How can someone take a bit of this and a bit of that and create a new system, then say it contains, for example, (www.yaukungmun.com.au) “external influences of Bak Mei”.
MA just doesn’t work that way. you are either studying the style or you aren’t. the moment you change it or take bits, it’s no longer that art anymore!
Bak Mei for one doesn’t have “internal” or “external” influences. It just “is”.
Then you’ve got the fact that to actually “get it” (the style) you have to study it for yeeaaaarrrrrs! Bak mei (again) takes AT LEAST four years just to get the Jik Bo (first form) right, if you are incredibly dedicated! I mean the only legitimate way of taking anythng from any style is to have completely utterly become grandmaster of it, so you “own” it. Otherwise you aren’t going to understand it for freddy.
It’s like going “Oh, this form of Jiu Jitsu contains Aikido”. No it doesn’t. Aikido is Aikido, it can’t have bits taken from it, added to something else and then still be called Aikido. That’s just nuts!
That’s like writing a book on religion and adding the first page of the Bible, then saying “This book contains inlfuences from the bible”.
From what I understand Yau Kung Mun is a legit art. It is basically Pak Mei with some qigong thrown in. You should address this to Fiercest Tiger as he is the sifu of that website/school. He should be able tog ive you a lot more info.
My point is, I do not understand everyone’s obsession these days with “blending” arts.
Even the highest Grandmasters in China are weary about making changes to their style for fear of collapsing the system. i mean each raw kungfu style has been carefully crafted and expressed over years and years by true Masters of the arts, then we westerners come along and just knock the whole thing to bits.
Not one kungfu style can be understood unless you have mastered it, and I think it is a downright insult to our forbears, the true masters in China who spent generations building and refining these arts, to have some big-headed westerner come along and pull it all apart, and then try and claim they have “blended” multiple styles to try and make people think “Oooh, wow, this guy is a genius”.
You cannot blend an art with another to make a new art form, then say it contains these other expressions. You can, however, master an art or two and blend them in your fighting (as in switch from one to another). But to actually splice them is nonsense.
Well, I don’t know of many systems like that (pieced together from bits), but I know that a style can, in fact, incorporate certain elements of another into its own repertoire.
Bak Sil Lum grandmaster Ku Yu Cheung exchanged both students and techniques with a prominent Choy Lay Fut master (Tan Shan? I forget if that’s his name…). Sun Lu Tang created Sun Tai Chi from the three main internal styles (Yang Tai Chi, Xingyi, and Bagua), though I suppose that falls under the “grandmaster” exception…
A martial brother of mine once related these (paraphrased) words to a prospective student who asked a similar question and it made a lot of sense to me:
“Mixing elements of styles is difficult. It’s like mixing a drink; mix the wrong elements in the wrong amounts in the wrong way and you get something that really tastes bad. There are so many more ways to get it wrong than to get it right.”
I suppose I agree with you, though: Only drink something new if it comes from an experienced bartender .
I am talking mre about these arts that say thing like
“I have blended Shaolin, Karate and Aikido togather to create ShaoKaratikdo)”
In close collaboration the masters, yes, can exchange such things. Obviously it is one expert working on things with another expert, and is done so under very, very carfeul experimentation.
But even then, if these things are incorporated, they are no longer the same expression and so cannot be called Choy Li Fut or Pak Mei.
Ueshibo, for example, was a very, very skilled martial arts master. he in fact learned many styles, and took what he leaned from each, creating Aikido. yet not once in his entirity did he ever say “I have blended this this and this to create Aikido.” In fact, he never once himself said “I have changed Samurai Aikijutsu and made it into this”. So again this idea of Aikido being evolved from Aikijutsu or whichever art is was, is a big misconception and a load of rbbish. Aikido is his own expression, Aikido is Aikido and can only be Aikido.
Ueshiba undertood that his mind learned and found an equilibrium, and that once bits were taken from these other arts they were no longer their original expression.
Even these chinese masters who shared knowledge with one another never once said “Oh this contais this art and this art”. No, they say “This art is a new expression in itself”.
a lot of old systems are combined systems these days. when master trained together, they would exchange forms and sometimes blend some of the moves into their system. the modern eagle claw system is a mixute of the 108 locking techniques and another system. took the guy years to do, but he did it. its been done for centuaries and will continue to be done.
Well, I certainly hear you, Weightvest. The problem is that people seldom distingush the matter like you would. If I understand you correctly you are basically saying there is a difference between giving credit where credit is due and outright free ride on the fame of one or more great system(s). Respect and retail are not the same thing. I also agreed with you that labeling one system being ‘ex’ this and another ‘in’ that and by blending them you got yourself the ultimate system is like you said “nonsense”.
Have you checked out the history of YKM? It is not just an art that was thrown together by some dude who learned a couple of different arts 30 years ago. It is an old and established art with a basis in Pak Mei. Many arts are like this - a synthesis of various other arts. This is how many MAs have evolved. Even arts such as Hung Gar have borrowed from other arts.
I guess where I am coming from is that kungfu is art in every sense. It is about the srtist expressing something and then manifesting it into the world.
I understand that many styles can and often do find inspiration from other arts, perhaps the master seeing Choy Lay Fut and going “Ah, that expression might help my art flow better” or something. But to say then that he has added Choy Lay Fut is the wrong way to look at it.
For example, if I were to create an art that was quite circular and flowing, then observed the directness of Pak Mei or Hsing-I, and then said “Ah, that would make my system better” it is not right way of thinking that I have added either Pak Mei or Hsing-I.
The art is only the art as a whole, and to some this may seem like splitting hairs, but it is not at all because otherwise we end up with this idea in our minds that the single elemnts are still the complete picture.
Take Ueshiba again. He was greatly influenced by the circularity of Ba gua and studied Ba Gua for a long period of time. And much of Aikido contains similar expressions to Ba Gua, did he ever at any point say “Aikido contains ba Gua”? No, because he undestood the expresssion has now different.
Thus you cannot ever be correct in saying “This art contains pak Mei”. It doesn’t. Unless every element of Pak mei is in there then it is not Pak mei.
The other thing is, if you do say things like that, you mislead people into thinking they then know what these other arts entail.
Think of it like this: the Mona Lisa contains all different pigments and colours. If a painter saw the Mona Lisa and went “What a great use of green and red blend! I shall do that in my painting.” he would be an idiot to go around saying “My painting contains The Mona Lisa”. It’s the same thing.
AFAIK, Ueshiba NEVER studied bagua or any other internal art.
His art is based on Daito Ryu, no aikido practicioner at the hombu ever acknowledged influences from any other art. Said that Daito Ryu and Ba Gua seem to share a few things.
When does ones MA study result in having developed a new styl?
When does a style cease to be a style?
More than what styles and systems were studied I think you need to look at the underlying principles that govern the “new” style/art.
Sun Lu Tang mixed TJQ, Ba Gua and Hsing Yi to form a new form of TJQ.
Why is it a new form of TJQ and NOT Hsing Yi or Bagua?
Well, what you are saying about the TJQ is eactly the point I am making.
Has Sun Lu Tang himself stated that TJQ is a blend of Hsing-I and Ba Gua? From what you are saying, he has simply said he has found inspiration from them (like the painter being inspired by colouring used in the mona lisa) to improve on his own art. But does his TjQ contain Ba Gua or Hsing-I? No.
BUT how many plcaes do you see say things like:
Master Lee’s School of Wing Chun - proclaiming he has added T’ai Chi and Jiu Jitsu to it.
Sorry, but that’s not Wing Chun anymore, it’s something completely different. many Wing Chun schools do things like this, and I am sure Yip Man is rolling in his grave!
Wing Chun is Wing Chun
Pak Mei is Pak mei
Hsing-I is Hsing-I
Even the highest Grandmaster of T’ai Chi in Chin a(or one of) is herald lineage of Ba Gua and Hsing-I, a Grandmaster of all three styles. yet has he ever blended them into one big art? No. because he knows you can’t.
Originally posted by weightvest Hello,
Without getting into a debate about Ueshiba, he did actually study many styles, one of which was Ba Gua. In fact he himself found it a bit insulting whenever anyone suggested Aikido evolved from anything.
I don’t know I spoke to a direct student of him and was told different.
Aikido according to him is a blend of Kendo, Iaido & Daito Ryu JuJitsu.
Nor have I ever heard differently from Aikido practicioners.
Also I never found a record of Ueshiba being a MA student while in China
Again, I don’t believe these arts have been blended to form TJQ. He may have found inspiration in the techniques, but once you take an art and change it, it’s no longer that art.
Hmmm, I will ask my Sun TJQ Teacher what he thinks about it.
To really, truly understand the art, you have to have mastered it. Even then creating a “new” art by picking the others to pieces is a very delicate and near impossible matter.
I thought that SLT was a recognised master of all 3 arts and that his teachers told him that they had nothing further to teach him.
One of the highest, if not THE highest T’ai Chi master in China is direct lineage Ba Gua, Hsin-I and T’ai Chi. He is a Grandmaster of each, yet has he “blended” these three arts together? no, because he understands that once you pick any of them apart they lose their structure. Sure he may chop and change throughout during a fight, but certainly has no intention of “blending” anything.
It hard trying to express what I am trying to say…
Okay, what SLT has done is exactly what I am saying is good.
Let me explain:
The worst thing I think anyone can do in kungfu is have one teacher, and one art. It is virtually impossible to see life from exactly the same perspective as another person.
SLT has a desire to understand what kungfu is. He follows a main way, TJQ, yet to get a better understanding and perspective of it, he uses Ba Gua and Hsing-I as different platforms from which to look at TJQ.
Kungfu is a house, if we are inside how do we get a good overall picture of it? well, we go outside. we have alook at it from diferent angles, every room, get different opinions on what makes good lighting, good layout. Then we make up our own minds.
It’s the same for an acedemic studying Christianity. he won’t just go buy the Bible and be done with it, he will go and readd all kinds of books on similar religions: buddhism, moslem, even self-help books. This way he can get to see all the different view of the same thing and learn just what Chrsitianity truly is, to get a better overall picture of it.
This is good, and the only real way to learn kungfu.
Originally posted by weightvest
[B]Ask SLT himself, he will tell you that each of the arts has filled in a gap where the other has missed. It is always good to learn a few arts as certainly no one art has all the answers.
{/B]
I would love to ask him, but since he died in 1934, I would need more psychic powers than I got.
IMO.
You can study multiple arts, but to keep them 100% seperate is a skill that not many have.
or
You can study mutliple arts and make them all your own in which case they will blend and merge into a new (YOUR) art, in this case you will most likely find principles of one art dominating.
Example:
I studied Sun TJQ, but am studying Chen TJQ now. If I am currently playing Sun TJQ it will look closer to Chen TJQ as this is where my focus currently is.
i get what your saying with WC is WC and such. and if you combine two you cant say well it has pak mei moves in it.
why dont you jsut say we have moves influenced byu pak mei. I see a lot of the same moves in different styles. its just influence. take out the flaw and add something better.
But that’s the thing. As I said it is good to learn various styles that compliment, ba gua, hsing-i and t’ai chi are often practised together because they are complimentary.
your sun and chen aren’t so much a blending of styles in the way i am talking about, becaue they are both t’ai chi. you’re learning within t’ai chi, well, within the same area of kungfu (the internal system i suppose you could call it).
what i am saying is if you take two COMPLETELY different kungfu/MA elements, and try to belnd them, it will collapse, or really be a collage of basics.
so i mean it’s fine to practise pak mei within other teacher’s versions of pak mei. but remove pak mei from itslef and it dies.
If i took sun t’ai chi, added karate, and then claimed i taught an improved version of Sun T’ai Chi, I bet you yourself would have a few things to say about that.
so there is a big difference between playing kungfu to learn it’s entirity, and just slapping together a bunch of different martial arts 9whic was more the point i was trying to make).
.