river. In the, in the river, they built those big rocks that they put us on.
[00:39:24] Mia Tate: Right, right. And then they put us, I thought you were saying the rocks were in the studio space. No, no, no. Once we went to the river,
[00:39:30] Musetta Vander: once we went to the river, you know, after we rehearsed and they had all these artificial rocks in the river, and then they put the antique dresses on us, and I remember they gave me this antique dress.
[00:39:41] Musetta Vander: And when we stepped into the river to, to start the performance or to start walking through and washing. Dress got wet, and because it was such a thin, soft silk, the whole dress, my dress started tearing and looking down to, I had to get my whole outfit replaced because the Cohen brothers were coming down the river looking at us, and they were like, wow, this is a different movie.
[00:40:01] Musetta Vander: Because my dress is literally from the weight of the water just tearing. Yeah. No.
[00:40:07] Mia Tate: Oh, but how they, how the costume department did the sirens, I thought was perfect. Perfection, and the hair that sexy through, but like that subtle, sexy, because we had the lingerie, the, the old fashioned lingerie, and then the dress over, and then when the water would make it a little see-through, it was just perfect.
[00:40:25] Mia Tate: Like the costumes on that.
[00:40:26] Musetta Vander: It was really funny because somebody watched the movie and they said, your elbows were dirty. And I was like, what?
[00:40:33] Mia Tate: Wow. That's a specific note.
[00:40:34] Musetta Vander: I was like, my elbows were dirty and I was like. What a strange thing to say.
[00:40:37] Mia Tate: I've never, why are you looking at my elbows?
[00:40:39] Musetta Vander: Okay, so then, then I was like, what?
[00:40:40] Musetta Vander: I was like, then it dawned on me, we were on the artificial rocks. So because we were wet and out, I never, I, to me it didn't look like dirty elbows. My elbows always looked like that, I guess. But then I thought, well, maybe it's because of the paint from the rock, because we were lying back on the rock.
[00:40:56] Musetta Vander: Maybe that's what she picked up is the album. You know, the things people pick out of movies, you know, to go, well this was like,
[00:41:02] Mia Tate: and do you remember when we went to where we shot? I mean stunning back. Yeah, but back Country. I mean, we entered, we entered an unknown world. Just going by. It looked like sets practically.
[00:41:15] Mia Tate: These, just these little shacks along the,
[00:41:17] Musetta Vander: I have some photos us there that I don't think you've ever seen, but I took, yeah, I'll dig 'em up somewhere. Put them out there. But yeah, it was an incredible experience all around. It was, it was just absolutely joy
[00:41:28] Mia Tate: to be part of the storytelling of the Cohen Brothers is, is amazing.
[00:41:32] Mia Tate: It's an event. It is an event. And then what else were we, what
[00:41:36] Musetta Vander: was we went to traveling around. Sometimes. Oh,
[00:41:40] Mia Tate: oh. Well, we were, we were looking for things to do on our,
[00:41:43] Musetta Vander: we were looking to do, 'cause we had, we had downtime.
[00:41:45] Mia Tate: We had downtime, and we weren't walking distance. We'd go walking to try to find things.
[00:41:50] Mia Tate: We're like, we'll, go get a,
[00:41:51] Musetta Vander: was a Waffle House. I'd never been to a Waffle House before. It's like, wow. Waffles. I, I like waffles.
[00:41:56] Mia Tate: She's from South Africa. That's a Waffle House. Been to a Waffle House.
[00:41:59] Musetta Vander: I was very excited about the Waffle House. I was very,
[00:42:02] Mia Tate: I was very excited when we, whose car?
[00:42:05] Musetta Vander: I don't know. It was an house.
[00:42:06] Musetta Vander: It was, was it George? Was it.
[00:42:08] Mia Tate: Maybe George is. So this is this I love, we were, I don't know why not far from us, there was a radio contest. Remember the days when they would do radio contests and it was the last person to stay in the car. And I have a lot of follow up questions on that, but I'm not gonna get into
[00:42:26] Musetta Vander: Right.
[00:42:26] Mia Tate: But back in the day when radio stations would do these giveaways. This particular one was the last person to stay in the car, so we decided
[00:42:33] Musetta Vander: why they got the car, they said, and so you had to go to the bathroom, eat in the car, whatever you had to do. I don't, but how do you, those people were never allowed to get out of the car.
[00:42:42] Musetta Vander: So I think it started with a lot of people in the car and as the days went by people, and this was night, nighttime, and so they left. Okay. And so there were only like, uh, two or three left there when we were there.
[00:42:53] Mia Tate: And so we decided to go mess with them.
[00:42:55] Musetta Vander: Well, it wasn't, we. Yeah,
[00:42:59] Mia Tate: but we, we, we did, we were part of it.
[00:43:02] Mia Tate: So, yes. So George, who is a big fan of show Tunes. Yes, yes. Remember, I do remember Hello Dolly was playing and we cranked Hello Dolly, and we all laid down of the car and we just started circling around people.
[00:43:14] Musetta Vander: That's hilarious.
[00:43:16] Mia Tate: And they probably, you know, they saw George, we were probably like,
[00:43:19] Musetta Vander: they can't get outta the, but they couldn't get out.
[00:43:23] Musetta Vander: It was very, very funny. It was. It was very funny. It was very funny. It was honestly the things that go on behind the scenes. Oh, on movies. Movies are actually
[00:43:32] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: just on location. Amazing. So fun because
[00:43:35] Musetta Vander: you, you, you get to meet people and really get to know them. You spend some quality time with people and you, in this case, that moment.
[00:43:42] Musetta Vander: Us driving around those poor people trapped in their car with all their trash.
[00:43:46] Mia Tate: Oh, hello Dolly. I can never hear Hello Dolly. Without being taken to Jackson, Mississippi.
[00:43:51] Musetta Vander: That's very funny. I don't know who won the contest. I know there was a girl in there and a guy I remember.
[00:43:54] Mia Tate: I dunno who won it.
[00:43:56] Musetta Vander: I We should look that up.
[00:43:58] Musetta Vander: See who won the car. I wouldn't want that car after all.
[00:44:00] Mia Tate: I feel like we should be plugging them right now. Well,
[00:44:02] Musetta Vander: I hope you're enjoying your car. Wherever you are.
[00:44:04] Musetta Vander: You, you burned it.
[00:44:07] Mia Tate: Many years later. Oh, okay.
[00:44:10] Musetta Vander: So that brings us back to now, how did you come up with this concept of why we dance? What, what triggered it?
[00:44:19] Mia Tate: Well, so after I did, um, my own dancing in Havana, when I went on that journey of healing and remembering, um, I just, I, there were so many, there was such a strong response to that. Especially women, but a lot of people were just like, really wanted to know about that. Had had a lot of energy. How did you know how to go do that?
[00:44:42] Mia Tate: How can I do that? And um, so we're like, well, maybe this is something. And I always knew by the response I was getting that this was about something bigger, but I hadn't quite put my finger on it yet. So I, so, uh, we got some funding and we took, um, I took a crew back to Havana. My same crew who you'll see, um, the footage when I read my letter, it's our footage from when we went back there and it's, uh, Robert to Chile, an amazing cinematographer.
[00:45:15] Mia Tate: And then my other cinematographer, Kurt Wallen, they are so talented. And um, so we went back to get a proof of concept. 'cause that's what everyone wanted. Let's see what this, I was, let's just see what this is, but what is this response we're getting? Right? So we had that and I don't know, I just. Something wasn't fully sitting with me and I couldn't turn it.
[00:45:37] Mia Tate: I didn't know what to turn it into. And I'm kind of in this time in my life where I'm not muscling. So I was like, let's just see where this goes. And um, I just kind of waited. And then one night I was walking into the grocery store to get cat food. Sounds like a very lonely set up. Yes, and the doors opened.
[00:46:01] Mia Tate: The electric doors opened, and I just went, why We dance? And I knew that it wasn't just about me, it wasn't just about Cuba, it wasn't just about salsa, it was about all of us. It was about why we dance and. And then it just came flooding in and I was like, and I want it to be a podcast. I want it to be a visual podcast.
[00:46:25] Mia Tate: I wanna get through as many stories as I can and I wanna do it in this way. That is kind of the outlaw of media, right? Yeah. Podcasts. You know, it's make your own rules right now, which is so exciting. So that's pretty much where it came from. It it then I knew exactly what to do with this because. It was bigger.
[00:46:47] Mia Tate: It was bigger than my story, but it was my story that kind of helped me remember my own connection to movement. And then I went seeking stories. And by the time I was talking to the production company, I was like, well, I've got 41 episodes.
[00:47:03] Musetta Vander: You know, it's amazing, right?
[00:47:04] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Because there's so much information.
[00:47:05] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: And then the best part is people. Um, I tell everyone, you know, when you do a project, you usually keep it kind of close. Yes. Not this, I've been telling anyone who asks me. Every time they'll be like, you know what? That makes me think of, uh, I met a rabbi who told me about this influencer who is a granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, and she uses as a dancer, she uses her platform, you know, to speak out.
[00:47:29] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: And, and then we've booked her. You know, it's, it's amazing. It's amazing. Everyone has a story. They have their own story or they tell me about someone else. And I really hope with this, I hope that this becomes kind of, um. A community where we find these amazing stories, these amazing peoples, people who use movement.
[00:47:48] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: But then I also wanna find 'em in the audience because it's all of us. This is why we dance. You know? It's, it's, it's a human expression.
[00:47:57] Musetta Vander: So beautifully said. So beautifully said. Yes. Because you, that inspirational moment, you were almost connected to like a divine message.
[00:48:05] Mia Tate: It was like it poured in. Yeah.
[00:48:07] Musetta Vander: You know, you get, that's, it's so infectious.
[00:48:09] Musetta Vander: Everybody you talk to is affected by it, and they can share a story. They can relate to it, right? They or they have a moment in life where, oh, I remember when I did this or that, or that person did that. So those moments are very, very profound and I think, and I hope with all this going, but I, I truly believe that just from the little bit we've been talking about and the people you've told me about, I really feel this will really have a good impact on people and be healing, be healing journey, and awaken us back as a society, as a global society.
[00:48:41] Musetta Vander: Back to our true rhythm and source and connecting to that base rhythm of the earth. Planet. Planet. Yes. Our own primal heartbeat. We have all our primal rhythms, you know, so we are not sheltered, controlled society. We're not so different. We're not different. That's the problem. Everyone thinks we're so different.
[00:48:58] Musetta Vander: We're all the same. We just different Sound different.
[00:49:00] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Right, right. Come from the same place. It's all the same thing. I know, I know.
[00:49:04] Musetta Vander: And that has a rhythm, right? It's like the opera singer who, who's, who hits a certain frequency of certain sound. Then she shatters the glass, right? If you've seen the opera singers, you hit those really high notes and then shatter the grass because in that high note, they've hit the frequency of the glass.
[00:49:19] Musetta Vander: That's what the glass vibrates on that particular note. So every human being has a note, a frequency, right? When you tap into that frequency of, of what the, what people have, and we start accessing rhythm and raising our frequencies, it elevates. The human being. I mean, it can also be detrimental if you hit the wrong frequency.
[00:49:43] Musetta Vander: You know what I mean? Like that, that book by Massaro Emoto, he did all these experiments with water, hidden messages of water where he showed you, when he played, he would stick the words like, I love you, or I hate you on a glass of water, and then photograph the molecular structure. So when you dance. Okay.
[00:50:01] Musetta Vander: You are affecting the rhythm and the molecules of your body, the blood, everything, and, and your body. And that vibration of the music that you're listening to is changing your molecular structure literally, and your energetic structure and raises your frequency and makes you feel good. That's why you feel good and you listen to music.
[00:50:18] Musetta Vander: It makes you happy. 'cause it's literally changing the molecules in your body.
[00:50:23] Musetta Vander: Yes. Oh.
[00:50:28] Mia Tate: Oh, I love that Musetta. That's perfect. I think that's perfect. Yeah. I mean, sounds good to me. God, I loved how the water, the, you would just see the different shape. Yeah. Is it amazing shape? It took with the words amazing that he, the intention he put into the water.
[00:50:44] Musetta Vander: Well, that's what words can make you sick, right?
[00:50:46] Musetta Vander: They say you can, you can, you can, uh, raise a spirit with your words. You can elevate a spirit with your words, you know? Or you can maim. Spirit, break a heart with what you're saying. 'cause your words have power.
[00:50:58] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Right. And collectively, you know, people think, you know, when we, when we do it, when we work on ourselves or when we do this stuff, that it's just, it's not just personal.
[00:51:08] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: You're raising the collective vibration. You know, it's like I go in, when I teach yoga, we start somewhere and I can feel us as a group. Somewhere else. And then we take that out into the world and then they take, and it's just, it's totally true. Speaking of water,
[00:51:23] Musetta Vander: you know, it's, you can only start with yourself.
[00:51:25] Musetta Vander: You can change another human being when you're so inspired as you are to make this podcast on why we dance. It's something that motivated you and Infectiously made you get all these things together so that you can make this podcast correct and that in internist. Infecting everybody else and the stories and exciting things, and it's, you have to start with what fuels you that moment, that inspirational moment, that's like, aha.
[00:51:51] Musetta Vander: It's the aha moment. And then that is so infectious, that energy, people can't resist it, you know? And I think that it's like that Michael Jackson's song that says, be the change you wanna see in the world. Start with you. You can't change anybody else if you try to change anybody else.
[00:52:11] Musetta Vander: That's silliness hand. You know, change is hard, but it's good.
[00:52:18] Mia Tate: Change is hard, but you know, it's the only con movement's. The only constant change is the only constant. So here we are to learn,
[00:52:25] Musetta Vander: to grow, to listen.
[00:52:27] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Before we get to the letter, I do wanna do a shout out to, uh, Terry Reed. That's whose beautiful building we're filming in.
[00:52:35] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Davies. Read rugs here in Ketchum, Idaho. If you want to experience an beautiful and exotic treasure hunt of artifacts around the world, come here. Yes, please for stories. Um, Terry also has supported this tribe in Afghanistan, where he's now educating women and making these rugs. It's, I mean, I could do a whole podcast on this, so thank you for this lovely space that we get to this lovely space filled with stories that we get to tell our stories in.
[00:53:12] Musetta Vander: Alright. Alright, Mia, so it's a moment of truth. I'd like to hear this letter of why you dance. Yes.
[00:53:19] Musetta Vander: Okay.
[00:53:19] Musetta Vander: Really looking forward to.
[00:53:20] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Yay. Alright, here we go. Why I dance by Mia Tate. For me, dance is breath. It has always been when I knew I didn't wanna hold my breath in life any longer, couldn't hold my breath any longer.
[00:53:37] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I let go and inhaled, and then I remembered I needed to dance. This has always been the case for me. When I was little, living through some hard family stuff, I would hold my breath, trying to make myself very small. Then I found dance there. I wasn't small and I couldn't hold my breath. There I was movement and expression whirling across the floor.
[00:54:03] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I could. Span and take up space and breathe fully. It felt like coming home to who I really was. Deep down, every time I would climb those dark, narrow stairs up to my ballet academy or hang out in the window seat of my jazz studio. So at 50, when I woke up from my slumber, I knew I needed to dance. I turned to Cuba.
[00:54:27] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: I was recovering from surgery and had gotten pneumonia. I was emotionally raw from blowing up my life. All the shoulds and heartbreak becoming unbearable. I couldn't breathe literally and figuratively. In the beginning, my breath was ragged. My life force was weak, but it grew stronger. Every day I arrived at that tiny magical studio in Havana with Yali and Zel and the whole crew.
[00:54:54] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Six hours a day, I danced and I could feel myself coming back to life. At first, it wasn't fiery or sexy, as one might imagine. It was resilient and quietly strong, filled with deeper truths in this country. I love. Which is also hurting and healing. I danced. Now I see it so clearly. Here we are on this planet that is hurtling through the skies, spinning, tilted on its axis.
[00:55:26] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: How do we think we have a choice in movement? Our heartbeats, our blood flows, our breath, and hells and exhales. We are movement in my life. When I stopped dancing, holding my breath, I was fighting against the natural rhythm of this world, clamping my eyes shut, my ears shut, singing the ABCs, but the breath was always there waiting for me to remember.
[00:55:54] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: Here I return to my first love dance, this show. These stories using my life force, my breath to celebrate those forces out there. Keep it turned on. This is why I dance and I couldn't be more excited.
[00:56:12] Musetta Vander: Hmm. Now it's just beautiful. You dance so you can breathe.
[00:56:17] Mia Tate: It's breath for me,
[00:56:18] Musetta Vander: dance. That's just the breath of life.
[00:56:21] Mia Tate: Thank you. Thank you my friend, for doing this journey with me. I'm so grateful.
[00:56:26] Mia Tate and Musetta Vander: So welcome. Thank you for sharing it. So beautiful, so healing. Yay. Yay. I love us. I love you. I love you too. May everybody be healed.
[00:56:39] Mia Tate: Namaste
[00:56:40] Musetta Vander: Namaste