(gusting wind) (rumbling thunder) (chanting and drumming) - [Announcer] Wild Rose!

Hello ladies and gentlemen!

How about a round of applause for that beautiful grand entry.

(audience cheering) - [Announcer] Holy smokes.

One of the most beautiful sights you will ever see.

- [Marcella] Welcome to the Wacipi, or more commonly known as a powwow.

At first glance a powwow can be seen as a fashion show dance off.

Dressing in our best and showing off new bead work and new moves.

Powwow regalia would give the fashion giants a serious run for their money.

The bead work, the quill work, the hair, the makeup.

We're talking full on style power.

And our people, beautiful.

Modeling agencies would never run short of striking beauties.

Powwows in the present are a mosaic.

Dance, song, regalia... Markets, hand games, food, and occasionally merging with rodeos and carnivals, turning it into a grand multi-layered gathering.

No matter how many aspects of the powwow there are, dancing is the heartbeat of it.

- [Announcer] Another round of applause for our women's traditional dancers.

Come on over here, ladies.

- [Marcella] My name is Marcella Gilbert.

I am Oohenumpa and Thithunwan living on the Cheyenne River Reservation in South Dakota.

My mother is Madonna Thunder Hawk.

My grandmother is Faith Feather Necklace Traversy.

My father is Jim Gilbert and my grandfather is Emery Owen.

Dance has carried me since childhood and I've watched our powwow evolve, from a handful of families to a grand gathering that draws people from around the world.

It all began with the dancers.

When you're out in the arena, the first drumbeat lands, your mind aligns with your body, and the world falls away.

Then it's you, the earth, and the drum becoming one.

Each dance had a purpose.

Men's Traditional tells tales of courage.

(chanting and drumming) Women's Traditional honors the land.

Grass dancers cleared a path for us to setup camp to laugh and visit for the upcoming months.

Everything we did, everything we do, like so many indigenous cultures around the world, moves with the rhythm of the earth and nature.

(chanting and drumming) - [Marcella] There were six original categories for the powwow.

Men's Traditional, Women's Traditional, Men's Grass, Women's Jingle, Men's Fancy, Women's Fancy.

We'll start with one of the oldest, Men's Traditional.

Men's Traditional, one of the oldest dances in the powwow circle.

Lakota warriors would breathe life into stories of bravery encouraged through dance.

Not to glorify war, or the killing of people or animals, but rather to remind us of our responsibility to protect the people, the land, and honor the memories that have shaped us.

(chanting and drumming) (chanting and drumming continue) - [Announcer] All right!

How about a round of applause for our Men's Traditional dancers?

(birds chirping) - [Marcella] Women's Traditional honors the land and all it provides.

A story from the prairie speaks of two male prairie chickens in the center, feet tapping rapidly as their wings sweep low.

Surrounding them, the female chickens circle, bobbing in place as they watch.

In this dance, we pay homage to that same land, its rhythm, its gifts, and the lessons it offers to each generation.

(chanting and drumming) (chanting and drumming continue) - [Announcer] Beautiful!

Put your hands together as our Women's... (ethereal music) - [Marcella] We learn to listen to the land.

The Lakota moved as the buffalo moved.

Shifting camps in seasons.

When a new ground was found, we pressed the grass flat making a stage for months of life and ceremony.

Grass Dance shows how deeply we breathe with the earth.

Taking ordinary work and shaping it into something beautiful.

- [Announcer] Here we go, song number one.

Ho-Chunk Station.

Grass Dance.

(chanting and drumming) (chanting and drumming continue) - [Announcer] Uh-huh, make some noise, Shakopee.

- [Marcella] Unlike the other dances, the Jingle Dress did not originate with a plains tribe.

It comes from the Ojibwe Anishinaabe people of what is now Minnesota.

The traditional story tells of a little girl who was sick.

A vision came in a dream of a dancer wearing a dress adorned with tin cones.

After that vision, the dress was made, the dance performed, and the girl recovered.

- [Announcer] You are on the air and the microphones are on.

(drumming and chanting) (drumming and chanting continue) - [Announcer] Round of applause.

- [Marcella] From the heart of Oklahoma emerged one of our newest dances, Men's Fancy Feather.

The freestyle thread that broke from traditional, yet carried its roots forward.

The dancers wore the familiar Men's Traditional silhouette at first, then crowned the back with a new bustle, a spark that transformed the form into a blaze of speed and flash.

It's among the most exhilarating dances in the powwow.

A living pulse of energy in flight.

(chanting and drumming) (chanting and drumming continue) - [Announcer] Oh, make some noise!

- [Marcella] Last, but definitely not least, Women's Fancy Shawl.

Created shortly after Men's Fancy Feather.

And let's set the record straight right now, the butterfly story did not birth Women's Fancy Shawl.

It came from real people.

My mom and a few others who stitched color, motion, and a bit of stubborn pride into something unmistakably ours.

My generation just turned up the speed dial and the sparkle.

No butterflies required.

(drumming and chanting) (drumming and chanting continue) - [Announcer] Make some noise, Shakopee!

That was song number one, Women's Fancy Shawl.

Walk around, ladies, walk around.

- [Marcella] Also very important.

- [Announcer] We have something of yours up here.

- [Marcella] We need those water heroes.

- [Announcer] Taria Daniels, come on over here.

You might need this.

Uh-huh.

All right, tell us what you think, sir.

Coming back at you shortly.

That was deadly.

Deadly!

We're ready to go, this is song number two.

(drumming and chanting) - [Marcella] Before the grand stages.

Before everyone was dripping in bead work, there was simply the drum, the singers, and the dancers.

People gathering, listening, moving, healing together in time.

As long as I can remember I've been dancing at powwows.

When we would go to a powwow, everybody gathered and was getting ready and visiting and all that until the drums are ready.

When you're out there entering that circle, you don't start actually dancing until the oldest man out there starts dancing first.

Out of respect.

Because he's the oldest, and you know, back in the day they probably went to war.

You know, he's probably a veteran or warrior of some sort.

You know, and that's just part of our culture, having respect for each other and recognizing each other's life, what they earned through their life.

Before contests, people danced because they wanted to.

They loved the music.

You know, everybody liked getting dressed and putting on your regalia and stuff.

That made you feel good just in that way.

The dancers were truly there because they loved it.

The competition, I guess you would say, I don't know if it'd be competition or the challenge was between the dancer and the drum.

You could just tell the way they'd hit their drum and then they'd start singing.

And you knew that, okay, this is it.

And they could go 10 push ups or three, you know?

But you had to know.

And you had to know the drum, you had to know the song.

It's on a different level.

Your intuition and the drumbeat and your body and your heart.

You had to feel when you thought that drum was gonna stop.

And that was the challenge.

It was so cool!

I mean, because you really did get that drumbeat in your body and in your heart.

That's what kept me dancing all my life.

But as soon as money got involved, then... You know, it changed it, of course.

People dance for money.

Rather than the music, so.

I mean, it's not all like that, you know, but there's definitely a change once money got involved.

The, I don't know what you call it, sacred relationship between the dancer and the drum is lessened now.

But I remember when it first, you know, when they started having contests.

And I was refusing to register and wear a number.

(Marcella chuckles) Because I thought, you know, I thought it was disrespectful.

To monetize it.

Because it took something away.

It took away that, for me, anyway.

I felt like it was interrupting that relationship between the dancer and the singers.

But now, that's all it is now.

These contests.

And that's not a bad thing, it's just different.

And you know, the good thing is everybody tries harder now.

It's still there.

I mean, the heartbeat is still there.

And you can tell the good, you know, when you watch people dancing, you can tell the ones who have really got in them.

Because they'll dance all the time, not just during contests, but all the time.

Because they love it.

You know, the song, the music is in their heart.

(drumming and chanting) (drumming and chanting continue) - [Marcella] Powwows happen because of singers and their drums.

Without the singers and their drums, there is no powwow.

(light music) Part of the healing that happens when we dance, and have good music is something that science is beginning to study.

And that's frequency.

The pulse in the drum, the rhythm in the rain.

A pattern on a leaf's edge.

In the drum's heartbeat we hear a map of connection.

That's an ancient chorus that science is now beginning to study.

From the moment we stepped into the world, vibration has moved through everything we touch, the water we drink, the soil that feeds us, these bodies that carry us.

Scientists study frequency as the language of interaction.

In plants, vibrations can influence growth patterns, opening channels for signaling.

Signaling that we're just beginning to map.

In water, structure shifts with every note of the environment.

In the body, rhythmic forces shape flow, balance and healing.

Healing, that's the purpose of song and dance, is our healing.

Of course, these studies don't claim miracles.

But they chart correlations, mechanisms, and limits.

Yet that thread remains, frequency.

Frequency travels, influences, and connects.

The heart's cadence, the brain's waves, the way tissue yields to a measured tremor.

When frequency enters a system, it can reorganize that system.

It can reorganize flow, signaling, and even the response.

Even clothes, textures, and the skin carry and transmit vibrations.

And those vibrations affect comfort, warmth, and our perception.

The earth itself hums.

Seismic waves, atmospheric tides, quantum vibrations in minerals.

When we listen, you can hear a shared conversation between rock and root, between sun and seed, between human and earth.

When we listen, we become part of a larger chorus.

Our steps echo the drum.

The drum echoes the planet.

And the planet echoes back in weather, soil, in the quiet heartbeat of life forming and reforming.

When you go out there and dance, dance hard.

Dance hard because there's people out there who can't dance anymore.

And there's people out there who might be sick, or feeling bad, or whatever.

So go out there and dance hard, so that you can give healing to your people.

And so that was one of the teachings I learned as I grew up in the powwow arena.

Our dance was based in healing.

And of course, we, as a dancer I received healing from dancing and dancing to the drumbeat.

Because the drumbeat is just amazing.

It just fills my body and I have to move.

I have to get out there.

I have to do something, so.

And that something is dance.

(drumming and chanting) - [Marcella] I think everybody should dance.

Just like some of our horse people are like, everybody should have a horse.

Every kid should grow up with a horse.

Every kid should grow up dancing.

(jingling) (crowd chatting) - [Child] I'm gonna start dancing.