T'AI CHI

Rock and Roll has certainly tried to take its toll on me. I’d rather not talk about my past excesses here, although some hardcore rockers might argue that those excesses were responsible for some great records, but I know which side I came out on. You might say that one day I woke up and smelled the green tea (and I’ve been drinking it ever since). Today I wouldn’t exactly describe myself as a poster boy for healthy living, but I believe I’ve made some healthy choices in my lifestyle in recent years.

T'AI CHI CH'UAN

Since my teen years I was interested in martial arts. My sixth grade teacher, Mr. Bill Flanagan, told us about some men from the mysterious Orient who could break pieces of wood with their bare hands and feet, and what they did was called Karate. My eyes widened, as this was pure fantasy at that moment. The word “Karate” was not yet a household name, although I was aware of Judo from an old James Cagney film. By seventeen I had found a Karate teacher, Master Min Pai. I later found out he was teaching Moo Duk Kwan, a Korean version of Karate, but he prudently used what was then a generic term for the striking and kicking martial arts.

As I started to work in music full time my interests in martial arts took a back seat for a few years. Getting my nose broken and a finger dislocated assigned Moo Duk Kwan to the back burner. After a few years of hard work in the recording business in London I found a Karate school and trained for a short time. But suddenly, out of nowhere, came Bruce Lee, showing the world this incredible new thing called Kung Fu, for us westerners a new world of Chinese martial arts. Until then we had access to only Karate, Judo, Jujitsu, Kendo and Aikido, and all of them came from Japan (I’m not making a case of Japanese versus Chinese martial arts, Japanese martial arts are poetry in motion). But within a few short years of Bruce Lee’s presentation we were hearing about some extremely exotic sounding martial arts of Chinese origin. The Monkey Style, Eagle Claw, White Eye Brow, Praying Mantis, Drunken Style (as made famous by Jackie Chan in The Drunken Master) and T'ai Chi Ch'uan were some of their names and later we found that there were hundreds more.

Eventually I met two Chinese teachers in London. I briefly studied a rare style called Fung Sau with a Master Chee Soo. Later, a young teacher, William Tse. taught me Wing Chun, Bruce Lee’s original style. (If you got an original copy of my album Inventory you can see William Tse and myself on the sleeve). These were both fine martial arts, providing great health benefits and certain knowledge of how to kick butt. But one style piqued my interest more than the others. When translated into English, it is “Grand Ultimate Fist.” How could you not resist being at least a little curious about a Grand Ultimate Fist? I read everything available about it at the time. Only one style (Yang) was dominant in the western world and one particular Chinese master seemed to be the standard bearer of this art during the 70s, Cheng Man Ching. My obsession led me to find a wonderful teacher in London, Master John Kells. I began my t'ai chi studies in 1980. Oh, Grand Ultimate Fist is T'ai Chi Ch'uan in Chinese, and most people know it as simply T'ai Chi, or Taiji (there are several different methods of rendering Chinese pronunciation into English)!.

Tony Visconti and Grandmaster John Kells, 2003.

Master John Kells studied with two Chinese masters of T'ai Chi, Dr. Chi Chiang-Tao and T.T. Liang, both were students of Grandmaster Cheng Man Ching in China. The style is called the Yang style, the most popular of the five well-known styles. I studied with Master Kells for nearly four solid years. In my last year I attended his school as often as seven days a week. His emphasis was on softness, developing a yielding quality. He also put a great value on practicing a two person exercise called ‘push hands.’ Master Kells could make himself feather-light when I pushed hands with him, but in a split second he could send me literally flying across the room with a sudden burst of energy, using a technique in the Yang style called uprooting. I have been the recipient of this enigmatic technique many, many times.

When I moved back to New York I looked for a T'ai Chi teacher that had similar qualities, but I found that John was a rare teacher. I couldn’t find the right combination of openness and high skill in those teachers I had observed. Over the years I continued to practice the solo forms on my own, but I could tell that they had suffered from the lack of Master Kells’ critical eye. Besides that, I had no one to push hands with.

Master Ren Guang-yi

Eventually I met another t'ai chi master who didn’t disappoint me on any level. I was very fortunate to be introduced to my present teacher by none other than Lou Reed. Through a mutual friend Lou and I found out that we both studied tai chi, although they were two different styles. Lou suggested that I check out his teacher, Master Ren Guang-yi, an expert in the Chen style of t'ai chi. Chen is the original style of T'ai Chi which all other styles are derived from, and was practiced for hundreds of years only by the Chen family in one small town in China. This was common in China. A particular martial arts style was sometimes practiced only within an extended family and was a heavily guarded secret. Even today, Chen T'ai Chi is the only martial art taught in Chenjiagou, in central China, but now both outsiders and non-Chinese are allowed to study there.

Master Ren gives Reed a spontaneous kung fu lesson.

World T'ai Chi Day in Central Park, NYC, April 24th, 2004.
left to right: Tony Visconti, Lou Reed,
Hsia-Jung Chang and Joey Bevilacqua.
We are all students of Master Ren Guang-Yi

Master Ren has studied exclusively with the current head of the Chen clan, Grandmaster Chen Xiaowang. To have a teacher of such high quality in Master Ren, in New York city, is a dream come true. Every so often we are graced by a visit from his teacher, Grandmaster Chen, who would conduct a seminar for our school.

Sifu Greg Pinney and Tony Visconti.
Sifu Pinney is also a student of Master Ren Guang-Yi
and he has his own school in New Jersey.

T'ai Chi is not the most aerobic martial art, but the slow, meditative movements can be executed at any speed and with explosive energy at anytime. Whereas most martial arts can be categorized as ‘external’ styles, t'ai chi, and a few other martial arts, are classified as ‘internal’ styles. The slow training is meant to emphasis internal strength involving harmony of the internal organs and opening the path of meridians referred to in acupuncture, rather than external muscular strength. A t'ai chi expert can move as quickly as anyone, but they draw their power from a different place as, say, a boxer does. There is an enigmatic axiom in T'ai Chi, “Move last, arrive first,” which indicates one of the intricacies of this subtle art. There are many books written by past and present t'ai chi masters, explaining exactly what internal energy is and how it works.

As witnessed, millions of people practice t'ai chi every morning and most of them don’t look like ferocious fighters. This is because T'ai Chi has branched off into an exercise purely for health and has a reputation for promoting longevity. You can gain wonderful health benefits just practicing T'ai Chi for health only. In fact, as a martial art it is probably the hardest one to learn and use effectively. For self defense there are easier martial arts one can learn.

An hour of T'ai Chi practice, in my opinion, does more for one’s health than an hour of running, or an hour in a conventional western gym. It is a low impact exercise, very easy on the knees, but every muscle in the body gets a workout, especially the legs. All the internal organs are directly affected in a positive way. In China, people in their 90s can still practice T'ai Chi , I see no reason why we can’t in the West.