Posted by Lee W. on January 06, 1999 at 13:24:02:
In Reply to: Re: Where to start... posted by bruce ching on January 05, 1999 at 23:33:05:
Bruce,
I can understand how Kumar would reference Wu for helping his low back. The alginment with the rear leg in front stance does remove a lot of stress from the low back. It is especially noticeable if you have a few extra pounds from what I have seen and been told by friends who have a few extra pounds (I don't have any so I have to take their word for it). The tilting of the pelvis through the step also does a good job of working the lower back muscles in a gentle way to strenghten them so I can see where praise of this methods health benefits is deserved.
As for the videos of FZW and FSY, I did notice a difference in movement. It may be tied to the fact that FZW actually had to use his art when younger. From this, a certain martial feeling develops. For example, the shifting back into Ban Ma Bu in roll back is much more martial than sitting back a few more inches into more of a high empty stance. So, there was from what I have seen a difference in spirit and flavor from father to son.
One other reason that I omitted was that FSY was like a lot of children of famous masters when younger. He was not known to practice as seriously as he could have. In is later years, his study and practice of the art has been much more concentrated but habits learned when young are terribly difficult to break.
There are a lot of wushu masters that have had children who did not excel in their parents art. In fact, I seem to recall a story of the sons in the Yang family having a similar thing happen and being goaded by loss of face and challenges by a senior student due to their less accomplished abilities. (am I remembering wrong here?)
You are much more forgiving than I am in the area of photos for instructional books and such. I know that many teachers may have off days and end up with bad photos. However, I have always felt that there is no reason for any still photo to NOT represent your best form if you have control over which photo is used.
This is not the case if someone else takes the photos and decides which ones to use. If you do the selection, you have the ability to choose photos that show your form best in each posture. If none of the photos you took are up to standard, you can reshoot them until you get them right. This is not the case with video or film since the continuous nature of the medium means that you have to accept the good and the bad.
Many years ago, this was not the case since photos were very expensive. Given the production quality and expense of FSY's book (it looks DAMN GOOD in printing quality), the extra cost of a few more photos would have been nothing.
One accessible person in the US for viewing would probably be He Weiqi in New York. She was a Taijiquan student of FZW and I believe one of her relatives was quite close to FZW in his later years. I have only seen some of her students perform and never seen her technique (except for her external sword and barehand). If you have the opportunity to view her form for the spinal alignment this would be another example of FZW's lineage.
: Hi, Lee,
: Happy New Year to you, too. Thanks for your clarifications. I have a few comments/questions about some of them.
: : [re. comments on Su style alignment of the back, pelvis, and rear leg]
: Interesting. The Wu style that I’ve seen also has a forward tuck and folds into the front kua in the forward stance. BTW, Kumar Frantzis credits Wu style w/ healing his lower back injury, after Yang style healed his upper back but did not heal the lower back. It would indeed be helpful if someone who practices Wu style would comment here.
: : The question about the spirit in the photograph is the next and possibly easiest one to tackle.
: [re. comparison of photos of Fu Zhongwen and Fu Shengyuan forms]
: :The overall impression is much less martial and not as spirited. This is one photo. The entire book is similar. The form is correct but lacks the same fire that FZW displayed even in his later years.
: : In both FZW and FSY's pictures, the posture is "correct" but there is a certain "Something" in FZW's that is more martial and "spirited"
: Your observations may well be correct, but I’m a bit wary of comparing photos for “spirit” unless each of the models asserts that he gave the postures his best (or at least representative) efforts; it may be, e.g., that someone just didn’t want to show much on a particular day. (Surely we’ve all seen teachers who weren’t inspired to show much whenever cameras were around.) Movement is more revealing, even if the model isn’t inspired to do his best. What is your impression of videotape of FZW and FSY? I think FSY seems spirited enough when he throws his son around. I do agree that there are differences in something about their forms; e.g., more of a sort of rolling at beginning of FZW’s, if I remember correctly.
:
: : As to why the difference between FZW and his son, I think it has more to do with the times than anything else. Fu Shengyuan was born in 1931. By the time he was 20 (1951), he had lived through Japan's occupation of China, the attempt of Chiang Kaishek to set up the Nationalist government, the war between Chiang Kaishek and Mao Tsetung, the setting up of the New China communist government... Quite a lot to grow up through. This might very seriously impede the ability of a father to train a son to the level he wishes. Following 1950 you have the Great Leap forward, a lot of hard times and then in 1966 (FSY would have been 35) you have the beginning of the Cultural Revolution. Familys got moved around, people have lives and jobs. I would say that the difference is probably somewhere in this tumult. Another part is very probably not unlike a lot of us with our fathers. FZW may have indeed pointed out these things and FSY may have (as I have with my own father) thought that he was doing what he was being taught...but not really.
: The events that you cited apply generally across the generations in the PRC, and I think that they had a lot to do with the decline of the state of the art. But the alignment of the back is such a fundamental part of a style that I’m skeptical of assertions that appear to mean something like “a master didn’t notice what he was doing with his back even though it’s plain enough to the rest of us that we all can easily see where he went wrong.” I realize that’s probably more strongly stated than what you’ve said about the comparisons; I’m just trying to convey in an obvious way the need to be careful when we draw certain types of conclusions from pictures. It may be that the dynamics of the use of the back are substantially similar in FZW’s and FSY’s forms even though the forward lean is more pronounced in FSY’s; I don’t know.
: - bruce ching