Sanchin

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maxwell ainley
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Post by maxwell ainley »

I would say Kanei is the closest to Kanbun on Sanchin ,note I am not saying the same or exact ,and for what its worth he might have been the closest thing on earth to Kanbun ,and what I mean is instructional along with being his son ,for all we know he could have taught him all sorts of things behind closed familiy doors .

Another thing to ponder" Kanei spent his first ten years of study with beginners ,in this way he learnt the exact way his father taught ".

who do yo think gave Kanei that advice ,I will answer by saying Kanbun some one older and much wiser ,now is Kanei of track with his statements or Sanchin .
"
Master Kanbun uechi taught very slowly ,Master Kanei uechi teaches far more rapidly " This means from a Sanchin perspective Kanbun would be presenting a very slow formula ,now this in its own right will have a different effect upon the body mind and spirit ,of a student .
max ainley
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Bill Glasheen
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

I'm enjoying all the inputs here. I agree with much of what was said.

My personal talent as a scientist and engineer (part nature and part nurture) is to see all this "stuff" out there and try to tie it together.

When I spoke of Kanei being able to communicate "vanilla" Kanbun style, I meant something quite specific. To some extent, Rick was touching on this.

In my opinion Kanei's special talent was taking what Kanbun taught and breaking it down into its individual pieces. That is an ability that I've now learned to do not just with Sanchin, but with other kata in the system as well. This works well with some of my predictive modeling work on the job. At some point in a research design problem you can get lost in the forest. If from the start you're able to define your operating principles, then you can proceed with the most complex designs without danger of getting lost.

Kanei (and now myself as well) saw the fundamental building blocks in Sanchin. To some extent the reductionist style that Rick speaks of is more a matter of breaking the material down into bite-size pieces that teacher could perfect with student. However... what isn't apparent to the 1 or 2-year student is that you're supposed to put all the pieces back together again in myriad ways. And you're supposed to get rid of the jagged edges. No "karate by numbers" as I once heard George say. The more you blend and flow - and find multiple ways to blend and flow even with the same movement - the more the material is yours and becomes a natural response to an external threat.
M J Brelsford wrote:
While I agree with your point on Kanei’s sanchin, I do not agree with you on how Nakamatsu sensei is distorting sanchin. I have seen some crazy stuff over the years and that entire thing is WAY out, for me anyway. Either there was a serious misunderstanding in communication, because I know he did not learn it that way. Far, Far too much “Japanese” hips in what is an Okinawan style.
Once upon a time I felt the same way, Mark. I thought his stuff was "out there." I couldn't fathom what he was doing. I looked at film, I worked with his student Frank Gorman. I worked with Chris (a student's student). I saw some of the Germans trying to imitate what he was doing, and rather badly. Nothing... It didn't make sense to me.

The "aha" hit for me via a combination of things. First, I worked a long time with Dana on this. She is both a very special karateka (multiple style experience) and a great communicator. She had a way to tear his method down into steps. I could at least do it, if not feel what the hell it was all about. And then I saw George Schreiffer (trained with Ric Martin, Shinyu Gushi, etc.) do some "mochi" stuff with his hips while performing Sanseiryu's shoken sukuiage uke. Yes, it was that "hippy" thing that raises your blood pressure. But George had a way of doing it in this most advanced kata that visually made sense to me. He told me he worked a bit with Narahiro Shinjo, and he too had incorporated some of this.

All along, I spent years looking at things like still shots of the winners of the All Star home run derby (power and precision in one), or great baseball pitchers doing their thing in frame-by-frame sequence.

One day the "aha" just hit me. And now that I get it, I don't understand why I had such a hard time understanding it before. The thing is, I suddenly was able to tap into athleticism I acquired as a child doing other sports like baseball. My body KNEW this stuff. But I had to walk before I crawled before I ran in Uechi Ryu before I could put it together there.

What Nakamatsu is doing is making core muscle movement VERY BIG when doing special training classes in Sanchin. It's so big that any idiot can see what he's doing. But at some point, you have to tone it down more, and more, and more, until you can barely see it. And at some point, you feel it as a body wave that radiates out from your core in an almost imperceptible fashion.

However... You need to learn Kanei Ryu first. You have to start with his Sanchin. Until you master that, you have no foundation upon which to layer on the body wave mechanics.

You and I probably will not see eye to eye on this, which is fine. We all have our unique perspectives. But what it's done for me is tie in all these things that people are talking about. It's taking the pieces and building flow as Rick discussed. It's using core muscles in ways that natural athletes do. It's "being breathed" like Scott Sonnen talks about (and Van aspires to). Let's just say that I've found a structure that I can pull apart and put back together again in lots of different ways. That to me is powerful.

Sorry for the long rant.

- Bill
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Post by M J Brelsford »

Sorry Bill,

But your not selling your “core stuff” on me. No one, group, person does that hip stuff on Okinawa to the extent that I have seen the US dojo’s do. I am not buying it. It was never taught at or with any of the teacher I trained with.

To mention a few…

Uechi (Kanei, Kansei, Kanmei)
Tomoyose
Nakahodo
Takara
Inada
Gushi
Shirado
Senaga
Uehara
Kinjo
Kuna
Takamiyagi
Shinjo
Irei
Yonomine
Asato
Miyagi
Thompson
Summers
Washington
Mattson (Walter)


It is one guy/groups interpretation and that’s it. It is certainly what is not being done in 99.9% of Uechi dojo’s here or Okinawa. And remember Bill, this is not in training at some weekend or summer camp this its spending more then just a few weeks on Okinawa. If you would Bill, what dojo on Okinawa did you pick it up from or learn it from?

I see it as folks that are limited in there understanding of what sanchin/Uechi is, that they need to invent some new twist to keep themselves amused. None of the folks I mention have any faith in the exaggerated hip movement that is done in some dojo’s. Uechi does have hips but not the hula. Like I have told others and I will say here in black and white, Nakamatsu did not learn it that way, yet I have heard it is Uechi evolving (BULL)… I see it that it is a heavy influence of Japanese movements influenced from Japanese kumite drill.

Personally, I really don’t care what other are doing or calling it, but don’t call it Uechi ryu, because it is not.

With that said, I prefer to talk more on the topic at hand then go off on a different discussion.

Mark
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Dana Sheets
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Post by Dana Sheets »

The three senior Okinawans who I have heard state that they prefer teaching stepping and body coordination first are Masters Tomoyose, Takara, and Minoru Miyagi. It is my understanding, from how he has described his early training, that Mr. Nakamatsu was also trained this way with an early, heavy emphasis on sanchin stepping and jar work.
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Bill Glasheen
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

You ask; I answer.
M J Brelsford wrote:
Sorry Bill,

But your not selling your “core stuff” on me.
I predicted I wouldn't.
Bill Glasheen wrote:
You and I probably will not see eye to eye on this, which is fine.
M J Brelsford wrote:
No one, group, person does that hip stuff on Okinawa to the extent that I have seen the US dojo’s do.
I can't speak for what you have seen in the US.
M J Brelsford wrote:
Personally, I really don’t care what other are doing or calling it, but don’t call it Uechi ryu, because it is not.
I'll settle with Frank Gorman's quote from Uechi Kanei. Frank will tell you that Uechi Kanei felt Nakamatsu Sensei was doing some very important work with his experimentation in body mechanics. I would call that a direct endorsement from the man.

I'll also refer you to a number of Okinawan masters (including Shinyu Gushi and Kiyohide Shinjo) who feel that Americans don't have enough "mochi" in their Sanseiryu. And yes, I got that from them directly - in numerous one-on-one sessions with them.

As you know, mochi is a stretchy rice cake. In western kinesiology, it's referring to body elasticity that draws on the power of the dynamic stretch reflex at numerous spots in the body. Every athlete uses it. Every karateka eventually figures it out him/herself if he/she doesn't already understand basic mechanics from playing sports.

I agree that it looks god-awful when someone who isn't naturally athletic is trying to infuse this in their karate. But once you get it, you throw the mold away.
M J Brelsford wrote:
With that said, I prefer to talk more on the topic at hand then go off on a different discussion.
Fair enough... except that it really is part of the same discussion.

We've known each other for years, Mark, so I know both how you feel about things and how both of us can passionately discuss a topic near and dear to us. I respect that in you.

Old or new, hippy or not hippy, reductionist or holistic, "right" or "wrong", Sanchin is still Sanchin. I see Kanei do his form and I see a basic structure. I see others do the form and - if they know what they are doing - I see Kanei's basic structure beneath their individual expression. To me it is only "wrong" if there is a violation of that basic structure.

What you do with that structure is what separates the "kata queens" from the fighters. At some point when the sucker punch comes and the amygdala first instructs your body what to do (the "flinch response") what the body does from evolution should blend with what your Sanchin training instructs you do. Names don't matter at that point. Geography doesn't either. What matters is what works.

To me the essence of Sanchin is about those basic principles we drill into students that on the one hand blend with the lower brain response and on the other hand take it to the next level in the upper brain.

You and I approach martial arts very differently, Mark. And that's not a bad thing by any means. You are an encyclopedia of your Okinawan journey. I'm a scientist and analyst who peers through the labels and titles, and looks for the principles that work. When you can get the two perspectives to jive, then maybe you have something pretty interesting.

Enjoy your day, Mark. Gotta catch a plane home.

Bill
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Post by M J Brelsford »

Dana,

Thanks for the input, interesting stuff.

Bill,

Please PM me if you would like to talk about the UECHI HULA. I prefer to talk about real sanchin for now.

Thanks

Mark
nosib
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Post by nosib »

Years ago a good friend of mine (now hachidan) and I use
to joke about how we wished we could get master Uechi alone
for an hour so we could correct his sanchin.
I agree,Uechi sanchin should be performed one way....but
should be trained,reversed engineered and seasoned with
the various mechanics and principles of which Bill speaks.
To me sanchin is not so much the "event" but more the training and developement of the various parts that get
you to the "event".

Sanchin is my favorite kata....the never perfected golf swing.
It's great,BUT!! it's not all that. If it was all karateka would
be doing it.....kind of like roundhouse kicks.

life is too short to mop floors with the same exact stroke everytime. I don't want steamed rice everytime,sometimes
I want fried.

The average Uechi student 40 odd years ago performed
sanchin more intense and with concentrated eye focus IMO.
Now in various dojo I see students just doing an exercise...
something to get done with. Not their fault!
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interesting

Post by M J Brelsford »

nosib,

Very good points. I agree with you 100%, Sanchin is just that a tool used in development, everyone has his or hers own take on it. Yet as I said before it has its limits. That is what to look at and learn from. Some I/we agree with other not!

I do, very much agree how its seems that many modern schools/teachers have taken sanchin and what it can do for ones core training for granted. Excellent post.

Mark
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Glenn
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Post by Glenn »

M J Brelsford wrote: Please PM me if you would like to talk about the UECHI HULA. I prefer to talk about real sanchin for now.
A single real Sanchin is, to me, a phantom. There are so many variations in China and Okinawa that we cannot point to any one version as the "real" way to the exclusion of others. Kanbun Uechi learned one version of Sanchin being taught by one person in one area at one point in time. To my knowledge that version of Sanchin is not still being taught in China, so either it died out or went through modification there. George has said that when they visited China in the 1960s some Chinese martial artists commented that Uechi Ryu appeared frozen in time. Change would seem to be the norm in the Chinese martial arts from which Uechi Ryu originated then.

However we cannot even say with certainty that Kanbun Uechi did not modify to some extent what he learned to create what he practiced or taught. Did he really spend 10 or so years developing his martial art in China only to stop developing because his teacher certified him as a master and able to teach? And what of the legend that even with certification his training was incomplete (i.e. having to leave before learning that fourth form), what would he have learned if he had remained in China under Shushiwa's tutelage?

Then what of his time after China? While the specific dates vary depending on who is telling the story, we do know there was about 15 years between his last interaction with Shushiwa and the Chinese martial arts scene and when he started teaching in Japan. What influence might he have had from other Okinawan martial artists after he returned from China? Does anyone do martial arts exactly the same for 15 years without any change? Is anyone reading this doing your martial arts today exactly as you did 15 years ago?

So on the one hand we have a style that has been described as old school, on the other we have ample opportunity for some modification added with the propensity of human nature for change. Unfortunately all we have to go on are the stories of students who first saw Kanbun after he had about 25 years of development under his belt (more if we include the training in Okinawan martial arts that he did before going to China). All I would hazard to guess is that he took ownership of his martial arts and made it work for him, and that kind of mastery of an activity rarely comes from parroting someone else.

Check out the "hula" action on these Chinese versions of Sanchin:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SPq3ds8mmw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvE1swAv ... re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQ0-78E5 ... re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnP1VlMRTOM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQhjmUMCwHU&NR=1

Here is an interesting contrast of one version of Chinese Sanchin performed by two Chinese teachers, Uechi Sanchin performed by Shinyu Gushi, and Goju Sanchin performed by Morio Higaonna. First they each perform separately then they all perform at the same time:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tu9aZ1dPk0o
There are other obvious differences in how they are using their bodies. What is curious is that in none of the Chinese versions I have seen do they strike with only one hand at a time like the Okinawan versions do, the Chinese versions all have both hands striking at the same time. For the most part that will limit the side-to-side swivel hip action. So did Kanbun learn Sanchin with one-handed strikes or two-handed strikes? If the latter, why the change and when? And if it was changed, was the simultaniety of the strikes changed without changing the 'hip action', for whatever reason?

Lots of questions, unfortunately the answers are likely lost to the mists of time.
Glenn
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Agreed

Post by M J Brelsford »

Glenn,

Interesting points, but as I have said, I really have no interest in looking at Chinese forms, they do nothing for me. I am speaking of Okinawan Uechi methods of today and by gone times. Yes we can say Uechi has evolved since leaving China, agreed. Things have been added and lost in Uechi, agreed.

I am more trying to clear up what we do now compared to then (early Uechi). Not looking for new wave Uechi and what is coming down the pike.

I have said it before and will say again, I am a very traditional teacher. I teach and train as I have been taught, it is me. I like how I have been taught and the way I train.

Not to get off topic, but...I had always tried to encourage others, sadly many took my agreeing with them as they were doing "strong Uechi" or Uechi as performed on Okinawa. I have time and time again been bitten in the ass for this. Now I don’t care really what others do or how they train, sadly I see many that have missed the "Uechi" boat. I am trying to speak of sanchin in the Uechi method. trying to get intelligent input based on fact and not so much on opinions. Sorry...

As for Uechi/Goju apples and oranges… same house different rooms. I am speaking of “Uechi” sanchin no more or less.

Mark
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Glenn
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Post by Glenn »

Well, I suspect most of us can really only seriously comment on the changes we've seen during our respective time in the style, given the sparsity of video or detailed descriptive info for the "old days". Therefore with such a narrowly focused query I think you would have to consult those whose training goes back the furthest. But even then you are only going to get first-hand info on the past 60 years or so, and likely still not get satisfactory info for the comparison you seek.
Glenn wrote: all we have to go on are the stories of students who first saw Kanbun after he had about 25 years of development under his belt (more if we include the training in Okinawan martial arts that he did before going to China)
When dealing with a nebulous history, unfortunately not all questions can be answered...opinions and circumstantial evidence is about all that is available to us. But the joy is in seeking those answers nonetheless
Last edited by Glenn on Thu Dec 18, 2008 9:13 pm, edited 4 times in total.
Glenn
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YES

Post by M J Brelsford »

Glenn,

I could not agree with you more.

It is indeed a joy to look at the past and learn from it!

I have spoken in depth with many on Oki about this. The answer is always pretty much the same, “we do it the way Kanbun taught Kanei”. If there is a different way, I have yet to see.

Go figure…

Mark
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Glenn
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Post by Glenn »

It could be that Uechi Ryu is not evolving as much in Okinawa as it is outside of Okinawa. Uechi Ryu as developed by Kanei Uechi and others is an Okinawan cultural folk art that has now spread globally, and thus now affected by globalization processes. Okinawans obviously have more of a stake in preserving their culture, and thus are more likely to resist change, while non-Okinawans do not.
Glenn
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Post by hoshin »

Mark i am not trying to be disrespectfull or anything but i am really lost by your statements ( maybe this is because what one thinks and what one actually writes is sometimes different or taken differently)
you wanted to have a thread on sanchin "then and now" then from my perspective you disregard many posts from others as "not what you wanted to talk about" and your not interested in chinese kata. one by one you narrow the topic ....it seems you have an agenda or a very focused idea in your head ,,but we/I aint seeing it. so please, like you said in the begining you have your opinions ,,fill us in on what that is. then we can discuss that. it is very difficult to have an opinion on the "then" of sanchin when 99% of us on this web sight were never there and have never studied with an okinawan ( save a few) most of us are more interested in the future and what we can get from stuff we trian in today.

steve
~~~~~
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Post by fivedragons »

Here's a quote from the book called "Cold Mountain". Like Mark, I don't care what anyone thinks about it, or it's relevance to this thread. :lol:

"Ruby said there were many songs that you could not say anybody in particular made by himself. A song went around from fiddler to fiddler and each one added something and took something away so that in time the song became a different thing from what it had been, barely recognizable in either tune or lyric. But you could not say the song had been improved, for as was true of all human effort, there was never advancement. Everything added meant something lost, and about as often as not the thing lost was preferable to the thing gained, so that over time we'd be lucky if we just broke even. Any thought otherwise was empty pride."
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