dedicated to the discussion of the chinese internal martial arts of xingyiquan, baguazhang, taijiquan, related arts, and anything else best discussed over a bottle of rum
daniel pfister wrote:Ok, more athletic than Grannie's Tai Chi sure, but what is your evidence that it was more so the anything anyone does today?
There are a few references of witnesses published during early republican era, the most famous of course that of Chen Weming explaining that Yang Luchan could pick up a coin on the floor with his teeth while performing "snake creeps down", and a few other less known.
Sure, I read that story too. Of course YLC was long dead by the time Weiming studied with his grandson, so I'm not sure what it proves. Anyone can tell a story.
Moreover, if you are lucky enough to stumble upon some of those less popular lines below Yang Luchan you will see that they still practice in an extremely "athletic" way. Those people are not on YouTube, of course, but you can get glimpses of what they do by watching for instance public stuff like the video below just to get an idea [youtube]http://youtu.be/79lfEBj2Ohs[/youtube]
I admit to being impressed with that form. But how do we know it's not just a self-fulfilling prophesy derived from the story of YLC? In other words, teachers who manage to achieve a high degree of flexibility can then better claim they have same mythical fighting prowess as the old masters. And if they did, why be so secretive? Humility?
Here's another clip of a flexible Qigong lady [youtube]http://youtu.be/iW0_U1O3ynQ[/youtube]. Looks great, I can't do it, but I don't think she's a fighter.
daniel pfister wrote:Ok, more athletic than Grannie's Tai Chi sure, but what is your evidence that it was more so the anything anyone does today?
There are a few references of witnesses published during early republican era, the most famous of course that of Chen Weming explaining that Yang Luchan could pick up a coin on the floor with his teeth while performing "snake creeps down", and a few other less known. Moreover, if you are lucky enough to stumble upon some of those less popular lines below Yang Luchan you will see that they still practice in an extremely "athletic" way. Those people are not on YouTube, of course, but you can get glimpses of what they do by watching for instance public stuff like the video below just to get an idea
[youtube]http://youtu.be/79lfEBj2Ohs[/youtube]
Best
YM
I can pick up a coin from the floor with my teeth from a Snake Creeps Down posture.... I'm not sure that makes me Yang Lu Chan....
daniel pfister wrote:I admit to being impressed with that form. But how do we know it's not just a self-fulfilling prophesy derived from the story of YLC? In other words, teachers who manage to achieve a high degree of flexibility can then better claim they have same mythical fighting prowess as the old masters. And if they did, why be so secretive? Humility?
Daniel, your point is totally understandable and I am sure we can all agree with you If however you had happened to be taken down in the blink of an eye from somebody moving in a similar way I am sure you would have different believes, and if that had happened to you more then once from more then one person I am afraid you would have no problem to agree with me
Irrespective of what level of skill one might infer from the preformance, Du Ye Ze's frame is from Chen Fake's father, Chen Yan Xi, and gives us a peak at the frame before Chen Fake or perhaps an initial iteration and we really can't call this a "Taiwan" version as Du was from the Henan Province and learned his taiji there.
In our baji circle, after learning xiao baji and holding postures, we used to joke about, "Where's the posture training for taijiquan?" One way of looking at it, also in a semi-joking manner [excluding zhan zhuang] is that the slow movement, deliberate postures of the version of the "Yang style" we see publicly was the stance training but it was "stance training in motion".
Hence what we were seeing in Yang Cheng Fu and others was a small part of the total training package a chapter in the "Encyclopedia" we call taijiquan.
Also as baji practitioners whom Liu had many of his disciples learn Yang's taijiquan [my teacher telling us about his learning experiences with Liu], we often wondered where the da qiang or big pole training was [we are talking about the 1980s and virtually no public info] in Yang's taijiquan. It wasn't until I bought TT Liang's Wind Sweeps Away the Plum Blossoms book and video that I saw a Yang's taiji practitioner blowing through a big pole form with the ferocity of what I learned in baji that I saw the connection and later saw its relationship to the the Chen's system.
Below is a small clip of the Tai Zu Quan [entire form has much more than shown here that Liu Yun Qiao learned in his youth, like 7 or 8 years old, to improve his health--I can't vouch for the correct flavor or postures but its movements were slow, relaxed intentionally coordinated breathing with postures, one legged stances etc; etc.. To me, I see foundational connnections to what we term Yang's taijiquan and also to other systems. And without getting into a pissing match with Chen family practitioners, its possible relationship to the long fist form practiced by some Chen players:
Published on Jul 7, 2012 大約拍攝於1989年,是我僅見的一次公開表演這套(太祖長拳)...非常珍貴!!!
Described as:
Long Fist (Changquan)
Grandmaster Liu's family have resided for generations in the Cang County, the so called "Martial Art Village". Liu's family had a Long Fist system that was passed down through generations. This system only has one routine, but contains over 300 movements. The movements of this routine are large, expansive and slow. Comparing the characteristics and the names of the movements in this Long Fist routine to the available records from the Chen Village in Wen County of Henan, it appears to be similar to the lost Long Fist routine of the Chen Village taijiquan. According to the legends, this routine was first composed by the founding emperor of the Song Dynasty. It became popular in the Ming Dynasty, and was included in the military training by General Qi JiGuang, who included such training in the "Quan Jing Jie Yiao" chapter of his book "Ji Xiao Xing Shu".
Perhaps the system we call taiji, if I understand Yuen Ming correctly, is more of a vast set of lego blocks from which one can construct their own "taiji" system to uniquely fit the needs of the individual practitioner. This means that there is really no such thing as an "original" form--just a vast tool box of original principles which might have also grown in number over the decades.
Last edited by Bob on Tue Feb 05, 2013 4:42 am, edited 2 times in total.
(teachers who manage to achieve a high degree of flexibility can then better claim they have same mythical fighting prowess as the old masters. And if they did, why be so secretive? Humility? )
All it means is that their bodies are very open and that they have worked a long hard time to achieve a skill, weather this translates into usage for those viewing is up to ones own experience level weather they can see it or not..
I dont think anyone of them claim anything except to say this is what they can do. They are not the ones asking questions about training or what its for,,,,they know, understand, and practice....If one studies under one them I am sure that they allow others to feel their skill.... in taiji, its very important to be able to make distinctions about type of skill, what it is and is not,,,,takes time just to even understand the skill in question,,,
" It’s all in the Form; but only if it is, ALL in the Form."
Yuen-Ming wrote:Daniel, your point is totally understandable and I am sure we can all agree with you If however you had happened to be taken down in the blink of an eye from somebody moving in a similar way I am sure you would have different believes, and if that had happened to you more then once from more then one person I am afraid you would have no problem to agree with me
My point here, is that you come on this forum and you say that people who practice more than one style of Taijiquan are "totally wrong". You know full well many here do practice more than one style of Taiji, XYQ, BGZ etc and don't do so flippantly or "just for fun."
When you say people we're totally wrong in what they've been practicing diligently for a good number of years, if you want people to take you or your research seriously you'd better have solid evidence or even better logic to back up your claim. I heard neither. Just more hearsay about the epically indefatigable master who will never reveal himself to the world.
Andy_S wrote:. The broader question - and the one I am interested in - is what did the classic Yangs and Chens practice that we do not do today?
After awhile it all starts to sound like people trying to make Taijiquan a lot more mysterious than it really may be.
What I am proposing is not that it was more mystical in the earlier days. I do believe that much was simple fighting practice and to the point. But there were certainly more variations, more different practicing methods, more shorter drills and more variations on frame work. My own personal conclusion from what I have read and learned form various sources over the years is that Tai chi practice seems much more complete and more varied than nowadays. Today people just wants to do everything according to very narrow style principles. Not many people are interested by the broader principles or principles that overlap style boundaries.
Andy: I said that the original Wu Jianquan form was fast, not that all tai chi was fast. But also here I believe that a form was practiced in many ways and did not have a standard speed. You can read more about training speed here if you are interested, but it's mainly from a Yang perspective: http://www.itcca.it/peterlim/tcspeed.htm
Thoughts on Tai Chi (My Tai Chi blog) - Storms make oaks take deeper root. -George Herbert - To affect the quality of the day, is the highest of all arts! -Walden Thoreau
Bob wrote:Irrespective of what level of skill one might infer from the preformance, Du Ye Ze's frame is from Chen Fake's father, Chen Yan Xi, and gives us a peak at the frame before Chen Fake or perhaps an initial iteration and we really can't call this a "Taiwan" version as Du was from the Henan Province and learned his taiji there.
Holy crap! That dude's punch was damn near parallel to his front leg. Just like in Yang style! Fuck'n-A Bob, where'd you find that clip? Any lines like that left?
Last edited by daniel pfister on Tue Feb 05, 2013 4:52 am, edited 1 time in total.
My teacher had this from the time he arrived here in the US--however, in the past, it has drawn a lot of criticism from Chen family practitioners I respect. I am sure others had these clips but we weren't responsible for posting it on the internet--lol--took me 15 years as a disciple and learning anything my teacher wanted to teach me before he gave me a copy of the tape a couple of years back. I think Du is about 79 or 80 on the clip--you can't expect too much from him at that age, right? LOL
BTW, the original clipping shows the entire form and another filming of it being played again but I don't know where this is at on YouTube.
I used to say how, based on these clips and my own training, I could see the connection between long fist, Yang and Chen taijiquan but some of the more modern family practitioners, whom I really respect, look quite a bit different from these clips--again, if I understand Yuen Ming correctly, that would make sense.
But for me, at this stage, there is just too much arguing over who has the original and correct form that I have become relatively indifferent--reminds of the old series The Highlander--in the end only one can remain. LOL Done with that. I take Liu's old adage much more comfortably today--"Northern Chinese Martial Arts systems are all sons of the same mother," Liu Yun Qiao--
"It's the mother that I want to get to know and would like to spend less time hanging out with the sons!" Bob--lol
Last edited by Bob on Tue Feb 05, 2013 5:09 am, edited 5 times in total.
daniel pfister wrote:My point here, is that you come on this forum and you say that people who practice more than one style of Taijiquan are "totally wrong". You know full well many here do practice more than one style of Taiji, XYQ, BGZ etc and don't do so flippantly or "just for fun."
When you say people we're totally wrong in what they've been practicing diligently for a good number of years, if you want people to take you or your research seriously you'd better have solid evidence or even better logic to back up your claim. I heard neither. Just more hearsay about the epically indefatigable master who will never reveal himself to the world.
Daniel, I just expressed my opinion based on my experience which brings me to believe that - yes - doing different things at the same time is totally wrong. I am sure a lot of people have different point of views and I have no problem with that.
Historically speaking all great masters of Taijiquan were either doing TJQ "only" or, when they did more then one thing, this was either long before starting TJQ (then left) or at a point in their development in which their Taiji-body was developed to a level in which ANYTHING they did WAS Taijquan anyway. LI Ruidong, who studied with Wang Lanting and was one of the earliest multi-style masters, did many styles but all 're-worked' under Taijquan principles. In short, he may have practiced a Shaolin-looking frame but in fact he was doing Taijquan. In modern times, if we look at professionals of traditional activities/sports, we will see that the best runners for instance are not into table tennis, bowling or any other sport but devote all their time to their own speciality. Those who do a little bit if everything are mostly the hobbyist like most of us.
windwalker wrote:The better question would be, what skill sets did they have back then that is not evident by many today..
Another question would be did they have the skill sets back them that people claim today. It's apparent from more recent events that exaggeration is not unknown in MA circles
in my own experience, everything that I have read about I have either seen it, or experienced it..there is no question for me in this...for me the stories are more or less true accounts....my question was directed to to those talking about skills,,,,but not mentioning what type....
" It’s all in the Form; but only if it is, ALL in the Form."
RobP2 wrote: It's apparent from more recent events that exaggeration is not unknown in MA circles
It has been apparent a long time that it's all about marketing. People can put up any kind of show for marketing reasons.
Thoughts on Tai Chi (My Tai Chi blog) - Storms make oaks take deeper root. -George Herbert - To affect the quality of the day, is the highest of all arts! -Walden Thoreau
