Wu 吴 vs. Wu / Hao 武 / 郝

[Bao]

[quote="velalavela"

Hi Bao,

I'm not so sure about this point Yang Lu Chan slowed down Ta Chi so he could teach nobles in the court.
Wasn't he hired s martial instructor to the Imperial gaurd? So most of his students were military and quite able to handle a little hard work? Fu Zhong Wen's book and Ma Yueh Liang's book both state changes were made when Tai Chi went public from 1914. Some time after yang Lu Chan's time.

As `for martial artist being looked down on...sure you are right, until Sun Lu Tang's Xing Yi Quan book was published in 1915 (primarily to promote martial arts for health) the educated in China did not have much time for martial artists or martial arts.

Regards[/quote]

Hello velalavela,

It is about an old national attitude with an extreme focus on hierarchy. It doesn't matter how high or you are, a merchantman, a noble or an imperial guard. The code that all men were to follow was that of the "junzi", or "gentlemen". The demands on how you act and behave were extremely strict. The code of the junzi taught you to control and not show any kind of feeling, not anger, not sadness. And you could not act as anything lower than yourself or your own rank. That is why the chinese soldiers of any kind of rank, except the very lowest ones, for many generations were quite weak. Their training focused on technique and tactics, not strength. And that is why, when Sun Lutang introduced his arts, he could not focus on martial aspects. He must represent it as health exercises. Any kind of CMA teacher at that time, with any kind of public status, would say that martial arts should not be practiced for fighting. A gentleman should not fight. And if you were practicing martial arts, you must officially do it for another reason than fighting. Of course, high guards studied martial arts for fighting, but their social code was still that one of the junzi. And when they studied martial arts, they must still act as junzi.

[Bao]

]I think large external movements with no understanding of the forces/pressure and connection within the body just leads to large external movements.

yes, exactly. And this is how about 98 % of all taijiquan practitioners in the whole world practice taijiquan.

[Ron Panunto]

I heard that there is no difference between the small and big frames in principles but that someone starting from scratch should start with the big movements but someone already with some body skills can start with smaller movements. As I heard it the smaller stuff was usually done by guys in their 40's and up who didn't want to rip snort all over the place any more because they were getting older.
Bob

In general one should start with larger circles, and later on they become smaller as the jins are internalized. This does not mean to start with Chen dajia and then switch to Chen xiaojia. The forms and postures are quite different and usually the Chen's stick with one or the other. It is also not true that older people do xiaojia since xiaojia is significantly more martial and athletic then dajia, which can be considered simplified Chenjia.

[Ron Panunto]

I find your comment here to be quite arrogant, insulting and presumptuous, especially considering that you obviously have no idea what is or is not legitimate.
Doc

No intent to be any of those things Doc, it's just that IMHO most of the so-called Yang small frame stuff that I see posted here looks pretty damned hokey, and there seems to be more people who do the "original YLC" form than you can shake a stick at, yet they're all different and mostly look like the slow form just speeded up.

[Ron Panunto]

As far as I know, nobody knows what YLC taught, except that it had to be damned close to Chenjia. Also, I believe that it was YCF who took all the martial type movements out and slowed it down to today's slow speed.

[Doc Stier]

I find your comment here to be quite arrogant, insulting and presumptuous, especially considering that you obviously have no idea what is or is not legitimate.
Doc

No intent to be any of those things Doc, it's just that IMHO most of the so-called Yang small frame stuff that I see posted here looks pretty damned hokey, and there seems to be more people who do the "original YLC" form than you can shake a stick at, yet they're all different and mostly look like the slow form just speeded up.

Hi Ron:

Not a problem. Please accept my apology for misunderstanding your comment.

I totally agree with your general assessment of these various video clips, and also with your comment that the earliest versions of Yang Style TCC would most likely retain a greater flavor of Chen Style TCC in their stylistic interpretation of the movement patterns.

It is exactly for this reason that I consider the Old Yang Style TCC that I learned and teach, which does retain these characteristics, to be more authentic than most sets which claim to be the same style, yet show no sign of Chen Style influence whatsoever.

Doc

[D_Glenn]

Why does anyone think that going fast is physically harder than going really slow? In my experience when slow and low is the tempo it is physically harder than going fast where momentum takes you in and out of moves. And Ron, you really think Yang invented slow moving practice in the CMA's? Not to mention that today's "slow speed" is actually done way too fast.

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[velalavela]

Hi,

as a Wu Stylist from the Shanghai line: regards the Wu Style fast form. Check out Ma Yueh Liang performing the set and you'll see it is not all 'fast'. It is a mixture of slow/fast soft/hard/fa jin. (Also there aint nothing hokey about it either)

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 3140638886

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJ8nMcqKN9s

Regards the Wu slow set. Ma Yueh liang said the slower the better. I've practiced with Shi Mei Lin doing slow set and we hit the 45 minute mark in the class. The control she shows in the Kicks, stepping, turning, all performed slowly is quite something to see.

Also note that fast form is not just the slow form speeded. My teacher is quite clear about that as well.

Regards all.