Research reference : syllabus of Uechi Kambun's school

[AAAhmed46]

Yet, as I said, in all the hours and hours of footage he has of those practitioners there is no Sanchin, no Seisan and no Sanseirui.

Well Rick, I'm not sure what videos you watched, but I've seen at least a dozen different "Sanchin" performed by Fukien stylist. (A couple being displayed on the E.A. Learning Center)However, none of them look exactly like our Sanchin. The reason for this? Well, basically because the Chinese modify their kata to suit their own needs and interpretations of the movements. I can say the same has happened with Seisan and Sanseiryu.

The fact that the Chinese searched for the roots of Uechi and didn't find the kata in a form that we recognized doesn't mean a thing. Hell, I've seen ex students of mine who do Uechi as taught by me 40-50 years ago and I don't recognize what they are doing today! And practitioners in the West are far more protective of their "roots" and of the "original" makeup of the system than any Chinese practitioner.

So does a 4th kata exist in Uechi. Hell yes. And probably a 5th and 6th. And I bet many other conditioning drills and fighting drills.

In a second interview with Simon which I believe is also for sale in the store, he talks about how Superempi changed from the first time he learned it compared to how he saw it being performed a few years later. So is it any wonder that you don't recognize Sanchin, Seisan and Sanseiryu after a 150 years? Go figure.

Here is my PERSON view and mine alone.

Dont we have enough kata? Motobu Choki or whatever his name is, practiced what? Three? At most four kata.

Lots of chinese systems, lots of well reputed chinese systems have just a few forms, which to go over like detectives on a crime scene, taking everything useful they can from it and make drills from it.
Baji QUan originally had three forms, but according to Asia(From bullshido, Baji fighter and professional ring fighter) said taht Baji became 'wushufied' with three main forms of which the martial artist was to draw his technique from, but now has FIFTEEEN different forms, that the combative aspect of Baji has been downplayed, and has a focus on learning all the forms rather then drilling.
Look to the history of many big chinese systems. When these systems were at thier peak, often only had one big form, or three forms.

Haven't we seen enough of shotokan schools where the karateka learn so many damn kata that they cant devote as much time toward drills and sparring?

Even the kyokushin crew, known for thier hard hitting, hard fighitng. Talk to them, and you'll see how many have a very negative veiw on kata.

BUt kata is the essence of karate! So CLEARLY it's a useful tool.

Everything we do comes from kata, it is our library, kata can be interpreted in different ways.

But......cOuld there really be too much of a good thing?


How much is too much? How much does it take to spread our training too thin?

EDIT: On the existence of sanchin for other systems, lots of chinese systems have sanchin.

Should we take forms from them as well? Seems like a universal form for many different systems. Goju-ryu and uechi-ryu are very different systems. Both very good systems no doubt(i iove goju-ryu body mechanics and conditioning), but different styles with similar backgrounds.

Watch some southern styles....COUNTLESS southern styles that practice Sanchin. THey all come from the same region, but they all look very different. ALot of chinese sanchin looks very 'karateish' where it's rigid and isn't fluid, while others are more 'chinese' that are very fluid.

Look at Southern praying mantis sanchin(i think thats what the system was), looks NOTHING like our sanchin. It was an awsome form, loved it. But it didn't look like our sanchin. Though it was extremely fluid.

Southern TIger sanchin, also very different. More 'tight' but relaxed. Though i dont think it looked like either uechi-ryu or goju-ryu.

Five ancestors fist, or Wuzuquan. They have sanchin, but i highly doubt it's a uechi-ryu ancestor. They do alot of things differently, too differently. But a great system, though i dont know any training practices by them in terms of drills.

THe seisan and expecially sanserui define uechi-ryu, along with sanchin.


There is the sanchin in so many systems, each unique to each different style, each very different.

I guess if all these other styles also have seisan and sanserui i may be more convinced.

Though, i know goju-ryu has it's own version of seisan, but thats goju.

[jorvik]

Well I guess we are back at that "old Chestnut" .just what is Uechi?
Is there a principle, a guiding idea...........a philosophy

[gmattson]

People are different and therefore we need different kata. In China, teachers will modify kata to suit the student at a particular time in their training. Eventually, we will adopt a "favorite" kata to play with. Kabun's was seisan, Kanei's was sanseiryu, Tomoyose's is seisan, mine in Conching.

Speaking only for myself, I perform Conching much differently than others... my individual strengths and weaknesses are part of the way I perform the kata.

My students learn kata based on what I feel is important for the person at a specific time in their development. I expect that they will, at some point in time, make the kata part of them, which will make the kata different in some respect from what I do.

To say that Uechi kata can't be found in the area where Kanbun studied the movements should tell you something about the nature of uechi-ryu as it was originally taught in China and how it was preserved in a "time capsul" by the Okinawans and Westerners.

To draw any conclusions about a 4th kata based on this flawed logic is about as flawed as a person still driving a 1900 Model A "flivver' . . .looking for the factory that created it so he can get parts!

[mhosea]

Dont we have enough kata? Motobu Choki or whatever his name is, practiced what? Three? At most four kata.

As a historical aside, Motobu studied with both Matsumuras and Itosu and so surely knew several kata. Most common knowledge about Motobu (except his public fighting) is misinformation that stems from his rivalry with Funakoshi in Japan. They often had ill things to say of each other, and it was Funakoshi who was better integrated into Japanese society. However, you are correct insofar as Motobu apparently did not teach many kata, and in Motobu-ryu there are, to my knowledge, only Naihanchi shodan and nidan. However, they do have Motobu's 12 Jiyu Hon Kumite. This is an interesting set of yakusoku kumite. They're very short, each bang-bang-bang and it's over, and there is almost no stepping once the attacker and defender have closed to striking distance. Both attacker and defender only move forward. One of them, for example, is something every Uechi-ka would recognize as an application of our crane block and knee strike move. In fact, now that I think of it, they remind me rather a lot of practicing kata bunkai in discrete segments, without the kata.

[MikeK]

Try finding a kata that Kyan Chotoku taught the same way twice.

Dont we have enough kata? Motobu Choki or whatever his name is, practiced what? Three? At most four kata.

Well, could three or even two kata be too much? How about one? Is there a magic number?
If you're into training by kata, then no, you really can't have to many floating around, as choice is usually a good thing. If you only know one kata but it doesn't fit you then change it. If you don't like the kata of your ryu-ha, then go find ones that you do like that work for you. Kata are to be used not preserved like some animal you shot out back.

That's just my opinion.

[Rick Wilson]

Sorry George but I disagree that we could not recognize Sanchin or Seisan or Sanseirui when modified I personally have not had any problem picking them out of any film I have seen taken at anytime. And I respectfully propose that you don’t either.

There are a lot of Sanchin or Sam Chin Katas out there in China and modified or not they are need not be related to the system that Uechi Kanbun learned.

I strongly suspect he performed his Kata very differently than we do today but I also expect no one would have a problem knowing which Kata he was doing.

There was a comment that Toyama’s Sanseirui is different than normally seen but still we know what it is.

So, I guess we agree to disagree that the Sanchin, Seisan and Sanseirui learned by Uechi Kanbun would be unrecognizable to us today.

I think we would know it when we see it but the roots have not been found yet.



Jorvik: I know Bill learned this from Mr. Lailey etc. and I also know that his form looks far more Uechi than Mr. Lailey's whose form reflects his Goju training.

[Gene DeMambro]

I'm just getting a kick out of someone who thinks we're all bunch of chumps because we practice kumites and has a forum of his own telling us what Uechi is or isn't.

Gene

[AAAhmed46]

If a boxer uses take downs, he is not using a boxing technique, im sure many of us would agree on that.

The same logic can be used here with this form.
If you go off and learn fencing, then put it a part of your schools curriculem, suddenly fencing is a part of uechi-ryu?

And Gene DeMambro:




Lets PLEASE not start the kumite debate.

I hope that this may be some bait to get another kumite debate started so that people get banned.


BUt believe me, im soooo tempted, and id call you out on it. But not here, for obvious reasons. What are those reasons? Well lets look at the past, and think about it, and people who vanished with the past.

[AAAhmed46]

Try finding a kata that Kyan Chotoku taught the same way twice.

Dont we have enough kata? Motobu Choki or whatever his name is, practiced what? Three? At most four kata.

Well, could three or even two kata be too much? How about one? Is there a magic number?
If you're into training by kata, then no, you really can't have to many floating around, as choice is usually a good thing. If you only know one kata but it doesn't fit you then change it. If you don't like the kata of your ryu-ha, then go find ones that you do like that work for you. Kata are to be used not preserved like some animal you shot out back.

That's just my opinion.

Well, i see what your saying.

i find lots of fellow TMA who know so many different kata but know little applications.

Am i right to assume you mean to have many kata at hand to examine and dissected, rather then learning one kata then learning another and another without stopping and admiring it?

I dont entirely agree, but you present a very good arguement, and i think it's something i shoudl think about.

[Rick Wilson]

Gene:

Wow never met you and you know me do you?

First if you would kindly read what is written you will find I am not telling anyone what Uechi is.

I am commenting on the claim this fourth Kata is the one Uechi Kanbun didn’t learn.

Please read before you lash out.

Second I have not commented about anyone choosing to do the Kumites in many many years and I pretty sure my comments were about the Kumites themselves but hey things got heat way back when so maybe I did.

Balance deleted by Rick Wilson as it detracts from the thread.

Gene: You can PM me or come over to my forums if you want a discussion on the Kumites.

[Rick Wilson]

Deleted by Rick Wilson as it detracts from the thread.

[M J Brelsford]

All...

Lets not get wrapped around words or views that in the long run... life... mean nothing.

It is easy to shoot at each other and say whose obi is blacker then the other, it means nothing...

It take a better man to reach out to someone in friendship and respect then anger... we see this in the world each day... We are better then that. I know I have done things to upset others and although at the moment it might appear "fun" we all need to truly try to care and respect each other...

Lets get back on subject, learn and help each other.... after all.. WE ALL ARE UECHI...

Mark

[Rick Wilson]

Oh yeah Mark step in with the voice of reason.

Darn.

Okay I had my say and I think made my point clear so I leave it to you folk to take the thread wherever.

It was bringing up some good information, sorry to be part of the derailing.

So I will step aside (unless personally insulted again) and let things drop.

[Bill Glasheen]

I do find it interesting that there is so much energy spent over this.

Simon ( a Goju practitioner) came to George with a form. Simon had heard about a 4th kata named 108 (by various languages) that Kanbun never taught. He stumbled on "a" 108 form while studying martial arts in Fuzhou. He showed it to George. George taped it and asked me to learn it. I met Simon and filled in what I messed up by trying to learn it from tape.

Simon thinks that the 90-something person who headed this martial group was a relative (nephew) of Shushiwa.

George has validated that Simon was a house guest in the Fuzhou region, studying martial arts for some time.

George and I see strong parallels between this and the 3 kata of Kanbun's style. The parallels are striking. This definitely is from the same neighborhood as what Kanbun looked at.

George, Simon and I have ALL commented on the volatility of this form. As I have stated many times in many threads, Simon has seen this form change over time, and people do it in unique ways. It has that kind of "jazz" flavor like a crane form I learned on Thompson Island. The practitioner could do it slightly differently every time he did it.

Nobody has been able to go back and find people doing Kanbun's three kata "as is."

So we have something interesting here. It may be some distant descendent of the 4th form Kanbun never learned and/or taught. We really don't know for sure. OR it could be from the neighborhood, and really the only thing we have to date from Fuzhou that has strings of techniques right from both The Big Three and even a few techniques in the bridge forms.

It is what it is.

More importantly (to me), the existence of a "Uechi-like" form from Fuzhou that changes over time where there is no Big Three makes you question whether the folks who taught Kanbun (and his contemporaries) might even find it amusing that someone froze a set of forms in time when they never do such a thing. THAT is a fascinating theory to ponder.

Since then, there have been flair-ups over what "it" is.

One has to ask why there is such anger at questioning this 108 Kata?

I'm thinking the same thing, only from an entirely different perspective.

It reminded me a bit about this past week's flairup over Curt Schilling's bloody sock.



That sock bothers more people... It makes you wonder why.

What I find so fascinating is the fact that this form - to me - represents what this style SHOULD be. It should evolve. It should adapt. It should be practiced different over here than it is over there. It should respond to new ideas that come available over time. It should have material added, and maybe some material removed.

But the core should remain pretty much the same.

And one more thing...

We should celebrate human achievement around us. One person doing well in the community or finding a new spin on the same old same old potentially benefits us all.

Potentially...

- Bill

[M J Brelsford]

Rick,

I love you man...

Sorry I had a moment of reason


Believe me they are few and far between...

Where is Rodney when we need him!

Can we all just get along???

Mark