ABOUT

Tap dancers are both dancers and musicians and tap dance has always been a part of jazz music. This is common knowledge.  What’s unique about this album is our uncommon approach: allowing tap, without its visual component, to function as an independent, percussive voice in jazz—in other words, tap dance without the dance. 

It has always been a dream of mine to record an album, and together with Patrick Bebelaar and Jan Roder, I finally felt that this idea could be become a reality. The three of us share a mutual, musical understanding and a willingness to innovate using tap as an instrument, integrating it as an equal voice in a musical interplay, where free improvisation is the main component.
 
The album was recorded without spatial separation and directly in stereo, some of it even with a live audience in the recording studio. The tapping included both soft shoes with leather soles and tap shoes with metal taps, which enabled us to explore rhythmic and melodic expressions with a variety of tonal colors and moods.  Selected jazz standards and compositions by Patrick Bebelaar were interwoven with short, freer movements: tap in an avant-garde sense, while remaining deeply rooted in the tradition of jazz. 

Tap has always been my personal gateway into music, and the drums, with their wide range of sounds, have given me the ability to expand the dance and transcend the tonal limitations of tap. For me, both instruments belong together; they complement each other. Tap is much more than just an additional percussive voice. The visual component may be absent, but the dance remains present, creating a new dynamic: the movement becomes audible through all the instruments.