This month’s podcast guest is Richard Johnson a long-time student of Joseph Chen of Chen Style Practical Method.
As well as a Tai Chi practitioner and teacher, Richard is a full time movement coach working with athletes, so he brings an appreciation of athletic movement to his views on Tai Chi.
In our discussion Richard delves deeply into the internal workings of the Chen Style Practical Method and we talk a lot some interesting movement principles based around rotation. We also talk about how the Practical Method is different to the Chen Village style of Tai Chi.
Enjoy the podcast. You can get in touch with Richard using his email address trukinetix at gmail.com
The Tai Chi Notebook 
Thanks for the additional details Richard. Great conversation!
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Also, I referenced a book on Chinese archery, but I was vague about the details, The Way of Archery, A 1637 Chinese Military Training Manual by Jie Tian and Justin Ma. The core of this book is a translation of an archery manual by Gao Ying, but this was expanded, commented upon, and demonstrated by the authors.
In Ming and Qing China, if one studied for the military examinations, one learned archery. It was part of the martial culture of the day. I think it is not required today, but crossovers and parallels can be illuminating.
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Graham, thank you for the invitation and the interview.
I caught one piece of errata. I misspoke at 29:53 and said “Chen Zhonghua asked Chen Fake….“ It was Hong Junsheng who studied with Chen Fake and asked him about the form.
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It should always be noted up front that the “Practical Chen Style” has movement principles that are markedly different from the official Chen-style Taijiquan. They even acknowledge that they move differently (they try to convey the idea that it is a better way of movement). The same problem arises when you lump all the varying martial styles calling themselves “Taijiquan” together … it is impossible that they are all truly Taijiquan when they move so differently and most of them don’t even move the body with dantian (a primary requirement to be Taijiquan).
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