When I am in China in the next couple of weeks I will have a chance to study 吴家太极拳 Wu Style Taijiquan. (I included the characters because there are two different styles that are both Romanised "Wu".) Is anyone here familiar with it and can anyone point me to any good resources that I can use during my four-to-six-month hiatus between trips to China so I can keep up on it. I study Wing Chun now and I've studied Chen and Yang Taiji before when I lived up north. I actually know someone from the 吴 family in China so I'll have a chance to learn. I heard that this particular Wu style includes joint locks and throws, which is why I'm excited to be learning it. Any Wu-style practitioners out there?
I don't know Chinese characters, but I have done some Wu style that comes from Wu Chien Chuan. The other Wu style I usually refer to as Wu-hao style due to the spread of lineage that passed through the Hao family, though there are other lines that didn't. I guess it's useful to differentiate the styles if you're not up on your Chinese. If you can say a bit more in English about which style it is and which line maybe someone can advise. What kind of resources did you have in mind ?
We are talking about the same style, the Wu style, not Wu-Hao. Sorry about the Chinese. I'd appreciate anything - links, video, books. My friend in China will hook me up with materials in Chinese, but I'd like some in English as well because my Chinese is good, but not fluent.
I've gotten some good Wu style stuff from this guy. Should find most of what you need. He was a student of Ma Yueh Liang. http://www.chiflow.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=SFNT&Store_Code=chiflow "the gold book", a handy basic resource. third one down http://www.chiflow.com/cgi-bin/miva...reen=CTGY&Store_Code=chiflow&Category_Code=19 videos http://www.chiflow.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=chiflow&Category_Code=7
thanks for the pointer! This looks like what I was trying to find, and I'll see what I find in China next week. Thanks again!
What you called the 'gold book' is what we call the 'orange book'. I thought it was out of print! To the OP, if you can get a copy of that then it's a great resource. I wouldn't recommend anyone trying to learn a form from a book, but if you are learning from a teacher then that book is a great 'memory jogger' when you get a bit stuck. And it has a wealth of good information about Taiji. The push hands book also has some good information I understand, although it isn't regarded as being much use for helping anyone learn push hands! I'm basing that on what others have said, as I haven't opened my copy for about twenty years now.
Here are a couple of links which you might find some useful and/or interesting information in: http://www.wu-taichi.de/cms/wu-taichi.com/ http://brennantranslation.wordpress.com/2012/05/08/wu-jianquans-taiji/
Thanks for the information! I know you can't learn push hands (or chi sao for us Wing Chun types) from a book, nor can you learn the forms from a book, but I appreciate the cautions. I am looking for memory aides and references, so I will look into these while I'm in China. My colleagues there will help me out. Thanks for the pointers and the information, and I will certainly report back when I return from China.
Translated from Chinese,the best written work in English about new Wu I'm familiar with is Wang,Pei-sheng's " Wu Style ". I feel it's one of the better TC works ever published in English. It only has a short form in it but the details given for that and the applications,including throws, are quite nice. Wang was known for his ability against real opponents. There are also some good writings by others senior to him in Wu in the book. A good book for Yang practitioners,also. Be aware that if you are around some people/family from the late Master Ma there may be some political problems about Wang and the other practitioners of what is now sometimes referred to as Northern Wu so I wouldn't bring it/him up unless I was sure about who I was talking with. As a memory aid for the form I suppose Ma's book would be the one to look for.
