Mike
I have to apologize right up front. I started this long post to you this morning. I had two purposes. First was to give you some information regarding what I do. But also provide readers some small hint that I am not some newbie imposter, as accused by RyuShiKan, but a long time and dedicated student of the art. So I made this long post in Word and when I went back to add it, I saw another post by you where you indicated long replies might not be welcome. So here are my apologies right up front. My reasons for not revealing my art are complex and much relates to the complexity of what we call Shuri-te, so here my goes.
Mike Clark said you said you did it training in the bunkai from the kata Seipei.
This kata is from the Naha-te tradition is it not? And I was wondering how come you practise it if you train in Shuri-te?
The 'feeling' found in the kata from each of these traditions is very different, as are the fighting stategies encoded in the kata. Do you train in many Naha-te kata then? And if so, where do they fit in with teaching the concepts put forward by the Shuri-te tradition? Off hand I can't think of an Okinawan Shuri-te school that teaches Naha-te kata?
It would be helpful to know which branch of Shuri-te you train in also, as that way I'll be able to get a better undestanding of your approach to karate.
Glad you caught that one. I was waiting for someone to ask. My students and I are doing a demo for a visiting master. We each do bunkai from different kata. Therefore students of mine will do bunkai from the Pinans, Kusanku Dai, Bassai Dai, and Naihanchi. My shodan studied some Naha te kata earlier, so we will include Seipei. Actually, I myself am going to do some bunkai from Kururunfa, if my shoulder survives some seminars I want to attend prior. I have twenty students, myself included, that will participate. Each of us does a Han, something practiced in Iha's Shidokan, a branch of Kobayashi that I have studied. Four students surround the defender, and launch a variety of attacks. Each student does a unique combination, all including some kind of takedown. The fourth defensive combination ends with a control technique of a lock or choke. Since we are all doing unique techniques, that comes to 80 combinations, all with takedowns.
One of my students will be doing Pinan Godan movements against a bo. Did you know there are really cool bo disarming techniques in Pinan Godan.
Regarding my reluctance to be pinned down on a style, it would be helpful if I ramble a bit regarding the evolution of Shuri-te. I could organize this better but after typing for a bit longer than I should have in an effort to quiet down RyuShiKan, I am a bit tired. I rolled onto my shoulder at 4:30 am and have been up since.
For those like you in Goju ryu, it is important to understand that when compared with those of Naha-te, these Shorin Ryu "styles" have enormous variability. A hundred years ago, there well may have been a number of masters that may have been known as Naha-te teachers. But today we think pretty much of Higaonna and Miyagi, and therefore, it was unified much more recently. Even in name it is the same. All Miyagi's students that teach his system call it Goju-ryu. But it is not the name that is important. The really significant thing is that from system to system, the kata are all so similar, at least when compared to Shuri-te. (There are of course, masters that studied with Miyagi that teach other systems, such as Mabuni and Tatsuo Shimabuku.)
This is not the case with Shuri-te. 100 years ago there were many masters whose influence pervades the art, and as such, there is great variability between the various systems. In some ways I consider myself a student of "Shorin-Ryu" systems, as I have familiarity with many of the kata of most of the more prevalent systems. The reason I don't like the term Shorin Ryu, is that it tends to exclude mainline branches in Japan. Toyama, Mabuni and Funakoshi all trained under Itosu. But the arts of these masters are considered Japanese. And both Toyama and Mabuni learned Naha-te kata from Higaonno, and this also tends to make people further exclude them when they think of "Shorin Ryu" branches. But Toyama's kata, at least as practiced in Shudokan and Koeikan, and Mabuni's kata all have great similarity to the kata practiced by Chibana's students. Only Funakoshi decided to make the stances longer in his kata.
Typically, when we refer to Shorin Ryu, we refer to the systems that have come down from Kyan, Itosu and Hohan Soken. If we look at Itosu's major systems, we have Chibana's Kobayashi, and Nakamura's Okinawan Kempo on Okinawa, and we have systems coming from Funakoshi, Mabuni and Toyama in Japan. If you look at a total count of students, the vast number of students studying in systems that evolve from Itosu, they are in systems we call Japanese karate, not Shorin Ryu. It is my opinion that the term Shuri-te better captures the breadth of Itosu systems, including those in Japan.
It is when we look at the kata of the systems that have evolved from Kyan, Itosu, and Soken that we really see some major differences, but we still call them all Shorin Ryu. (Of course two students of Kyan, Tatsuo Shimabuku and Joen Nakazato chose not to keep the term Shorin Ryu for their systems. But Zenryo Shimabukuro, Eizo Shimabuku and Shoshin Nagamine all kept the Shorin Ryu name, as did Chibana and Hohan Soken.)
The first difference in kata regards the practice of the Pinans. In the Shorin Ryu systems that descend from Kyan, both Nakazato's and Tatsuo Shimabuku's don't teach the Pinans (as Kyan did not teach them.) But the others do. (In my opinion, that would be like some Goju Ryu schools not teaching Sanchin.) Obviously they are done in Zenryo Shimabukuro's Seibukan. He learned them from Nakama And Eizo Shimabuku included them is his Shobayashi as he learned them from Chibana.
And Nagamine has them in Matsubayashi but you have to use a process of deduction to see where they came from. In "The Essence of Okinawan Karate" he states he learned kata from Kyan, Motobu and Arakaki. We know that Motobu and Kyan were almost certainly not the source. As Nagamine states that Arakaki studied with Gusukumu, Hanashiro and Chibana, (all students of Itosu.) we can assume one or more of them might have been the source.
Regarding the Pinans, those practiced by Soken's Matsumura Seito have some major differences, compared to those handed down through mainline Itosu systems. Bishop reveals the various discrepancies regarding the source of Soken's kata where he states that in an interview Soken told him he learned Pinan Shodan an Nidan from his uncle, Nabe Matsumura, who is reported to have learned all his kata from his grandfather the great Bushi Matsumura. So the origin of Soken's Pinan is a question that may never be resolved.
While there are some differences in the approach of the various Shorin Ryu systems to the Pinan, fortunately they all have the common thread of Naihanchi. But when you get beyond those two families, the differences are really great. Although there are commonalities between the kata of Itosu and Kyan, there are far more differences. The two versions of Chinto kata probably have the greatest differences, and it is arguable that Bassai could be next in degree of difference. And both Kusanku and Gojushiho have perhaps as many differences as similarities. On top of that Itosu systems differ from Kyan's in that they have Jion, Kusanku Sho, Matsumura Bassai and Bassai Sho (as it is called in Shotokan and Shito Ryu).
This is not meant to be a complete catalogue of differences, just a splash to show the great variation.
It is my opinion that the enormous variation of the way kata is practiced across Shorin Ryu or Shuri-te styles makes it hard to categorize them as a common system. I train in a number of these systems, and the focus I have in trying to understanding the range of kata and application in these many systems makes me reluctant to pigeonhole my study and teaching into what I consider an increasingly obselete notion of "style". My "style" is unique, because it comes from own experiences and training in grappling arts, as well as Okinawan systems. I integrate it all into a package I practice and teach to my students.
I have been fortunate to have be exposed over the years to good bunkai for a lot of the kata, and have shared it freely in dojos of a number of different "styles" or systems. In fact, I find bunkai to be the great bridge between the various systems. Usually you have to make some small modification anyway to a movement in the kata to make any particular application work, so if different systems have to make slightly different alterations, what's the difference.
Although my focus is almost completely on "Shuri-te" systems, I have trained with several Goju schools and know all the kata. And I have some great bunkai for some of them. In Kururunfa, are you aware of a wrist lock after you break away from the full nelson? Are you aware of a leg lock after the movement initiated after you bend forward to the ground with both feet together?
Let me know if you would like me to share some ideas on application with you. And please let me know if this post was too long and unwelcome. I find the information fascinating, and I imagine there just might be a Shorin Ryu person out there that might benefit from it.
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