KAE’S GUIDE TO CONTACT JUGGLING
by Kae Verens
[email protected] Thanks to the others of the “Four Horsemen” - Ferret, Rich, and Marco – for providing the shoves I needed to finish this.
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Thanks to Ferret in particular for hosting the first ever contact juggling convention. Also, thanks to Rich in particular for www.contactjuggling.com, without which I wouldn’t have felt the need to constantly improve .org (competition is great…) Also, thanks in particular to Marco for providing lifesaving assistance when the website was in threat of disappearing. Thanks to the many wonderful people in the contact juggling community, for pushing us to keep refining and creating moves. I can’t name them all, but a few might be Shifty, Lance, the various Matt[e]s, Klas, Chico, Ian (the Four Horsemen’s Stableboy), and all the other people. Sorry if I haven’t mentioned your name – the Contact Juggling community is immense, and I have a book to write! Thanks to all the people who contributed their experience and videos to the www.contactjuggling.org website. This book is an almost direct consequence of your creativity. Thanks to Bronwyn, for sometimes letting me sit at my computer so I could produce this. Thanks to Michael Moschen for his video, and James Ernest for his book. Thanks to Terry Pratchett – I like his books.
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Basic Contents Palm Hold.................................................................................................24 Cradle........................................................................................................24 Tripod Hold..............................................................................................25 Thumb Hold.............................................................................................26 Cradle Hold w/ Thumb Hold..................................................................26 Knuckle Hold............................................................................................26 Fist Hold....................................................................................................27 Open Fist Hold.........................................................................................27 3-Finger Hold...........................................................................................27 Elbow Hold...............................................................................................28 Outside Elbow Hold.................................................................................28 Forehead Hold..........................................................................................29 Neck Hold.................................................................................................29 Temple Hold.............................................................................................30 Windshieldwiper......................................................................................32 Wristhold Windshieldwiper....................................................................34 Elbowhold Windshieldwiper...................................................................35 Butterfly....................................................................................................35 Twirling Butterfly....................................................................................36 Spined Butterfly.......................................................................................37 Planebreaking Butterfly..........................................................................38 Palm-Palm Pass........................................................................................38 Back-Palm Pass........................................................................................39 Palm-Back Pass........................................................................................40 Back-Back Pass........................................................................................41 Back-Back Walkaway..............................................................................42 3
Palm-Palm Walkaway.............................................................................43 Thumb-Thumb Pass................................................................................43 Forearm Roll............................................................................................45 Backarm Roll............................................................................................46 Backarm-Forearm Roll...........................................................................48 Forearm-Backarm Roll...........................................................................49 Chop Roll..................................................................................................49 Armroll to Shoulder Hold.......................................................................49 Spiral.........................................................................................................50 Helicopter.................................................................................................50 Forearm Chestroll....................................................................................51 Backarm Chestroll...................................................................................52 Neck Roll...................................................................................................53 Neck Loop.................................................................................................54 Pirouette Neck Roll..................................................................................55 Back Roll...................................................................................................55 Elbow Catch.............................................................................................58 Outside Elbow Catch...............................................................................59 Shoulder Catch.........................................................................................59 Foot Catch................................................................................................60 Head Catch...............................................................................................60 Neck Catch................................................................................................62 Elevator.....................................................................................................64 Back-Back Butterflies..............................................................................65 Palm-Palm Butterfly................................................................................66 Palm-Palm Twisting Butterfly................................................................66 Flytrap.......................................................................................................67 Circle.........................................................................................................67 4
Walking Halfpipe.....................................................................................67 Horizontal Circle......................................................................................68 2b Palmspin..............................................................................................71 2b Palmspin Transfer..............................................................................72 3b Palmspin..............................................................................................73 3b Cascade................................................................................................75 3b Palmspin Transfer..............................................................................75 3b Chasing Transfer................................................................................76 3b Pinkylift...............................................................................................76 3b Thumblift.............................................................................................76 4b Stack.....................................................................................................77 4b Stack Pinkylift.....................................................................................78 4b Stack Thumblift..................................................................................78 1b Palmspin..............................................................................................79 4b Flat Diamond Palmspin......................................................................79 4b Flat Spin...............................................................................................80 2b Orbital Isolation..................................................................................81 2b Ratchet.................................................................................................81 2b Curl......................................................................................................82 2b Isolated Curl........................................................................................83 2b Magnetic Palmspin.............................................................................83 3b Ratchet.................................................................................................84 3b Orbital Isolation..................................................................................84 4b Stack Tumble......................................................................................84 1b Isolation...............................................................................................85 4b Curl......................................................................................................85 5b Linespin...............................................................................................87 5b 2h Palmspin.........................................................................................88 5
6b Linespin...............................................................................................88 6b 2h Stack...............................................................................................89 6b 2h Triangle Palmspin.........................................................................89 7b Linespin...............................................................................................90 7b Stack Linespin.....................................................................................90 7b 2h Flower Propellor............................................................................91 7b 2h “Cheater” Flower Palmspin.........................................................91 8b Stack Linespin.....................................................................................91 8b Linespin...............................................................................................92 9b Stack Linespin.....................................................................................92 10b 2h Pyramid Stack..............................................................................92 11b 2h “Cheater” Flower Stack..............................................................92 2b Folding Butterfly.................................................................................93 2b Asymmetric Butterfly.........................................................................94 2b Symmetric Butterfly...........................................................................94 2b Back-Back Butterfly...........................................................................94 2b Twirling Butterfly...............................................................................95 2b Circle....................................................................................................95 2b Back-Palm Shower.............................................................................96 2b Forearm Roll.......................................................................................96 2b Train....................................................................................................97 2b Backarm Roll Transfer......................................................................97 2b Simultaneous Back-Forearm and Fore-Backarm Rolling..............98 3b Forearm Roll Cascade........................................................................98 3b Backarm Roll Transfer......................................................................99 3b Folding Cascade................................................................................100 3b Backarm Cascade.............................................................................100 4b Circle..................................................................................................101 6
4b Backarm Cascade.............................................................................102 2b Palmspin Escape...............................................................................103 3b Palmspin Escape...............................................................................104 4b Stack Escape......................................................................................105 4b Flat Spin Escape................................................................................105 Combining Chest Rolls with Hand-Hand Passes................................106 2b Square................................................................................................107 2b Elbow Catch......................................................................................108 2b Elbow Catch Shower........................................................................108 2b Elbow Toss Shower...........................................................................108 3b Mill's Mess with Cradle...................................................................109 3b Back-Palm Mill’s Mess.....................................................................110 3b Mesh...................................................................................................110 3b Forearm Shower...............................................................................111 3b Baby Pass Shower.............................................................................111 Butterfly W/ Head Butterfly.................................................................113 Neck Butterfly........................................................................................114 Neck to Chest Circle..............................................................................114 Head Butterfly........................................................................................115 Arm Roll to Forehead Hold..................................................................116 Head Circle.............................................................................................117 Through the Body..................................................................................118 Colour Change.......................................................................................119 Scarf Balance..........................................................................................120 Sleight Of Hand......................................................................................121 Videos......................................................................................................131 Books/Magazines....................................................................................131 Websites..................................................................................................132 7
Finger Flip..............................................................................................133 Finger Roll..............................................................................................133 Pilf Regnif...............................................................................................133 Finger Flurry..........................................................................................133 Tripod Pickup........................................................................................133 Caterpillar..............................................................................................133 Outside Elbow Flyaway.........................................................................133 2b Stairstep.............................................................................................133 2b Tandem Spined Butterfly.................................................................133 2b Mineshaft roll....................................................................................133 2b Blackstone’s Balls.............................................................................133 The Train................................................................................................133 2b Back-Back Pass w/ Thumb Hold.....................................................133 2b Upsidedown Palmspin......................................................................133 2b Toss and Catch..................................................................................133 2b Palm-Palm Pass w/ Cage..................................................................133 3b Propeller Isolation............................................................................133 3b Mesh w/ Arm Catch..........................................................................133 3b Mesh Cascade....................................................................................133 3b Mesh...................................................................................................133 3b Thumblift Isolation...........................................................................133 3b Rockabye...........................................................................................133 4b Isolation.............................................................................................133 4b Vertical Isolation...............................................................................133 Floating 4 Stack (aka Half Diamond)..................................................133 4b Twist...................................................................................................133 4b Snake..................................................................................................133 4b Rotating Columns.............................................................................133 8
4b Propeller............................................................................................133 4b Collapse and Rebuild........................................................................133 4b Pinky Lift...........................................................................................133 4b Asymmetrical Orbital.......................................................................133 5b Propeller............................................................................................133 Blossom (5 Stack)...................................................................................133 5b Pyramid.............................................................................................133
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Detailed Contents Palm Hold.................................................................................................24 Cradle........................................................................................................24 Tripod Hold..............................................................................................25 Thumb Hold.............................................................................................26 Cradle Hold w/ Thumb Hold..................................................................26 Knuckle Hold............................................................................................26 Fist Hold....................................................................................................27 Open Fist Hold.........................................................................................27 3-Finger Hold...........................................................................................27 Elbow Hold...............................................................................................28 Outside Elbow Hold.................................................................................28 Forehead Hold..........................................................................................29 Neck Hold.................................................................................................29 Temple Hold.............................................................................................30 Windshieldwiper......................................................................................32 Wristhold Windshieldwiper....................................................................34 Elbowhold Windshieldwiper...................................................................35 Butterfly....................................................................................................35 Twirling Butterfly....................................................................................36 Spined Butterfly.......................................................................................37 Planebreaking Butterfly..........................................................................38 Palm-Palm Pass........................................................................................38 Back-Palm Pass........................................................................................39 Palm-Back Pass........................................................................................40 Back-Back Pass........................................................................................41 Back-Back Walkaway..............................................................................42 10
Palm-Palm Walkaway.............................................................................43 Thumb-Thumb Pass................................................................................43 Forearm Roll............................................................................................45 Backarm Roll............................................................................................46 Backarm-Forearm Roll...........................................................................48 Forearm-Backarm Roll...........................................................................49 Chop Roll..................................................................................................49 Armroll to Shoulder Hold.......................................................................49 Spiral.........................................................................................................50 Helicopter.................................................................................................50 Forearm Chestroll....................................................................................51 Backarm Chestroll...................................................................................52 Neck Roll...................................................................................................53 Neck Loop.................................................................................................54 Pirouette Neck Roll..................................................................................55 Back Roll...................................................................................................55 Elbow Catch.............................................................................................58 Outside Elbow Catch...............................................................................59 Shoulder Catch.........................................................................................59 Foot Catch................................................................................................60 Head Catch...............................................................................................60 Neck Catch................................................................................................62 Elevator.....................................................................................................64 Back-Back Butterflies..............................................................................65 Palm-Palm Butterfly................................................................................66 Palm-Palm Twisting Butterfly................................................................66 Flytrap.......................................................................................................67 Circle.........................................................................................................67 11
Walking Halfpipe.....................................................................................67 Horizontal Circle......................................................................................68 2b Palmspin..............................................................................................71 2b Palmspin Transfer..............................................................................72 3b Palmspin..............................................................................................73 3b Cascade................................................................................................75 3b Palmspin Transfer..............................................................................75 3b Chasing Transfer................................................................................76 3b Pinkylift...............................................................................................76 3b Thumblift.............................................................................................76 4b Stack.....................................................................................................77 4b Stack Pinkylift.....................................................................................78 4b Stack Thumblift..................................................................................78 1b Palmspin..............................................................................................79 4b Flat Diamond Palmspin......................................................................79 4b Flat Spin...............................................................................................80 2b Orbital Isolation..................................................................................81 2b Ratchet.................................................................................................81 2b Curl......................................................................................................82 2b Isolated Curl........................................................................................83 2b Magnetic Palmspin.............................................................................83 3b Ratchet.................................................................................................84 3b Orbital Isolation..................................................................................84 4b Stack Tumble......................................................................................84 1b Isolation...............................................................................................85 4b Curl......................................................................................................85 5b Linespin...............................................................................................87 5b 2h Palmspin.........................................................................................88 12
6b Linespin...............................................................................................88 6b 2h Stack...............................................................................................89 6b 2h Triangle Palmspin.........................................................................89 7b Linespin...............................................................................................90 7b Stack Linespin.....................................................................................90 7b 2h Flower Propellor............................................................................91 7b 2h “Cheater” Flower Palmspin.........................................................91 8b Stack Linespin.....................................................................................91 8b Linespin...............................................................................................92 9b Stack Linespin.....................................................................................92 10b 2h Pyramid Stack..............................................................................92 11b 2h “Cheater” Flower Stack..............................................................92 2b Folding Butterfly.................................................................................93 2b Asymmetric Butterfly.........................................................................94 2b Symmetric Butterfly...........................................................................94 2b Back-Back Butterfly...........................................................................94 2b Twirling Butterfly...............................................................................95 2b Circle....................................................................................................95 2b Back-Palm Shower.............................................................................96 2b Forearm Roll.......................................................................................96 2b Train....................................................................................................97 2b Backarm Roll Transfer......................................................................97 2b Simultaneous Back-Forearm and Fore-Backarm Rolling..............98 3b Forearm Roll Cascade........................................................................98 3b Backarm Roll Transfer......................................................................99 3b Folding Cascade................................................................................100 3b Backarm Cascade.............................................................................100 4b Circle..................................................................................................101 13
4b Backarm Cascade.............................................................................102 2b Palmspin Escape...............................................................................103 3b Palmspin Escape...............................................................................104 4b Stack Escape......................................................................................105 4b Flat Spin Escape................................................................................105 Combining Chest Rolls with Hand-Hand Passes................................106 2b Square................................................................................................107 2b Elbow Catch......................................................................................108 2b Elbow Catch Shower........................................................................108 2b Elbow Toss Shower...........................................................................108 3b Mill's Mess with Cradle...................................................................109 3b Back-Palm Mill’s Mess.....................................................................110 3b Mesh...................................................................................................110 3b Forearm Shower...............................................................................111 3b Baby Pass Shower.............................................................................111 Butterfly W/ Head Butterfly.................................................................113 Neck Butterfly........................................................................................114 Neck to Chest Circle..............................................................................114 Head Butterfly........................................................................................115 Arm Roll to Forehead Hold..................................................................116 Head Circle.............................................................................................117 Through the Body..................................................................................118 Colour Change.......................................................................................119 Scarf Balance..........................................................................................120 Sleight Of Hand......................................................................................121 Videos......................................................................................................131 Books/Magazines....................................................................................131 Websites..................................................................................................132 14
Finger Flip..............................................................................................133 Finger Roll..............................................................................................133 Pilf Regnif...............................................................................................133 Finger Flurry..........................................................................................133 Tripod Pickup........................................................................................133 Caterpillar..............................................................................................133 Outside Elbow Flyaway.........................................................................133 2b Stairstep.............................................................................................133 2b Tandem Spined Butterfly.................................................................133 2b Mineshaft roll....................................................................................133 2b Blackstone’s Balls.............................................................................133 The Train................................................................................................133 2b Back-Back Pass w/ Thumb Hold.....................................................133 2b Upsidedown Palmspin......................................................................133 2b Toss and Catch..................................................................................133 2b Palm-Palm Pass w/ Cage..................................................................133 3b Propeller Isolation............................................................................133 3b Mesh w/ Arm Catch..........................................................................133 3b Mesh Cascade....................................................................................133 3b Mesh...................................................................................................133 3b Thumblift Isolation...........................................................................133 3b Rockabye...........................................................................................133 4b Isolation.............................................................................................133 4b Vertical Isolation...............................................................................133 Floating 4 Stack (aka Half Diamond)..................................................133 4b Twist...................................................................................................133 4b Snake..................................................................................................133 4b Rotating Columns.............................................................................133 15
4b Propeller............................................................................................133 4b Collapse and Rebuild........................................................................133 4b Pinky Lift...........................................................................................133 4b Asymmetrical Orbital.......................................................................133 5b Propeller............................................................................................133 Blossom (5 Stack)...................................................................................133 5b Pyramid.............................................................................................133
Foreword Up until very recently, this rare form of juggling was unknown to the general public. It was looked down on by a lot of the mainstream jugglers, and it was impossible to find any more than half a dozen websites that had any information on the art. All that has changed. Contact juggling turns up in the strangest places now, and almost every person has seen at least one person magically roll a ball around his/her arms. Contact juggling turns up in music videos – “Pommes Frites” by The Orb, for example – books – Robert Jordan’s “Wheel of Time” mentions a man rolling golden globes over his arms and body – television shows – Star Trek DS9 has a scene where a man can be seen in the background contact juggling – and, of course, films – Jim Henson’s “The Labyrinth” is the most famous example. Up until very recently, there was no sign that a revolution was about to take place. Every search for contact juggling on the Internet returned the same three or four sites, and those sites had not been updated in years. I had read The Book – “Contact Juggling” by James Ernest, and had studied every move in it – there are only a few that I still cannot do, and I’m not certain that they are possible at all. One day, I came across an Internet mailing list concerning contact juggling. I was overjoyed – for years I had been developing my skills in isolation – my only contact with another contact juggler 16
being Paul Wills, who started learning at the same time as me, but left off developing his skills after he reached a level sufficient for his own purposes. The mailing list gave me a chance to learn what other people had been doing. Those of us who had been CJing for years had been doing exactly as I had – searching the Internet irregularly, and becoming despondent when the same lack of news was returned. In 1999, together with Marco Van Der Bijl, I created www.contactjuggling.org; a website dedicated to teaching new contact jugglers, and providing a community website for us all. The site brought out the contact juggler in a lot of people who would otherwise have passed it by. New people came, and brought fresh variations on old moves – Shifty, Lance Coombes, and Matthew Olsen, for example. New moves were also created by people who had been regulars in the original mailing list – Marco, Ferret, and myself, for example. This book is an effort to bring to the public what has been created since James Ernest wrote his book. I have tried to describe as many different moves as I could. There are still many, many more moves that I could have placed in the book, but I had to stop writing at some point and publish the thing. If you are new to the world of contact juggling, then I hope you find this book easy to follow. If you are an experienced contact juggler, I hope you find enough variations and difficult moves to keep you busy for a few months. Enjoy. Kae
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What Is Contact Juggling? Good question. According to James Ernest's book, "Contact Juggling" – which originally coined the term – contact juggling is "manipulations of single objects or object groups, usually involving very little tossing or spinning". According to the community website – www.contactjuggling.org, Contact Juggling is half dance, juggling, mime and magic1. Contact Juggling is almost always about balls – whether they’re silicon, acrylic, or plain tennis balls, it is rare to find a person doing something with anything other than balls, and calling it Contact Juggling. Staff-spinning, pencil-manipulation, coin-rolling and other such stuff could theoretically be called “Contact Juggling” using the definition, but they already have their own names. Contact Juggling has been accepted as solely belonging to the manipulation of balls using the body, and shouldn’t be confused with other forms of object manipulation. The best way to really get to know what contact juggling is to see it in action. Michael Moschen's PBS video, "In Motion", has a section at the end where he is contact juggling – although he prefers the term "Dynamic Balance" or “Dynamic Manipulation” perhaps he is more entitled to call it by either of those names, as he was “CJing” before the term was invented. He can also be seen in Jim Henson’s film “The Labyrinth”; he is the hands of Jareth in the crystal manipulation scenes – no, that is not David Bowie doing it. No. It is not. No. Speaking of terms, there are many – "Dynamic / Crystal / Contact - Manipulation / Balance", "Ball/Sphere/Orb Rolling" are just a few. The average name for the art is "Contact Juggling", and that is how I will refer to it throughout the book. There is a small
1
My own little maths joke
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glossary of terms near the end of the book that can be referred to whenever I forget to explain one. Contact Juggling can be broken into two separate forms, each of which can be combined at a later stage to form more complex moves. The first form is ball-rolling, where balls are rolled over the hands, arms, chest, head, back, etc. The ball rolls from one point to another. This is the most basic form of contact juggling. The windshieldwiper is the first contact juggling move which should be learned from this form, where the ball rolls from the palm to the back of the hand, then rolls back again. The second form is palmspinning, where groups of two or more balls are spun in the hands. Up to eleven balls are used in palm-spinning routines. Although contact juggling usually means the balls stay in contact with the body, a lot of contact jugglers like to put tosses in their moves. These moves are sometimes looked down on by “purists”, but I believe that bending the “rules” of contact juggling should be allowed where the result is a fascinating move.
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Materials The first thing you need is a ball. For ball-rolling, there are no real restrictions on the ball's properties, but the ball should be heavy enough for you to feel it, and solidly spherical enough for you to roll it. For many, the ideal ball is a 3" acrylic ball, or a 2.5" if you are of slightly small stature (like me...). If you are on a tight budget, then it is crucial that you pick something which you will still be able to use when you move onto a more advanced level – so make sure that you buy something sturdy; this may mean saving for a while. If you plan on doing only single-ball work, you might like one of the larger balls. The ideal properties of a good contact juggling ball are slight but solid weight, the ability to hold three comfortably in the palm of the hand (for multi-ball work), and the ability for the balls to slide against each other (for simpler palmspinning). You can learn ball-rolling with a cheap rubber ball. I started off with a rubber ball I bought for one Irish pound, and it didn't impede me – I also got some much-needed exercise from chasing it every time I dropped it! Rich Shumaker (www.contactjuggling.com) advocates learning with a lacrosse ball. Possibly, that is equivalent to a rubber croquet or cricket ball. Acrylics can be purchased sometimes from good juggling shops, but if that's not true where you are, then you can always order over the Internet. www.dube.com, www.infiniteillusions.com, www.renegade.com, and www.seriousjuggling.com each supply acrylics. If you have a large group of people interested in contact juggling, then you can buy cheap acrylics by bulk from HYPERLINK "http://www.plasticballs.com/"www.plasticballs.com ($100 minimum order). It might be a good idea as well to have some balls you don’t mind scuffing, for practice. Ferret has some balls he calls his “stunt doubles” – survivors of earlier mishaps in practice. “Stunt doubles” are ideal for practice, as you are not restricted to practicing in 20
places that you would definitely not perform in for fear of ruining your good balls. One of the frequently asked questions in the forums of contactjuggling.org is "How do I get the scratches out of my acrylics?". The old adage "Prevention is better than cure" is apt here. A lot of scratches on acrylics are caused by the balls hitting and scraping against each other when being carried around in a bag or left in a box with other juggling materials or potentially sharp objects. A very easy way to stop balls from rubbing against each other is to keep them singly or in pairs in tight fitting socks. The socks prevent the balls from moving against each other, and protect from outside objects as well. Another way is to store your balls on a stand instead of in a box somewhere - Shifty, at http://www.shiftys-spheres.com/, shows his acrylics on fantastic stands, possibly originally made for candles, but easily adapted to hold acrylics. I keep eleven balls beside my computer at home held by a simple piece of rope. Make a 7b "blossom" shape, and measure off a circle of rope so it goes around the tops of the balls, but not so large that it might slip down over them. When you have the rope tied off, lay it in a circle and put the blossom shape within it. Then you can easily balance a 4Stack on top of it. Simple, yet pleasant to look at.
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About This Book This book was written to show some of the new moves that have developed in the ten years since James Ernest’s book came out. It is not a replacement. James’s illustrations are extremely helpful in most cases, and it is always advisable to learn different methods of doing the same things, so I would recommend that you at least get a look at a copy of the book, even if you don’t buy it. The instruction in this book is separated into chapters. I have arranged the chapters, and the moves in each chapter, in approximate order of ease. Well… you could learn Palmspinning before Armrolls, but that’s up to you - you do not have to learn straight through in order. Many difficult moves can be learned after learning only a few simpler ones, so I would recommend that you skim through the book once to get an idea of what you would like to learn, then start learning the steps that make up what you want. The most basic list of moves you should learn might include Windshieldwipers, Palm-Palm, Palm-Back, Back-Palm and Back-Back Passes, and maybe a hold or two. That will give you enough moves to make an interesting routine that will mystify most non-jugglers. The book is not comprehensive – almost every week, something new is developed by the contact juggling community. Usually, these new moves have to do with combinations with different arts – magic and toss juggling, for instance – but once in a while something new which is pure contact juggling comes along. Each style of CJing in the book is introduced with a chapter on “basic” moves. Maybe the word “fundamental” is more appropriate, as some of the moves are difficult, even for the advanced contact juggler. Although it may seem so, I am not describing every possible move in this book. A lot of moves involving combinations of patterns seemed a bit redundant for me. The same reason I prefer not to place an animation of a person performing a 4Stack in both hands on the contactjuggling.org lies behind my not placing similar moves in this move. Suffice it to say that almost every pattern that can be performed in one hand can be performed in the other hand at the same time. 22
Most of the two-handed moves that I describe are in the book because they involve using patterns that cross between both hands. Any two-handed pattern that involves patterns that do not cross between the hands is really two separate one-handed patterns performed at the same time. However, that does not mean that, for example, spinning simultaneous 5Stacks while gripping another ball between the elbows is not a true 2-handed pattern. You could say that the held 11th ball is halfway through a transfer - especially if now and then you actually completed the transfer... By the way – every image in this book is of me, yet they mostly look like different people. This is partly because of my (very) moderate skills as an artist, and partly because I keep cutting my hair shorter and shorter. In fact, as I write this, I am contemplating shaving my head to make my head rolls a bit smoother…
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Holds This chapter is about how to hold a ball. Don’t argue! There are many different holds, most of which you would never think of as out of the ordinary, some of which you would never think of how to get into, and one or two which are difficult to get out of. The Palm and Cradle holds are the most important for us, and are used in almost every move involving the hands.
Palm Hold This is usually just called Palm. Hold your hand out, palm up. Put a ball in the flat of the palm. Don’t bend your fingers, but let them relax. If you place the ball at the base of the fingers, you are technically still doing a Palm Hold, although it’s stretching the term slightly.
Cradle There are three basic ways to “hold” a ball on the back of the hand. The first is simply known as the "cradle". Hold your right hand out in front of you, fingers together, and palm facing the ground. Lower the middle finger to form a groove. Place your ball in that groove. The little finger may raise slightly – that's okay. This is also known as the "threefinger cradle", as three fingers support the ball. The second is the cradle that I prefer – the "two-finger cradle", so called that because 24
the ball is balanced on two fingers. Place your hand in front of you in cradle position, fingers together. Form a slight 'V' between the index and middle fingers. Balance the ball there. This cradle solves some little problems with the windshieldwiper and similar moves. Make sure not to exaggerate the 'V', as it is hard to correct later! The third is used by a few CJers on the www.contactjuggling.org site, and is known as the "Vulcan cradle", after the Vulcan greeting gesture in Star Trek. Place your hand as in the two-finger cradle position, but form the 'V' with the middle and ring fingers. Personally, I find this to be awkward to use, but I'm sure there are people that will find it useful if they have trouble with the others. More advanced holds on the back of the hand include holding the ball right behind the knuckles of the first and second fingers (between the tendons), holding between the little finger’s first knuckle and the ring finger, and holding between the thumb’s knuckle, the base of the thumb and the first finger’s knuckle. You will most likely never get to use these, though – unless you come up with some very outlandish moves - in which case, submit them to www.contactjuggling.org to share them with the world!.
Tripod Hold Put your thumb, index finger, and middle fingers up, with the tips held close to each other. You can balance a ball on the tips. This is used as a demonstration hold – it points out the ball. In the film, “The Labyrinth”, the first contact juggling clip begins and ends in this hold. Personally, I prefer the three-finger hold to this one, but a lot of people use this as their “Look! A
ball!” hold. It is simple to do, and can be moved into (or out of) from the palm, open fist, or cradle holds.
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Thumb Hold For this, start with a hand palm up. Place a ball there, and wrap your thumb over it. Now turn the hand over so it is palm down. The ball should still stay in the palm, held there by the thumb. This can be used to great effect as a surprise in the middle of something routine. If you butterfly normally for a while, for example, then suddenly throw in a single Thumb Hold so the ball ends up under the hand instead of above it, the audience is usually surprised and then impressed.
Cradle Hold w/ Thumb Hold This hold, while it is simply a combination of two other popular holds, pops up enough in contact juggling that I felt it needed to be pointed out on its own. The Thumb Hold is important to this hold, so should be practiced carefully. The Cradle Hold used here is the three-finger cradle. Although I am a great fan of the two-fingered cradle, it is simpler by far to use the three-finger version in this hold.
Knuckle Hold James Ernest says in his book that this is one of the only times he ever lets his fingers tense. It is a style decision. The hold is not right for everyone, but can be perfect for some moments. Form a fist, and raise the forearm so the fist is pointing up, with the index and middle fingers forming a groove along the first phalanges. Place the ball there. This is tricky to get into, and tricky to balance. Try tossing from one hand to another, keeping the same hold. Or, even harder – try placing your two fists together and roll the ball from one to the other. 26
Fist Hold This hold is also called the Cup Hold, as the shape of the hand is as if you were holding a large mug’s handle. Form a fist, with the fingers knuckles held in a vertical line so the index finger and thumb are on top. Place the ball on the slight dip formed near the end of the index finger. Mostly, this hold is used as part of a group of holds flowing into each other – it can look very good to “flourish” the ball with a series of holds.
Open Fist Hold I call this the Open Fist hold because, from the Fist Hold, all you need to do is unfold the fingers and press the thumb in tighter to get this hold here. This hold is elegant from all sides, so is ideal for little pauses in your routine.
3-Finger Hold This hold is a good starting and finishing move. It is also fascinating when come by suddenly The front view looks like the ball is just balancing on the end of the fingers. The side is even more magical sometimes. It can be very impressive when you are rolling the ball around your arms for a while, then suddenly stop with the ball apparently just balancing on your fingertips. Start learning this by making a tripod of your index, middle and ring fingers. Balance the ball on the fingertips. To begin with, the fingertips should be held wide apart, but as you gain experience, try to bring the fingertips closer and closer. Eventually, you come to a point where you can't bring the fingertips closer 27
without bending the middle finger. Stop there - bending the finger makes the hold lose some of its appeal.
Elbow Hold A lot of people hold their balls here by gripping the ball between the forearm and biceps. That is crude and unnecessary The inner elbow is relatively flat, so all it takes is a little practice to be able to balance the ball there without a problem. Balancing a ball there while doing something else with the same arm is another thing altogether, but we'll get to that. This version of the hold is called the “Inside” Elbow Hold.
Outside Elbow Hold Much harder to do than the Inside Elbow Hold, this one has a lot of possibilities. Robin Spehar, in the first video I saw of him, rolled a ball from the cradle to here, then paused in the act to hop the ball up and down there for a while. Joe DiNoto (the Golden Chicken) uses this in a strange variation of toss juggling’s “Mills Mess”. To learn this hold, you should first feel around the area with your other hand, while tensing, untensing, and moving the arm around in small ways. As you can see, I have let my right hand go limp in the picture. If you tense the hand, then the tendons of the arm shift and bunch in uncontrollable ways. I balance the ball at the base of the biceps, about two inches from the audience side of the forearm. Another interesting move, I see Robin doing very often, is to balance here, then keep the ball isolated while rolling it to the cradle, pass over the cradle to the other cradle, and do the same in reverse on the other arm.
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Forehead Hold This is not a beginners’ hold. Not because I think you won't be able to do it - with a few minutes practice, I'm sure you could be walking slowly around the room with no problems! No - it is an advanced CJer's hold because there are no simple ways to get into it. The simplest way to get into it is a toss to catch there (see Head Catch), and that is something I would refuse to teach any beginner because it is dangerous. Anyway - assuming you are an advanced CJer, here are my thoughts on the hold. To begin with, the ball is held just above the eyebrow muscles. Tense up your eyebrows (furrow them as if you were concentrating on something), and feel there - you will notice that with the muscles furrowed, you have a dip in the forehead - this is where the ball is held. With practice, the ball can be held without furrowing the muscles. I'd recommend this, as a move always impresses more if it looks effortless. Don't let the ball go below the eyebrow area - if it reaches the nose, it is difficult to get back to the forehead. If the ball starts moving left - move your whole body further left, and turn the head slightly to the right - this will cause the ball to roll a bit to the right - correcting the error. If it rolls to the right, of course, just reverse these instructions. If the ball starts rolling down towards the face, step slightly forward and lean your head further back. If it starts rolling further up the forehead, step slightly back and straighten up a bit.
Neck Hold This is another of the advanced CJers’ holds. There is no easy way to get into it. The most obvious ways – a roll up the arm
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behind the head, tossing to catch, and rolling from the forehead to the neck, are all advanced moves. Despite all that, this hold is extremely simple. Simply bend over at the waist, scrunch your shoulders up, and hold your head up so you’re looking straight ahead. The ball is cushioned at all sides – by the spine, the base of the head, and the shoulder muscles. The image here is of myself doing a neck hold with a 5” ball – it’s not a trick of perspective…
Temple Hold The Temple Hold is very difficult to keep steady. It must be done in a way that is awkward to the body (unless, of course, you are lying on your side as you do it), so a bit of flexibility is also required. Getting into this hold is a difficulty which all advanced CJers have to figure out at some point. The easiest way, in my opinion, is the first move of the “Butterfly With Head Hold”, where you simply roll the ball off the cradle and onto the temple. Robin Spehar (a comic artist who just happens to also be a fantastic contact juggler) submitted a video to contactjuggling.org of a small one ball show he did, in which he had the ball on the right Outside Elbow Hold, placed his head down so the right temple was on the ball, and flipped over towards the left and took the arm away so the ball was balanced on the right Temple Hold. In the image, I am holding the ball right at the front of the temple dip in the skull. I find that the bony rim of this area helps to keep the ball steady. Other people like to bring the ball further down so it is almost in the ear! This area is much more stable again, and makes your head contact juggling look extreme. I wouldn’t call that a Temple Hold, though – but go ahead and learn it anyway.
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Basic One Ball Moves I will describe all one-handed moves here using the right hand (my strongest hand), but you should also practice with the left. If you are left-handed, simply reverse instructions here, and don't forget to practice with your right hand. Two-handed moves should also be learned both ways. This chapter is probably best practiced by choosing combinations from the following chapter that you’d like to learn, then learning the moves in this chapter that are necessary for them. The Windshieldwiper and the various Cradles should most definitely be learned, as they are basic to almost all other moves. It is not necessary to learn all possible moves in order to be a great contact juggler. Just learn the basic versions of whatever you feel you can do, then when you feel competent, move on to harder versions and harder moves. Some of the moves at the end of the chapter should not be learned until you have practiced multi-ball and palmspinning. It is possible to learn straight through, but you will be better off with a general education in all styles than in specific in one style.
Windshieldwiper The first ball-rolling move most people learn is the windshieldwiper. This is a common basic move of a lot of complex combinations, and is also a good filler on its own between moves. It is named after the motion the arm makes, which is similar to the motion of a car’s windshield wiper. The similarity is more obvious when you do it with both arms simultaneously. Start with your ball in the right cradle. It doesn't matter which form of cradle you use. Toss the ball gently upwards, and catch the ball in the same position. Before you move onto the next stage, it is essential that you can do this. You may find that the ball bounces off your hand. In that case, when you are catching the ball, drop your hand at the 32
same speed as the ball and slow it so the ball comes to a gentle rest. It may help to examine closely how you would normally catch a ball in the palm of the hand, and apply that to the cradle. Next, practice the same with the palm. Your forearm should be pointing directly out from you, perpendicular to your chest. This should be easier than the cradle-toss, so won't need as much work. It is important that you do not allow your fingers to curl around the ball as you catch the ball, so a bit more care than usual is needed when cushioning the ball. After you are comfortable with the first two practice tosses, you can go on to the next stage. Practice tossing from the first position (cradle, forearm parallel to the chest) to the second position (palm, forearm perpendicular to the chest). When you are comfortable with that, try practicing the same, but toss the ball back from the palm to cradle as well. Now start to smooth out this movement. Learn to toss from cradle to palm and back again, while keeping the elbow in the same place. A good way to practice this is to hold the elbow with the left hand while tossing with the right (as seen in the images below). The final stage is to lower the height of the toss until the ball is in constant contact with your hand as it moves between palm and cradle. Be very careful here – if you are throwing from palm to cradle and your fingers are curled, the ball will get caught in the curl and be thrown at whatever is next to you! Practice somewhere out of sight of cats, TVs, valuable china, etc. The catches can be smoothed somewhat by moving the hand in the direction of the throw slightly as you catch the ball – i.e.; as you catch a ball tossed from palm to cradle, say, move your hand slightly further to the left to give the ball more space to slow down (before falling off the end of your fingers onto your toes). When you have this smoothly, your arm will be moving in a smooth windshieldwiper-like motion, hence the name of the move. Congratulations, you may now celebrate learning your first contact juggling move!
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Wristhold Windshieldwiper It is sometimes helpful to have a hand nearby to help you in case you drop the ball. In most cases, though, it is difficult to do this aesthetically. In the 3b Escape I placed onto the contactjuggling.org website, for example, I tried to keep my left hand by my side, but it jerked forward of it’s own accord when I almost dropped a ball from the right forearm. This move, however, allows you to keep a hand nearby while looking sufficiently graceful that it can be considered a move of it’s own. Assuming you are doing the Windshieldwiper in the left hand, here is how to do it. First try it without the ball. Hold a ball in the left palm, which is pointing left. The right hand is palm down, resting flat on the left forearm so the tips of the fingers are near the wrist. The left hand comes up to vertical, with the right hand slipping around the front side of it so the fingers are pointing left and the thumb is at the wrist. The left hand continues down so the ball is in the cradle. The right hand slides further down the back of the forearm and the right forearm is raised so the ball is still visible from the front. Bring the left hand forward so the ball is on the other side of the right forearm. Now, you simply bring the left hand back upwards to the starting position, and the right hand back around to it’s starting position.
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Elbowhold Windshieldwiper This is just like the Wristhold move, except the right hand is further down towards the left elbow and doesn’t move as much. Start with the left hand as before. This time, the right hand rests on the inside of the left elbow. Butterfly the left hand out until the ball is in the palm. All this while, the right hand remains at the base of the left biceps. Stretch the Windshieldwiper further left and slide the right hand around the right side of the elbow until its fingers are touching the outside of the elbow (the pointy bit). Butterfly the left hand in so the hand drops down inside the loop created by the right arm. Raise the right elbow and dip the left hand further down so you can then bring the left hand forward to the outside of the right arm, and slide the left hand back to the base of the biceps. You can also do this move in the opposite direction, so the ball comes up through the loop, but I think the way I have described is easier to learn.
Butterfly The butterfly is named after a hand motion used in some Middle-East dances where the hands intertwine and wave as if fluttering in the wind. The butterfly is an extension of the windshieldwiper. In the windshieldwiper, there are two end-points on the arc that the ball follows. We simply smooth the movement out by removing those end points, forming an infinity symbol. Moving your elbow will greatly help you with this move. Imagine a large figure "8" lying on it's side floating in front of you (an infinity symbol). Your ball starts on the bottom of the left loop, in the cradle. The ball then travels to the top of the right
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loop, where it goes over the fingertips to end up at the bottom of the right loop in the palm. From there, you pull the ball to the top of the left loop, where it goes over the fingertips to end up in the starting position again. Remember that at all times the ball is moving right, the ball should be in the cradle, and at all times while moving left, the ball should be in the palm of the hand. Good movement of the elbow will help you here, so limber up! The butterfly can be reversed, but there is little benefit to it – the average audience member will not notice the difference. Note: “Butterfly” is also used as a verb to describe the rolling of the ball from the palm to cradle and vice-versa, no matter how the movement is accomplished.
Twirling Butterfly Immediately, we see an example of the word “Butterfly” being subverted. This move does not form an infinity symbol, so technically it shouldn’t be called a Butterfly, but the word is so much nicer than Windshieldwiper, that it is used in almost all cases where the word Windshieldwiper should really go. Live with it. Start by placing your right hand palm up, and your left hand over it palm down so they cross at the wrist. The wrists should touch at all times. Now put the forearms together, bringing the hands up, and keeping the fingertips of the left hand as far apart from the right-hand fingertips (and vice versa) as possibly. You should end up with a ‘T’ shape. Continue the movement of the hands so the forearms are brought apart and down again, and the hands cross each other again at the wrist, this time with the left hand palm up and the right hand palm down. Repeat the movement in reverse to bring yourself back to the beginning again. 36
When you repeat this quickly, you’ll see that the hands are “twirling” around each other. This is the basis of the name “Twirling” Butterfly. Start from the beginning again, but this time with a ball on the right palm. Straighten the forearms out into the ‘T’ shape. The ball is still in the right hand, but moving towards the fingers. Now, as you bring the twirl to a finish, “Butterfly” the ball over the fingertips and down into the cradle. That is the end of the first part. From there, “Butterfly” the ball into the right palm as you straighten out the forearms again. When the ball rolls over the fingertips, you should be in the ‘T’ position again. Continue the twirl, bringing the ball back to the original position.
Spined Butterfly The butterfly motion can be performed in many different ways – this is a way to perform it in an almost flat line, using what Ferret calls a “flip-flop” to do the butterflying part of the move. Start with a ball in the right palm, with the palm held far to the left. Bring the palm to the right until it’s held in the normal position just to the right of the chest. Now, bring the hand up slightly, and flip the hand under the ball so the ball rolls into the cradle. Continue the movement of the cradle to the far right. If you are doing this with both hands, you can either start both butterflies from opposite sides of the chest (arms crossed), or from the same side. If you are starting both from the same side, then the hand which is on it’s own side of the body (i.e.: the left hand if you are staring on the left) starts with the ball in the cradle position, and ends up in the Palm Hold (remember that all contact juggling moves can be reversed!). Expanding even further, you can add a third ball. Perform a 2b Spined Butterfly as above, both hands moving from the same 37
side, but start with a third ball held in the palm-down hand. When the hands are flipping over, pass the ball from a Thumb Hold in the first hand to the second. The pass is a form of Thumb-Thumb Pass (described later in this chapter).
Planebreaking Butterfly In the original CJ book, “Contact Juggling”, James Ernest pointed out that most CJ moves seem to be in only two dimensions, and that they can be expanded into the third just by thinking about it. This is one example of that – instead of X and Y, we move the butterfly in Y and Z. Place your right hand out, cradle upwards, and put your ball on the cradle. Now, swing the arm up and back so the ball rolls over the fingertips to land in the palm, which is just above the right shoulder. The hardest part of this is when you bring the ball back down – be very careful! If you make a mistake, your ball may get trapped in the curl of your fingers, and be flung straight out in front of you – destroying whatever mirror you’re practicing in front of, or smacking an audience member unexpectedly (I hope they never expect to be smacked…). Another variation on this is the Reverse Planebreaking Butterfly, which is practically the same movement, but with the palm upwards in the beginning, and the cradle at the end held above the shoulder.
Palm-Palm Pass There are four basic palm-palm passes – the "classic palm-palm pass", a more difficult one I call the "chalice palm-palm pass", a variant of what is called the "cheater palm-palm pass", and the “baby pass”. The "classic palm-palm pass" is extremely simple – just hold your hands together, knife-edges and little fingers of both hands together. Now place the ball in the right palm, and simply roll it to the other palm, so it crosses at the base of the little fingers. It's
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called the "classic" palm-palm pass because it's the most basic method to do it. For the "chalice palm-palm pass", hold your forearms together so they're pointing in front of you and up. The palms should face upwards, with the right fingers pointing right, and the left fingers left. Place the ball in the right palm, and roll it across the heels of the hands to the other palm. I call it the "chalice" palm-palm pass because of the shape the arms and hands make. The "cheater palm-palm pass" is based on a lazy way to do the classic palm-palm pass, but smoothed up. Place your hands together so they're both pointing right, and the left little finger is touching the right knife-edge of the palm. Roll the ball from the right palm, across the knife-edges into the left palm, sliding the hands towards the left all the while so you end up with the hands pointing left, right little finger against left knife-edge. This pass allows you to make the movement quite large, which is good for stage work. For the “baby pass”, you should start with your right palm facing up, the little finger next to the left armpit. The left hand is also palm up, with it’s little finger next to the right forearm or elbow. This position is similar to how a baby is held against the chest. The ball rolls from the right hand to the left. From those four basic passes, it is possible to make more complex passes – palm-palm passes with the wrists crossed, palm-palm passes with the forearms twisted right round, palm-palm passes over the fingertips. As long as the ball passes from one palm into the other without too much messing around in between, it is a palm-palm pass. The choice of which you use at any particular time is aesthetic – whatever looks best is best.
Back-Palm Pass There are two basic forms of back-palm passes. For the most common form, place your right hand in front of you pointing to the left, palm down, and a ball in the cradle. Place the left hand so it’s pointing the same direction, palm up, with the heel of the hand touching the right hand’s fingertips. This is kind of an awkward position, but it can be adapted to more comfortable
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positions after it’s learned. Simply pass the ball along the fingers to the left palm. For a more comfortable form of the above move, place your hands in the beginning position again, then, keeping the heel and fingertips together, move the left hand forward. You’ll find that the angle becomes less awkward, yet the look of the move hasn’t degraded. This version of the back-palm pass is used in the “horizontal circle”. In the less common one, the ball is passed from the cradle back up the arm and off at the wrist to the other palm. The first form is good for large movements, and can be performed slowly, even “isolated”. The second is good for tight, or quick, movements, and is good for passing during “twirling butterflies” parts of your routine.
Palm-Back Pass This is just the opposite of the previous pass. The ball is passed from the palm of one hand to the cradle of the other. The most common two methods are similar to the two most common Back-Palm Passes, but in the opposite direction. For the most common version, place your hands in line, left hand pointing left and palm up, right hand pointing left with the palm down and the fingertips touching the left heel. Pass the ball from the left hand to the right. This must be done relatively slowly; as it is difficult to correct high-speed passes in that position (the hands aren’t too maneuverable like that). The more uncommon pass is done by placing the right hand palm down, parallel to the chest, and the left hand above it, palm up, both wrists touching. The ball passes from the right palm over the base of the thumb to the left hand. In this move, the right hand has more movement available to it, so fast passes can be corrected by raising the fingers, making the ball slow. There is a “Baby Pass” version of this as well. The right hand is placed palm up, with the little finger next to the left armpit. The right hand is placed alongside the left forearm with the thumb pointing downish so the left index finger is fully in contact with the
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right forearm. The ball is rolled from the right hand along the arm to the left.
Back-Back Pass The Back-Back Pass is the more difficult of the basic passes, and can be very frustrating for the beginner. Don’t worry, though – persevere! You will get it. Start with a ball in the right cradle; arm parallel with the chest. Place the left hand in front of it so the base of the index finger is against the right wrist. There is a groove between the index finger and thumb that slides very nicely against the opposite forearm. Try to get your hand into a comfortable position there so that the base of the left thumb is against the right hand’s heel. To start off learning this pass, it is possibly best to bend the left hand up and back so the fingers end up almost touching the ball in an almost vertical cradle. Tip the hands over to the right so the ball rolls over the right knuckles and is stopped by the left hand’s fingers. Tip the hand further and further so the ball is supported more and more in the left cradle, until you can take away the right hand. That method is only good for learning the move – it will hinder the speed at which you can perform moves at a later stage, so we’ll learn to improve it now. Starting again in the same position, lift the right fingers up to about 30 degrees, tilting hand so the ball rolls to the left hand, passing on to just behind the left knuckles. The ball should have enough speed to continue on to the left cradle position. If you find that the ball continues too far and falls off, you can slow its progress by raising the left fingers up at an angle to 41
cause the ball to have to climb uphill. The further you raise the fingers, the quicker the ball will slow. It is also a good idea to move the receiving hand slightly in the direction of the ball’s motion, bringing it to a halt smoothly. You can practice this using a move called the Back-Back Roll. Pass from the right cradle to the left cradle, then bring your right hand under the left to the other side and pass again from left to right. Done continuously, this feels great, and looks like the ball is rolling left to right. This pass is not yet complete. As it is, you are passing directly from the cradle to the opposite cradle. To make it look a lot better, and increase the control you have over the action, you can lengthen the move out by passing to positions further down the hand and back of the arm. Be careful, though – I used to practice with glass balls, which are very heavy and very hard. This caused bruising on the backs of my hands that took weeks to get rid of2. The best place to pass to aesthetically is possibly the position near the base of the radius and ulna bones, but not so near that the ball hits the lump of the ulna’s base (that can hurt, too).
Back-Back Walkaway This move is based on a variant of the Back-Back pass, and looks best when isolated. Start with a ball on the right cradle, hand pointing forwards. Place the left hand in front of the right and roll the ball onto it so at passes onto the back of the left hand and rolls to it’s cradle. Now, repeat the same move onto the right hand. You will need to step forward to be comfortable with this. The move can then be repeated over and over, all the while walking forward. The effect is that the ball is “walking away”, hence Walkaway. This move can also be isolated – the ball stays still, and the hands are pulled from under it, keeping the same movements of the hands, but the ball doesn’t move. This gives the effect that the ball is floating, which is a point of all isolations. 2
It also caused my to learn very, very quickly (through something like shock therapy), but I don’t recommend you learn that way.
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You can also reverse the move, so the ball is actually coming back towards you. In this case, you start with the ball on a cradle, and roll the ball backwards, picking it up with the opposite cradle. If done right, this makes the ball appear as if it’s moving smoothly along a path which is being created as it moves. If you reverse this move, it becomes the Back-Back Walktowards (imaginative naming scheme!).
Palm-Palm Walkaway After learning the Back-Back Walkaway, you should find this simple to learn. It is exactly as you would imagine. Hold a ball in the left palm, place the right hand in front of it so it’s heel touches the left fingertips, and then roll the ball forward onto the right palm. Then repeat with the left hand in front. You can, of course, variate this idea further by having BackPalm Walkaways, Palm-Back Walktowards, etc. I guess further instruction would be very redundant.
Thumb-Thumb Pass This is part of the Twirling Butterfly suite of moves, and looks out of place with most other moves. Start with the right hand over the left, crossing at the wrist. A ball is held in the right Thumb Hold. Twirl the hands as you would a normal Twirling Butterfly, pausing at the palm-palm position to roll the ball from the right hand to the left, grabbing it in the left Thumb Hold. Continue the twirl so you end up in a mirror image of the starting position, then repeat back.
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Body Rolling When you first describe Contact Juggling to a person who has never heard of it, you might say something like “It’s like normal juggling, but the balls are rolled all over the arms and body instead of thrown in the air”. This gives a mental image, which is fascinating, and is what I live for as a CJer – the idea that someone could dance, or mime, all the while rolling a ball on the body as though strings are attached. Unlike Palmspinning, which is a very “close-up” art, body rolling is large and expressive. To entertain your audience, you have to become large and expressive as well. Compare close-up magic and stage magic. In close-up magic, you concentrate on the hands (usually) – it does not matter what expression is on the magician’s face, or whether he/she is wearing an outfit. All that matters is the interaction of the hands with the object being manipulated. In stage magic, however, the magician’s body language is all important. A fantastic contact juggler can practice for weeks, and be baffled about why the audience is not impressed if he/she forgets to include the whole body with the move. I have seen routines where the audience “oohed” and “aahed” at moves which any green CJer could pull off with only the minimum experience – this was because of the performers “stage presence” – an invaluable aid in a performance. By all means, learn the most difficult moves you can learn, but always be aware of how they look to the audience! When you practice any move in body rolling – also practice moving the body to accentuate the move. Pretend the ball has a life of it’s own. One comment I heard about a CJer I knew years ago was that he never moved his legs. The commenter did not say anything about the CJing itself, which said to me that the fact the CJer had not moved his legs made the legs stand out more than the ball. You must avoid this.
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Move your body to focus the audience on the ball. Don’t look around while performing – examine the ball. The audience will pick up on your focus, and watch it themselves.
Forearm Roll After the butterfly, arm rolls are the next learning block. It will take a while to become consistent with them. The forearm roll is much easier than the Backarm Roll (yes, I made up the word “backarm” – what else would you call it?), as the forearm is very smooth, and therefore easier to balance on. To learn, you should first learn to balance a ball on the inside of the elbow. Hold your right arm out in front of you so it is almost straight, but not so much that the elbow is stiff. If you feel the elbow area, you will notice that there is a tendon that connects the biceps to the forearm. You can balance the ball to the right of this. If you straighten the arm even further you’ll notice the area flattens out even further. Don’t straighten so far that your arm is stiff, or you’ll find it difficult to correct the balance of the ball. Okay, now balance the ball there. If the ball moves to the right side of the arm, move the arm further right to compensate. If the ball moves left, move the arm left. This should be fairly easy at the elbow, but you should practice this balance point a lot, to make the action sink in. The next step is to learn to balance in the middle of the forearm. Feel the area. Close your fist and open it to see the difference. When the fist is closed, the arm is tense, and the muscles form a curve, which makes balance a little more difficult, so it is best to learn with the fist open. This agrees with a lot of people’s ideas of how contact juggling should be done, so that’s all the better. Place the ball on that area, and learn to balance there. This will take much longer than the elbow. In my case, it took weeks of practice to get to the stage that I could walk around with a ball there. When you have practiced sufficiently (in your opinion), it is a simple matter to roll a ball from the elbow, through the middle balance point, and to the palm of the hand. 45
Learning the other way around is a little more difficult. The hand is used to catching things, but the elbow isn’t. Try it and see. When the ball is just reaching the elbow, pull the elbow back a little, at the same speed as the ball, and slow it to a stop. This is a variation of the catch principle, which I’ll explain later. This stops the ball, yet isn’t as clumsy as a sudden stop. The ball slows to a halt. Now that you can roll the ball up and down the forearm, you can add it into your practice routines. You could stretch out your Back-Back Butterflies, for example, by doing a forearm roll every time you butterfly into the palm. You can even just do continuous arm rolls – balance the ball on the elbow, and roll to the palm, while pulling the arm in towards you so the ball is not really moving. When the ball reaches the palm, pass it onto the other elbow and roll back. You can also do this in the opposite way. Ferret came up with a pass from one elbow to the other. Roll from palm to elbow, bringing the other elbow in close to it, then roll the ball onto the other elbow. If you’re rolling from the right to left, then you simply move the right arm to the right and lift it – this will cause the ball to move left. If you roll it right, then the ball should just roll on down the other arm. If you want to learn this with larger gap between the elbows, then you should learn Elbow Catches first (described later), then just toss the ball from one to the other and continue the roll.
Backarm Roll The “backarm” is the side of the arm opposite the forearm (duh!). When you are learning to roll on the backarm, it is important to first get a feel of where the muscles are. Hold your arm out in front of you so it is parallel to the chest, palm down. Run your hands over the arm while alternatively clenching and unclenching your fist, hand muscles, and arms. You will notice that the backarm is much lumpier than the forearm. This is why you should learn forearm rolls first. Before beginning your rolling, you should plan out where are the points that the ball should stop or go through. If you tense your 46
biceps, you’ll see that a flat area appears on the inside of the elbow. This is one place you could stop the ball. Another is at the base of the biceps – it is not necessary to tense anything to balance here, but if you tense the back of the upper arm, the muscle helps form a wall just above the elbow which may help while you are learning. Of course, you will have to be feeling the area in order to notice this. They are difficult to see. Each of those areas will help you during Backarm rolls towards the elbow. The balance point in the middle of the backarm is directly on the opposite of the one for the forearm. Luckily the backarm doesn’t really get bumpy until near the elbow. If you straighten out the arm, you’ll see that the backarm muscles form a triangle, with the thin end at the elbow. This makes it difficult to roll with a straight arm, so we’ll learn with the arm bent at a right angle – parallel to the chest. Choose which spot you want to stop the ball in on the elbow, and mentally plot a course from the cradle to there. This is for two reasons: 1) you will know what you’re doing at all times, and 2) you will have accomplished the move already in your head, making the physical act much easier. Now, roll the ball. Concentrate on the stopping position so you really know what you’re doing as the ball gets there. Make sure that the elbow is in the right position, with the appropriate muscles tensed. Difficult, yes? It gets easier with practice. It is much easier to do a Backarm Roll if you don’t have to worry about stopping the ball. Place the right arm in position, with the ball on the cradle, then place the left arm in front of it. The right hand should rest on the left bicep, and the left arm should be pressed against the right. Roll the ball right down to the elbow, and then pass the ball forward to the left hand’s cradle. Then bring the right arm under the left (if you bring it over, it will obscure the audience’s view) and bring it against the right’s, so you are in the opposite starting position. This is a very extended Back-Back Pass. A variation of this is called the “Genie Roll”. Start with the right arm in front with the ball on the cradle, and the left arm behind, hand resting against the upper arm. Roll the ball down to the elbow, and pass back to the left cradle, which then rolls to its 47
elbow and passes forward to the starting position again. It is called the “Genie” Roll because of the position the arms take. A lot of people simply roll the ball right off the elbow in a straight line onto the opposite arm’s cradle. The receiving hand should be poking out past the starting arm’s elbow. This can be continued on the opposite arm then. Rolling down the backarm is a bit harder, as you have to figure out how to get into a position where you may have to roll from the elbow to the cradle. This can be done with the exact opposite move as just above. Place a ball in the left cradle; arm parallel to the chest, extended to the right. Place the right arm over it, extended to the left, and toss the ball to the right elbow, and roll to the cradle – if you toss it with a lot of sideways motion, you will not have to balance on the elbow before starting the roll. A very good way to practice your backarm rolls is to vary how you pass from one arm to the other. You can roll a ball to the elbow and pass to the other arm either inside or outside the bend of the arm, or behind the upper arm. By varying the pass, you are learning both to strengthen your backarm rolls, and also essential moves for recovering mistakes. The more ways you can do a move, the more likely you will be able to recover it smoothly when something goes wrong. Of course, the above variations can be reversed as well.
Backarm-Forearm Roll When rolling from the Backarm Roll to the Forearm Roll, you should first make sure that the backarm roll is performed parallel to the chest. As the ball reaches the elbow, allow it to roll slightly up the upper arm, and bring the forearm up and over in an arc as if you were performing a Windshieldwiper, then allow the ball to continue its roll down the forearm. This can be done to extend the roll in as long a line as possible. For a continuous Backarm to Forearm Roll, start with a ball in the right palm, butterfly it to the cradle, Backarm to Forearm Roll it, and you will end up with the ball in the palm again, ready to start again.
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Forearm-Backarm Roll Rolling from the Forearm Roll to the Backarm Roll is slightly harder, as when you are turning the forearm over, the elbow rises up on the outside, which means that your ball may drop on the inside. Therefore, you should roll the ball a little further than you would normally, possible giving it a little “hop” with the elbow to get it over to the outside of the elbow. For continuous Forearm to Backarm Rolls, it’s just the opposite of the continuous Backarm-Forearm Roll – start with a ball in the right cradle, butterfly to palm, Forearm-Backarm Roll it, and you will end up with the ball in the cradle again, ready to restart.
Chop Roll An extreme form of arm roll is the Chop Roll. It may help to learn this in a point-to-point manner. Start with the ball held on the Elbow Hold. The hand is held in a chop position (knife-edge down, thumb up). Roll the ball down to the hand, so it ends up in an Open Fist Hold. To do this, you’ll have to roll along the edge of the forearm, almost onto the backarm – the tendon from thumb to arm and the wrist bone tend to be a it bumpy. From there, bring the forearm straight up so the ball is in a Stretched Three Finger Hold. Carry on from that so the hand goes back behind the head, and the ball rolls down the backarm to rest on the extreme opposite of the Elbow Hold. It is easy to balance here as it is very flat, but getting into a position to use the hold is a bit awkward. From there, “simply” roll back up the arm, over the fingertips, and back to the Elbow Hold. It may help to sort of toss the ball upwards from the elbow before starting the chop motion required to bring the ball over and back to the starting position.
Armroll to Shoulder Hold This is just a roll along the arms ending at the shoulder. The Backarm Roll seems to be the most aesthetic one for long rolls, so use that one.
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There are two main areas in which the ball can be stopped – between the clavicle and the trapezius (the huge muscle covering the shoulder blade), and between the clavicle and pectoral muscle. The first one is difficult to get out of – the ball is essentially stuck there unless you either jerk it out with a body movement, or nudge it out with your chin. The second one can be used to go either back down the same arm, across the chest into a chest roll, over the shoulder towards the back of the neck, or down the body to your legs. James Ernest used this move as an example of “serendipity” – that even mistakes can be used to form new moves (he was practicing chest rolls, and the ball halted above the clavicle).
Spiral This move looks fantastic when accompanied by a lot of body movement. In the video “Contact Juggling: Part One”, Greg does several variations on it – pirouetting, both arms at once, and straightforward. Start with a ball at the Elbow Hold. From there, slightly toss it forward and up to give it a bit of momentum. The ball rolls up the forearm, but as it rolls, you should turn the arm under it so as it is coming up to about 2/3rds of the arm, it is then rolling on the backarm. As the ball approaches the hand, you spiral the arm around it so the ball curves around the heel of the hand and into it’s palm. Allow the ball to continue up the hand and into the Tripod or Three Finger Hold.
Helicopter This could be thought of as the opposite of the Spiral. Start with a ball in the cradle. Roll it along the backarm until it reaches the middle of the backarm. Using the elbow as a pivot point, swing the arm in towards the chest so it ends up with the hand pointing palm down and held above it’s own shoulder. The ball is still in the same position.
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Continue the pivot, twisting the hand palm-up so the ball rolls onto the forearm and the arm ends up pointing away from you again. Let the ball continue its roll to the elbow. I like to do this move, and continue with a Chestroll followed by a Spiral in the opposite arm. It is possible, but difficult, to do multiple Helicopters – when the ball arrives on the forearm at the end of the spin, twist the arm over (hop the ball to make sure it doesn’t get knocked off), and start a new spin.
Forearm Chestroll You will find after a while that it is easier to do Backarm Chest Rolls, but it is easier for the beginner to learn Forearm Chest Rolls. To do these, you should be proficient with Forearm Rolls on both arms. Just like learning the Forearm and Backarm Rolls, it is a great idea to plot out the ball’s route before journeying out. First of all, get an image of how you will be standing – you will be standing leaning slightly back, with both arms outstretched, as if inviting someone to hug you. The ball will travel up one arm, across the chest, and down the other arm. In greater detail, the ball will take the smoothest path possible, avoiding all bumpy muscles – it will roll up the forearm, up the inside of the upper arm (avoiding the biceps), crossing to the chest just above the armpit (avoiding the shoulders), crossing the chest below the collarbone (another bumpy area), and down the other side in the same method. After we have decided the route the ball is to take, it is time to decide how are you going to encourage it to take that route. The key is to use your body to change the ball’s momentum to make it want to move in the route you have planned. Rolling up the forearm is easy enough. Rolling along the inside of the upper arm encourages the ball to move towards the chest. As the ball comes towards the armpit, lean back, then move your entire body in the direction the ball should go, encouraging the ball to speed up to cross the chest – this movement is subtle, and you 51
won’t notice it after a while, but use it while learning so it becomes a habit. The ball should move just fast enough to reach the other side before starting to fall. The roll down the other arm is just a controlled fall from there. Leaning back also encourages you to get your chin out of the way – you don’t want a lump of acrylic hitting you in the jaw – especially in front of an audience (it’s a bit unprofessional).
Backarm Chestroll This chestroll is a bit more difficult to learn, but ends up being easier, and is a lot smoother in the end. It can also be repeated over and over, making for a good pause in the routine. Again, we start by figuring out how we’re going to stand. Stand straight, back tilted back a bit, and arms held out palm down as if they were around a large barrel. The index fingers should be about a foot apart (30cm). The ball will again be traveling by the smoothest route. This time, the route is clearer. The ball travels up the backarm, along the outside of the biceps (which is lying flat because of the pose the arm is in), midway between the armpit and shoulder, and along the chest just under the clavicle. The route down the other arm is just the same. To learn this chestroll, it is best to start with a large ball before gradually using smaller and smaller ones. I use a novelty 6” tennis ball to learn long body rolls. It is a good idea to imagine the ball rolling smoothly in a circle along the arms and chest, and make sure that the pressure is the same at all points. Don’t forget the small nudge in the direction of movement that you should do is the ball reaches the shoulder. It is needed to make sure that the ball doesn’t just get to the sternum then drop. If you do a lot of toss juggling, a chest roll thrown in at an appropriate point is a real crowd pleaser. This move can be repeated over and over by bringing the hands together at the end of the move and passing the ball over the fingertips and repeating the roll.
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A video I saw once (at yo-yo.org) showed a good example of when to allow the ball to drop at the middle of the chest. The person performing the routine (someone called Mike, I think) sat down on the floor, did a chestroll, and allowed the ball to roll down the chest and up the legs to the feet (he raised them together to make a channel for the ball to follow). Taking more from that video, it is a good idea to practice the Backarm Chest Roll in stages – practice Backarm Rolling to the elbow, then passing to the opposite hand, practice rolling right to the elbow and onto the opposite hand, practice rolling to the opposite shoulder before passing to the same hand you rolled from, and then practice the whole move from cradle to cradle. Don’t forget to practice doing this in both ways. You may never get as proficient in one way as the other, but you could say that the CJ equivalent of toss juggling’s “yeah, but can you do it with one more?” is “yeah, but can you do it in the other direction?”
Neck Roll This is also called the Back Roll, which can confuse, as some people call a Back Roll the roll of a ball from the neck to the lower back. Rolling behind the neck is more difficult than via the chest. Mostly, this is because of the shape of the shoulders – they are concave to the front. An added difficulty is the inability to watch what you’re doing, but that doesn’t matter if you have practiced the other Chest Rolls thoroughly. It is easier to perform this using the Backarm Roll than the Forearm Roll. This is partly because you will have to lean the head well forward, an awkward move if your palms are facing up. Also, having the palms facing up causes the shoulders to rise slightly, which will make later stages difficult. Using a large ball again, you should move as if to perform a Backarm Chestroll. When the ball reaches the shoulder, however, you should bow the head forward, and stoop forward at the waist a little so the ball rolls along the shoulders and behind the neck. At this point, it may help to stop the ball in a neck hold, to allow you time to think about getting the ball back down the other arm. To do this easily, you can turn the head to watch the ball 53
approaching, and raise the shoulder the ball is heading towards – when the ball goes behind the head, hunch your shoulders to slow and stop the ball. If you have long hair, it may be advisable to either have it loose, or tied into two separate ponytails. Having a single ponytail makes an awkward obstacle at the neck. I suppose you could get around that by hopping the ball directly over the neck using the shoulders, but you don’t want to learn that until you’ve learned to do it the old fashioned way. After you practice this for a while, you’ll probably come across one or two things that you absolutely need to iron out. If you find that the ball keeps falling off when it hits the neck, then you are not leaning the head far enough forward. It should feel like you are ducking under the ball – as if the ball was coming for your head and you were avoiding it. If you find the ball rolls onto the opposite shoulder blade before falling behind you, try leaning the head forward more and pulling the shoulders back a bit. If the ball goes around the neck, but then drops directly in front of you, try slowing down the move, and stand up a bit more as the ball goes behind the neck. This move can look very good if it is alternately combined with Backarm Chest Rolls continuously.
Neck Loop On contactjuggling.org, this is called an “Around the Neck Roll”, but I think a “Loop” is more evocative of what is going on here. Basically, a loop is where the ball travels from one position, rolls around something, and returns to the original position. In this move, the ball starts in the cradle, rolls to the chest, rolls round to the back of the neck, and returns to the cradle. Congrats to Michael Glenn for creating this gem, which I would have thought is impossible beforehand. Of course, as we always say on .org, if you can imagine it, then you can do it. Before you start this move you should be very confident of your Backarm Chestrolls, and have at least reasonable success with your Backarm Neckrolls. 54
Start with the ball in the right cradle (reverse, as usual, for the left hand). Roll the ball as for a Backarm Chestroll, with the roll traveling in the Chestroll route right up until it hits the middle of the chest. Now, pass the ball onto the left upper arm, but lower the arm so the ball is more on top of it than in front. When the ball is there, duck your head as if for a neck catch, and raise your left upper arm so the ball is passed back to the back of the neck. If you’re paying attention, you’ll notice that the ball isn’t so much passing around the neck, as the neck is passing around the ball’s route. The ball is returning in almost the exact path it used to get there in the first place. As with a Neck Roll, concentrate on getting the ball into a solid neck hold before letting it past onto the right upper arm, raising the head and bringing the ball safely down to the right cradle. Some people consider this to be one of the hardest commonly known contact juggling moves. I was pretty excited when I got it the first time.
Pirouette Neck Roll This form of Neck Roll is surprisingly easy to do, once you can already do a normal Neck Roll. Basically, the idea is to twirl your body whole performing a Neck Roll. In effect, this isolates the ball, so it seems that you twirl under the ball, and the ball doesn’t move. It is important to keep a rounded shape while doing this move. The usual Neck Roll can be done in any old rickety way, but in order for this version to come off properly, it is absolutely essential that the ball roll smoothly.
Back Roll For this move, you have to either be very flexible, or be ready to get into some rather strange positions. Learn to Neck Roll first, because this involves half of that move.
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Okay – roll a ball up the backarm and duck your head so the ball goes into the neck hold. Hold there for a moment so the ball loses momentum. Now, you have to decide how to do this next one – the lazy way is to drop carefully to your hands and knees, and very carefully lean your head back so the ball is pushed over the shoulders and onto the lower spine. Curve your back upwards to make a cradle for the ball to roll in. The non-lazy, flexible way is to do the same as above, but while standing. Keep your legs straight, and bend at the waist, remembering the curve of the back. You may need to spread your legs quite a bit in order to keep your balance. Getting the ball back up is interesting. Drop your upper back so the ball rolls towards the shoulders. As the ball comes up towards the shoulders, stand up quickly, and curve your back back to its original shape. The ball should roll back into the neck hold. From there, you can simply roll the ball down the other (or the original) arm and into the hands.
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Catches All contact juggling catches are based on the same method – you plot the approach of the ball to the catching limb, and when the ball is nearly in the right position, you move the limb to meet the ball, and then move the limb in the direction of the ball’s path at the ball’s speed, smoothly bringing them both to a halt. This can be seen in action by examining how you catch a ball in the open palm (without using your fingers). The ball comes down, and you bring the hand up to meet it. You match the speed of the ball with your hand, and bring them both to a smooth halt. This is a much more aesthetic catch in most cases than a gripping catch – one where the ball is caught between two or more opposing limbs (the fingers, the forearm and biceps, the feet, etc).
Elbow Catch The Elbow Catch is an ideal way to start learning contact juggling catches. The area is easy to balance a ball on, and it can easily be moved up and down – the directions you will usually have to catch a ball in. First of all, you should practice without a ball. Put your catching arm directly out in front of you, palm up, elbow bent at about 150 degrees (almost, but not quite, straight) with the hand at a level just below the shoulder. Watch the elbow while you alternatively push the hand further out, and bring it back in. As you push the hand out, the elbow rises, and as you bring it back in, the elbow sinks. Now, place a ball in the palm of the same hand, and toss it in an arc about a foot high towards the elbow. As the ball approaches the elbow, straighten the arm to bring the elbow up to meet it. Just before the ball hits, start to bring the elbow back down, so the ball doesn’t just bounce right off again. Bring the elbow down at the same time as the ball. Bring the elbow to a halt, and balance the ball.
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Outside Elbow Catch If you place your arm in front of you as if to perform a Backarm Roll, the side of the elbow facing upwards is known as the “outside” side. The goal of this move is to catch the ball on a stable spot there. Some such spots are mentioned in the Backarm Roll section. If you raise the elbow while keeping the hand still, you can see how the elbow is to move when it is catching the ball. This method of catching is best used for catching balls tossed from the opposite side of the body. Toss from the opposite hand to the elbow, with the ball describing an arc with its apex about a foot higher than the elbow. As the ball approaches, lift the elbow up to meet it. Bring the elbow down, then, at the same speed as the ball, and slow it to a halt.
Shoulder Catch This is done using the same method as the Head Catch, but is obviously much simpler because less caution is needed. There are two points at which you can hold the ball here, as pointed out in the Armroll To Shoulder Hold. The point below the clavicle is best for low tosses where you plan on leading the ball out with an Armroll. The point between the clavicle and trapezius is best for throws that are mostly vertical, or tosses from behind the back (a toss from behind the back to the Shoulder Hold is called “The Ungodly Jose”). Basically, a toss to the lower point is caught by leaning back at the same speed as the ball is moving. If you read what I’ve written about the Head Catch, you can use all the tips in there to help you with this (apart from furrowing your forehead, of course). The toss to the upper point is caught by raising your shoulder to meet the ball, and then dropping your whole body with the ball. You can help the catch, if you want, by leaning your head over to grip the ball between shoulder and jaw.
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Foot Catch This is easier to do in bare feet or wearing pumps or some similar tightly shaped footwear. It is best not to learn this while wearing shoes, boots, or runners (or “sneakers” as Merkins call them), as eventually, you will wear out the footwear, and when you replace it, you will have to learn all over again. This is easier to learn with a large ball and work your way down. I learned it with a soccer ball, and worked my way down through my trusty novelty tennis ball to a standard 2.5” acrylic. Drop the ball from about waist-high. It is best to drop from about 1.5 to 2 feet in front of the body to allow the leg room to maneuver – in order to lift the foot, the knee must be lifted. If it gets in the way, your ball will not reach the foot. As soon as you’ve dropped the ball, raise the foot to meet the ball, and then drop the foot at the same speed as the ball, bringing it to a halt. An ideal place to catch the ball is just behind the second and middle toes. Raise the toes to create a groove to hold the ball. It is a very good idea to spend some time, before attempting this, practicing balancing the ball on the foot. If you were wondering what could be done once you have the ball on your foot, I’d recommend watching some of Francis Brunn’s old videos. You can find some through the www.jugglingdb.com website. He used larger balls, but there is no reason why smaller balls can’t be used. One example from one of his videos is to roll the ball from the foot, up to the waist, then twist around to let the ball roll up the back and down one arm. You will need to be very flexible to perform that move, but as incentive, you will have the respect of the whole contact juggling community.
Head Catch Do NOT practice this with a hard ball until you are certain you have it down with a softer one. Learn the Shoulder Catch first – it uses practically the same motions, and will give you practice in the technique needed.
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The head catch is one move where the direction of the ball’s throw is very important to decide before trying the catch. Remember that in order to successfully slow the ball to a halt, you must be able to move in the same direction as the ball. This will be difficult in the case of the head. For example, if you toss straight up, then the only way to bring the head down at the right speed is to use your whole body to move the head. This is difficult, but not impossible – don’t try it until you’ve learned a simpler way. We’ll start with the simpler way. The ball will be tossed from about one foot in front of the chest in an arc, which would end one foot behind the chest. The top of the forehead is at the apex of the arc’s path, which means that when the ball reaches the forehead, it will not be moving upwards anymore. The only speed you’ll have to match is it’s backwards motion. Before tossing for the first time, decide where you are going to catch the ball. Most people have a fairly flat forehead (except me… courtesy of some nasty falls in my past), so you should be able to balance the ball easily without too much correction. If you can’t find a suitable place to hold the ball, then try furrowing your brow and pressing your eyebrows in towards each other. This will cause your forehead muscles to bunch, making a cushion for the ball to sit on. Now that you have a place to stop the ball, we can start learning the catch. First of all, you should practice for a while holding the ball just before the chest, then bringing it up in a smooth slow arc to sit on the balance spot – holding it in your hand all the while. After you get this smooth and can keep the ball there for a while, try learning to bring the ball up and roll it into the balance point from an inch or so below it. Use your head to bring the ball under control. It is important to learn this at this point, as when you toss the ball for the first time, you will not have your hand to bring the ball under control. For the first toss, start again with the ball held just before the chest. Bring your hand up as usual, and then just as the hand is over the bridge of the nose, release the ball with a little push so it is
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tossed to the point just before the balance point and rolled into place. Gradually, you should be able to make the toss longer and longer as you lower the hand, until it’s straight from the chest. I have been told (I haven’t seen this yet) that Tony Duncan can toss a silicone ball straight from his foot to his forehead. I’m sure it is possible – I have seen Francis Brunn do it with a larger ball.
Neck Catch This move is even more dangerous than the Head Catch; so make absolutely certain you can do it with a soft ball before moving onto a hard ball. You are best off learning with a large soft ball (trusty novelty tennis ball time…) before moving onto a small soft ball (trusty non-novelty tennis ball time…), and finally onto your regular ball. You must be aware of the dangers of this move before trying it. There was a 19th century performer who used to perform the neck catch with a cannonball. He died when he misjudged the toss and hit the back of his head with the ball. An acrylic is much lighter than a cannonball, but nevertheless, you should be careful. The back of the head is a dangerous area to mess around with, and the spine is not to be trifled with either, so make sure that you have other catches down well before you try this – to make sure you have the general catch method down pat. Another danger is that you cannot see what you are doing, but we can work around that. Starting with a large ball, toss it up six inches above your head so it would fall about a foot in front of your face. In fact, allow it to fall a few times to make sure you have it right. Now, try the toss again, but bend forward, keeping your head level, and bring your arms up. You keep your head level so the spine curves to catch the ball – not bounce it off, and your arms are brought up to bunch your shoulder muscles, creating an added cushion. If you have the distance right, then the ball will either land on your shoulders and neck, or bounce off them. 62
If the ball hit your back, then throw the ball further forward – a foot and a half in front of the face, for example. If it hit your head, throw it closer to your face, or bow further forward after the toss. If the ball bounced off the neck, then you are not bowing fast enough, or you’re bowing too soon. The ball should clear the head just before you start your bow, and the bow should start off slow, move a bit faster as the ball approaches the neck, and slow to a halt after the ball has landed. You can bring the ball off the neck by either reversing the bow while leaning your head downwards then flicking it up, or by rolling down either of the arms. When you have the catch down with a large ball, try making the ball smaller and smaller until you think you’re ready for a hard one. Before catching with a hard ball, make sure you are completely confident with the catch. If you hesitate at all, then the catch will be wrong, and you may hurt yourself. Certainly, I wouldn’t like an acrylic slammed into the back of the head. You should be wary of it as well. Make sure you are doing a low catch before you try tossing higher up.
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Misc “Tricks” This chapter describes some moves which are not palmspinning, and are not ballrolling, yet have made it into the contact juggling repertoire.
Elevator This wonderful move looks fantastic when the body is held as still as possible. Start by holding a ball in the crade of your left hand. Bring the cradle up to about eye height. Your other hand is directly below it, about waist height, palm up. Drop the ball from the cradle to the palm, without moving the hands or body beyond what is necessary to get he ball moving. That was not the Elevator – that was the reverse of it… Imagine what you have just done was filmed, then reversed. That is the Elevator. Hold a ball in the right palm, about waist height, with the other hand above it, about eye height, cradle up. Using a wave motion, bring the ball forward to the fingers. This wave motion helps you to “whip” the ball upwards with the fingertips so the hand doesn’t move too much – making the ball almost seem to go up of it’s own accord. The ball goes up so that if the left hand fingers are kept still, the ball would hit the finger tips before falling back. Curl the fingers so the ball goes just above hand height, then straighten the fingers out again. If you get the toss just right, then the ball seems to float upwards and stop right on the hand. The ball should not go any higher than the hand, or you may have trouble catching it and keeping still at the same time. To help with the illusion, you can use your body movement to try bring attention to the top hand, so the audience watches it instead of the left. I like to do a finger-flourish to distract the audience. Edson’s Enigma Greg’s Grip 64
One Ball Combinations This chapter is a list of combinations of moves that are common in the CJ world. Each one uses two or more of the moves mentioned in the previous chapter
Back-Back Butterflies This move can be seen in The Labyrinth – Jareth says, “I’ve brought you a gift”, then produces a crystal and manipulates it. Most of that manipulation is the Back-Back Butterfly. To learn it, first learn the movements without a ball, then learn it one piece at a time with a ball. Start off with your forearms pointing up, the hands palm up, the right hand pointing right, and the left hand pointing left. Keeping your elbows still, fold your forearms over so the right forearm is closest to the body. Keep the hands palm-up as long as possible, bringing them palm down at the last moment so they’re flat against the opposite arms. Now unfold the arms again to the original position. While the arms are unfolding, keep the hands palm-down until the last moment, then bring them palm-up again to the original position. Now repeat the fold, but with the right arm on the outside, and the left hand closest to the body. Unfold again, keeping the hands palm-down until the last moment. Now that you’ve gone through the motions, repeat them a few times to get the movements smooth. Concentrate on making the hand motions as smooth as possible – the motions should not be jerky, as you will be doing it with a ball next. Okay – time to learn with a ball. Go back to the beginning position – forearms raised, both hands palm up, and a ball in the right palm. Now fold the arms with the right arm closest the body (on the inside), butterflying the ball at the last moment into the cradle. From there, Back-Back Pass the ball from the right cradle to the left cradle. 65
Butterfly both arms out so you’re in the starting position but the ball is on the opposite side. Now repeat the above move, with the ball’s arm always butterflying to the chest-side of the other arm. Remember to try to keep the arms’ movement symmetrical, and keep track of the movement the ball makes. Try to make the ball’s movements as smooth as possible, with no hesitations or halts.
Palm-Palm Butterfly This is the opposite of the Back-Back Butterfly, and very good for practicing your cradle balance and choosing which Palm-Palm Pass is best for you. Start with both hands in front of you as if you were to do a Back-Back Pass from the left to right. The ball should be in the right cradle. Butterfly the ball out of the cradle and into the right palm. From here, it’s up to you which Palm-Palm Pass you do. If you want to do a quick move, maybe you’ll choose the Chalice Pass. If you want it to be as large as possible, choose the Cheater Pass. Up to you. After you have passed to the left palm, butterfly the ball into the cradle, bringing both hands together as if to prepare for a BackBack Pass again, this time with the left hand in front. Reverse the move to complete.
Palm-Palm Twisting Butterfly When I placed a video of the Twisting Butterfly on the contactjuggling.org website, I had one person comment that it was pointless, that there was nothing that can be done with it. I then described some variants of it leading up to a four-ball move. The point here is that even the simplest moves can be extended to create great new moves. To do the Palm-Palm Twisting Butterfly, first start with the hands crossed, right over left, right hand palm-down and left hand palmup. Place the ball in the left palm.
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Now, start twisting the butterfly. When you get to the point where both hands are symmetrical – forearms together, fingers pointing forward and up – pass the ball from the left palm to right palm (using the Chalice Pass) and complete the movement.
Flytrap The Flytrap is a variation of the Palm-Palm Butterfly. Start with the left hand palm-up in front of the chest pointing to the left. The right hand is then placed on top of the left cradle-up. The ball is placed in the right cradle. Keeping the hands touching at the wrist, butterfly the ball into the right palm, moving only the right hand. You should now be in a position to do the Chalice Pass. Do so, and then butterfly the ball into the left cradle moving only the left hand. You should now be in the opposite position from the starting one. This move is a good one to move into or out of a Cage section of your routine.
Circle This movement is a reason for great happiness when you are learning contact juggling. When you have learned this move, and can intersperse it with Back-Back and Palm-Palm butterflies at will, you can say you have truly accomplished something. You have gotten past the difficult part of the learning curve, and always have some moves to fall back on when you are fed up trying harder ones. This move is simply a Back-Back Pass followed by a butterfly to palm followed by a Palm-Palm Pass followed by a butterfly to cradle. The movement of the hands makes the ball travel through a circle – hence “The Circle”. Some people call this “Around The World”.
Walking Halfpipe This is an extension of Back-Back Rolls. Start with a ball in the palm of the right hand. Palm-Back Pass. Back-Back Pass. Back-Palm Pass. The ball should now be in the left palm. Simple!
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You can do this flat, or raise both ends of the pattern (so the ball travels in a ‘U’ or “Halfpipe” shape). Greg Maldonado and Owen Edson like to extend this even further by bringing the ball up to a Tripod Hold. You can extend it further again by bringing it to a Three-Finger Hold.
Horizontal Circle The Walking Halfpipe uses three of the four Basic passes – BackBack, Back-Palm, and Palm-Back. This move adds the last, the Palm-Palm Pass, to make a full workout for your passes. Learn the Walking Halfpipe. Then, doing it flat, start to do it so the Palm Holds at the endpoints are facing away from you – the fingers are pointing forward. If you do the Back-Back Passes so the fingers are pointing about 30 degrees forwards, then you can bring the palms even closer, until the fingers almost touch – let the ball roll over the ends of the fingers to the opposite hand, and you can repeat the whole movement over and over. Spiral Curly Backwards Prayer Backhand Roll 1b MillsMess Circle
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Palmspinning Palmspinning is the simplest way to contact juggle more than one ball. It is the art of spinning balls in your hands so they form what looks like “bubbles” that move in entrancing ways. The groups of balls may break apart and reform into new patterns, or separate completely and revert to body rolling. Some of the more mesmerizing patterns incorporate isolations, where parts of the patterns stay still in space, and other parts of the pattern and the body revolve and rotate around them. Palmspinning can be performed with a minimum of one ball, and up to eleven have been used to form patterns. The easiest pattern, the 2b Palmspin, is used in all sorts of alternative health plans. For details of how palmspinning affects your health, see the website www.handhealth.com. Palmspinning looks easy. In fact, when done smoothly, it looks like the balls are doing all the work, and you are just providing a platform for them. This effect is evident because of one of the differences between palmspinning and body rolling. Whereas bodyrolling uses expansive gestures to move the balls, the movements in palmspinning are extremely subtle – slight shifts in balance are all that is needed in most cases. This can be seen very effectively when you learn to spin a 4stack with large balls. Palmspinning can be very simple, using the various shapes of the stacks to define your routine, or it can be complex, with balls interchanging and swapping hands at any time. In the beginning, I would encourage you to learn all the 2b moves before going onto anything else, then, no matter what else you practice, I’d encourage you to get your 3b moves down solid and always practice them – plenty of other palmspinning moves are built on a 3b base, so make sure that is solid. You might be surprised that I leave one ball moves until after the four ball moves, but it is easy to understand when you start learning – the 1b palmspinning moves are much harder than the 3b moves, and I believe harder than the 4b – therefore, I’ve placed them after the four. Try them anyway when you feel like it – it may just be me… 69
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Basic Palmspinning (1-4 balls) 2b Palmspin In contact juggling “notation”, 2b is short for “2 ball”. The 2b Palmspin is very well known all around the world. It is used in oriental alternative medicine as a method of stimulating points of the hand (and meanwhile giving them some exercise and flexibility). If you go into just about any alternative health shop you will find a set of “Chinese Medicine Balls”, most of which have small bells in them, which tinkle when you roll them. In CJ, the 2b Palmspin is taken a few steps further. The balls are larger, forcing the fingers to exercise more, we don’t isolate ourselves to rolling in just one direction, and the movement of each ball can be individually controlled. Place two balls in the right hand. The first should be in the palm near the heel on the little finger’s side. The second is held between the thumb, index finger, and side of the middle finger. The fingers should be relaxed and in contact with both balls. Forgetting about the back ball, straighten out the middle finger a little and push the front ball to the left with the thumb. Straighten out the ring finger and curl the index finger in so it pushes the ball further left. The thumb loses contact with the ball and the little finger loses contact with the back ball. Straighten the little finger and curl in the middle finger slightly, but not so much that the ball falls off the hand. The back ball may start rolling towards the thumb now. Push the thumb downwards so the back ball rolls towards it. The index finger should curl in slightly to stop the ball from rolling too far. When the ball is behind and to the right of the front ball, curl in the little and ring fingers to make the front ball roll back towards 71
the heel. This will push the back ball further to the right where the thumb, index finger, and the side of the middle finger can stop it. Now you can practice this move over and over. Soon you will be doing it without thinking about it. If you practice for a long time, the tendons on the back of the hand may start hurting or becoming warm. If this happens, stop practicing and relax for a while or practice in the other hand. Learning in the opposite direction is difficult for some people. Just go through the steps one at a time in reverse, with one addition: To start off, uncurl the little and middle fingers, and push the thumb-side ball to the back with the thumb. When you get really good, you can start learning to palmspin without the balls touching. This is difficult for beginners, so practice the normal palmspin in both hands and directions well before you start on it. Some people find the clicking that happens with palmspinning to be a nuisance, but it is not a sign that you are doing it “wrong”. The importance is in the overall movement of the balls, not in a precisely kept distance between them.
2b Palmspin Transfer The difference between a transfer and a pass in CJ is that a pass is simply a way of moving one or more balls from one hand to the other, whereas a transfer is about moving two or more balls from one hand to another while retaining their pattern. Thus, a 2b Palmspin Transfer is about moving the two balls from one hand to the other, while keeping the palmspin going. There are two basic ways of performing a transfer. The first is simply to move the motion over, so that if the spin was clockwise, the balls retain that spin. The second is to reverse the spin, so if the balls started out clockwise, they end up anticlockwise. To keep the same spin, you have to learn to spin both clockwise and anticlockwise in both hands. Start with the two balls in the right hand, spinning anticlockwise. This is called a “pushing” palmspin, based on the thumb’s motion.
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Place the left hand next to the right, and move the palmspin over so both hands are performing it at the same time. The center of the palmspin should be between the hands. Now, raise the right hand, tilting the palmspin so it moves on to the left. At this point, you are now doing a “pulling” palmspin, because the left thumb pulls the ball into motion. To reverse the spin, you start with the anticlockwise spin in the right hand again. Place the left hand next to it. Now, allow one of the right hand balls to “escape” into the left hand, so it’s heading for the heel of the hand. The other ball chases after it so you start a clockwise spin in the left hand. This is called a 2b Palmspin “Chasing” Transfer, as the balls chase each other from hand to hand. If you continue transferring the balls from one side to another, you’ll see that they are chasing each other in a figure eight pattern.
3b Palmspin The 3 Ball Palmspin is a problem for many people. After trying it for a while, they decide that it’s impossible for them to do it as “the balls are too large”, or “my fingers don’t move that way”. This is wrong. As has been said many times on www.contactjuggling.org, if you can hold three balls in your hand, you can spin three balls in your hand. If you think about it, you don’t have to learn to spin the balls all the way around – the 3-ball pattern is symmetrical such that when the pattern is spun through 120 degrees, it’s the same as when it wasn’t moved at all. So – all you have to learn is to spin the balls through one third of a circle – the other thirds are the same move repeated. Place three balls in your palm such that one is in the palm held at the heel, and the fingers hold the other two.
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There are two directions in which the balls can be spun. In the right hand, an anti-clockwise spin is called a “pushing” palmspin (based on the movement of the thumb), and a clockwise spin is called a “pulling” spin. In the left hand, this is reversed. An anticlockwise spin is “pulling”, and a clockwise spin is “pushing”. Some people find pushing spins easier than pulling spins. It is your decision, which you learn first. It is important to learn both, though, for later moves that sometimes depend on them. For the “pushing” spin, we start in the start position, and curl the little finger in to pull its ball towards the back. Straightening the thumb allows the back ball to roll forward along its length, causing the entire pattern to start its spin. As the back ball comes forward, move the thumb behind it and push it forward to complete one third of the spin. Now, all that’s required is to repeat this move twice more to complete a full circle. For the “pulling” spin, you curl the index finger to push it’s ball back, and curl the little finger to the outside of the pattern to encourage it’s ball to move towards the index finger. Allow the thumb to slide under the index finger’s ball as it approaches, and when it’s possible, pull the ball towards the back of the pattern, completing a one-third rotation. No just repeat this twice to complete the circle. A lot of people find this move tricky to get, so here are a few tips to note. It is a habit of a lot of people to raise the front higher than the back, making the balls want to roll back, and as there is already a ball at the heel in some positions, the front balls therefore roll off beside it. Keep the front of the hand slightly downwards to counter this. Your fingers will stop the ball from rolling off from the front. Start off with small balls – perhaps pool or snooker balls. This will allow you to get the motion right without worrying so much about the balls always rolling off the hands. Practice while doing something else. Watch TV, or read a book, or whatever. Your hands will eventually accustom themselves to the movement of the balls, and you will find that you are learning the move smoothly without even trying. 74
It is possible, but very difficult, to do a 3b Palmspin with the balls completely separate from each other. It is essential to learn it that way if you are using balls that do not slide against each other, but otherwise, there is no need to go that extra yard.
3b Cascade This is a horizontal version of Toss Juggling's Cascade (the easiest 3 ball juggling pattern). Start with two balls in the right hand and one in the left. Spin the right balls anticlockwise, then pass one of the balls to the left hand. Now spin the left balls clockwise before passing one of the balls to the right hand. You can also do this the opposite way - spin the right hand clockwise and the left hand anti-clockwise. If you'd like a challenge, try isolation one of the balls while continuing the cascade pattern - it's harder than it sounds! Or, if you're wondering what other Toss Juggling moves made the translation to CJ, try The Box, or Mills Mess, or try make up your own version of a popular Toss Juggling move - Burkes Barrage, Rubenstein's Revenge, Dancey's Devilment, etc.
3b Palmspin Transfer In this transfer, you palmspin in one hand, and then simply pass it from one hand to the other without stopping the spin. The awkward part is that when you spin a palmspin in the right hand in your normal direction and pass it to the left, you end up spinning in the opposite direction to "normal". In order to learn this transfer, you must be fluent in spinning in both directions in both hands. Also, it is an added benefit to be able to palmspin in both directions using both hands (i.e.: the balls are held in both hands at the same time). If you transfer the balls forwards over the fingertips, then the move becomes a 3b Palmspin Walk – try to keep the palmspin in one location, pulling the hands in towards you as you transfer the pattern.
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3b Chasing Transfer This transfer is easier than the standard transfer as the spin reverses direction as it passes from one hand to the other. Start by spinning in your normal way in the right hand. For me, that means anti-clockwise. Now, bring the palms together, and pass one ball into the opposite hand. The other balls continue spinning, and follow the first one into the opposite hand, where the spinning continues, but in the opposite direction. While this transfer is easier than the normal 3b Palmspin Transfer, you should concentrate on the ordinary one more - the more you practice difficult moves, the easier all others get.
3b Pinkylift With the lifts, we bring palmspinning out of the flat plane, literally adding another dimension to your juggling. Hold three balls in the left hand. A ball should be resting against the index and middle fingers, and another between the pinky and ring fingers. One ball is in the center of the palm, not touching any fingers. Carefully, straighten the pinky and ring fingers, bending the fingers up so the ball resting against them is pushed right over the other two. As the ball comes down the other side, balance it with the thumb, while shifting all three clockwise to bring the stack into position to do it again. Of course, you could do it anti-clockwise, but it is simpler and usually more visible to the audience if you do it clockwise. The opposite applies in the opposite hand, of course. By alternating the direction of spin (first clockwise, then anticlockwise, then clockwise, etc), you cascade the balls. Therefore, alternating the spinning direction is known as the 3b Pinkylift Cascade.
3b Thumblift This is slightly trickier that the Pinkylift, and that difficulty is more pronounced as you learn to use more balls.
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Hold the three balls in the left hand so there is one on either side of the hand (one of which is completely held by the thumb), and the last one is right at the front. Bend the hand down at the front, and press the base of the thumb upwards so it’s ball is pushed up. As the thumb reaches the highest it can go, bend the thumb and push the ball over the other two balls with the thumb-tip. On the other side, the ball is helped down by the ring finger, before shifting the whole pattern clockwise. It is better (more visible) to shift the pattern anticlockwise, but easier to learn it (for me, at least) clockwise. If you find anticlockwise is easier, then practice that before learning clockwise. If you alternate the direction you shift the pattern in, then you are doing what is known as the 3b Thumblift Cascade.
4b Stack The 4 Ball Stack (usually called simply “The Stack”) is a 3b Palmspin with an extra ball placed on top of the three to form a pyramid. Some people call this a 4b Palmspin, but I like to differentiate between flat patterns (palmspins) and patterns in 3 dimensions (stacks). Besides, there is another move more rightly called a 4b Palmspin. For a long time, the Stack was called a 4b Palmspin, but there are ways of performing a Palmspin with 4 balls that are more appropriate to that name. Before you learn the 4b Stack, you should be very practiced in the 3b Palmspin. Place the extra ball on top of your 3b Palmspin, and very slowly start to spin. You will find that at some points, the pressure of the extra ball will push the bottom balls apart from each 77
other. Learn to tilt the hand in such a way as to minimize this, but not so much that the top ball falls off. For this move, it is best to start with large balls on the bottom, and a smaller ball on top – maybe 2.5” acrylics on the bottom and a pool ball on top. The smaller size of the top ball will make it more difficult for the ball to be thrown off, and its smaller weight will lower it’s tendency to tear apart the base’s pattern.
4b Stack Pinkylift This is just like the 3b Pinkylift, but more care is needed when you are settling the new top ball on the base. Extend your thumb up to catch the falling top ball as soon as possible. This will allow you to keep the balls together. If you don’t keep the balls together, the move looks haphazard.
4b Stack Thumblift This lift is similar to the 3b version, but there are some small differences, which you should be aware of. With the 3b version, you start with one ball held against the length of the thumb, and the other two balls held with two fingers each – this is a very secure way of holding three balls. The 4b version, though has the thumb holding one ball as usual, the index, middle, and ring fingers holding the front ball, and the last ball is held securely between the pinky and the heel of the hand. The pinky curls over the ball to hold it secure. This difference is because with a lot of the move, the front face of the stack is balanced against the back ball, so it is best to have as many fingers free as possible to manipulate the moving balls. Drop the ring-finger side of the stack slightly, and sort-of flow the thumb upwards, more pressuring than pushing the thumb ball to rise up over the stack. Stretch the index and middle fingers downwards so the stack face can be held smoothly at all points. 78
As the old top ball starts to fall over, reach up with the ring finger, and gently ease the ball down.
1b Palmspin Despite only using one ball, the 1b Palmspin is about as difficult as the 4b Stack. The reason for this is mostly because you are spinning a ball as if it were one of a pair of balls, but the second ball is not there, meaning there is no helpful pressure to keep the ball from rolling to the center of the palm. Possibly the best way to learn this move is using a point-topoint system. You learn to hold the ball in each point the ball passes through, and then you learn to move the ball from one point to another. Start with the ball held at the heel of the right palm. This is your starting position. From there, move the ball forward and to the right so it is held by the thumb and index finger. Now, you pass the finger so it’s held between the index and middle fingers, at the second knuckles. Pass the ball along each finger like this, until it is held by the pinkie and ring finger. From there, roll the ball back to the heel. Learn this until you get it smooth, and then concentrate on learning it so the fingers hardly move, and also so the ball travels in as wide a circle as possible.
4b Flat Diamond Palmspin The “Flat” part of the name is there because there is a stack palmspin called the Diamond. This move, though, is not stacked. Using smaller balls than usual, hold three balls in the palm as if you are doing a 3b Palmspin. Place one more ball beside any other two to make a flat diamond shape. There are two axes here – the long axis runs from the just added ball to the ball on the opposite side of the pattern, and the short axis runs through the two balls beside the new one. When you spin this, you have to be careful to keep the short axis balls together. This is easy when the long axis of the pattern runs from the fingertips to the forearm, but when it is 90 degrees 79
rotated, it is difficult to keep the short axis balls together and make sure the other two balls don’t drop off either side of the hand. A tip I’d give here is to bring the pattern forward when you are moving the long axis balls to the side. When you bring the pattern forward, the balls will be supported mostly by the fingers, and the front of the palm. You will still have to stretch your thumb and pinky out to the sides to do the move, but it does solve a lot of problems.
4b Flat Spin Also known as the 4b Palmspin, this move is difficult to learn - so learn slowly. It may even be easier to learn the 5b Stack before learning this – the 5b Stack helps to keep the pattern from collapsing into a 4b Flat Diamond Palmspin. Basically, a 4b Flat Spin is a group of four balls arranged in a square, and spun in the palm. Stretch your fingers before attempting this, and move very slowly until you are certain of the move. Again, like the Flat Diamond version, I’d recommend bringing the shape forward onto the fingers, which will allow you more room to play with. You will find after a while that a lot of the motion is performed by the thumb, which moves in a wave-like motion to bring the balls along. Try to bring the center of balance of the pattern close to the thumb to take advantage of this.
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More Palmspinning (1-4 balls) 2b Orbital Isolation An “Orbital” Isolation is when one ball is isolated, and one or more others are "orbited" around it - like the moon around the Earth. It's not really clear which should be learned first - the 1b Isolation or the 2b Orbital Isolation - learning the 1b Isolation first would help very much with this move, but also learning this move first would probably give you a basis for the 1b Isolation. Maybe you should learn them both at the same time. Start learning by spinning very slowly. Concentrate on one ball, and try to get it to stay still in space while the other one is orbited around it. Pick a spot on the floor, or a corner of the room, and try to keep the ball still relative to that point. The second ball presses against the isolated ball, which actually helps with the isolation. Without the second ball, as you see from learning the 1b Isolation, the ball tends to try moving to the center of the palm. You can learn to do this with the balls not touching. Transferring this palmspin takes a bit of thinking. You can’t just transfer it as normal, because you have to keep the location of one of the balls precisely still. If you are spinning anticlockwise in the right hand, wait for the moving ball to come closest to the left hand before starting the transfer. The isolated ball is moved over before the moving ball – as the moving ball continues spinning away from the left hand back to the right side, follow it with the left hand, taking control over the pattern.
2b Ratchet This move is half isolation and half joke. Start with two balls in the right palm, with the elbow held in front of the chest, and the arm going out in front of you. 81
Spin the balls clockwise, but move the arm around the balls so both balls stay isolated in space. When you reach the point where your forearm is directly on the opposite side of the balls to where it was in the beginning, move the forearm back, bringing the balls around clockwise with it. When spinning the forearm back to it’s “home” position, you can either not palmspin the balls, allowing the movement of the arm to spin them for you (giving the “ratchet” effect), or you can spin the balls – clockwise for a quick “unwinding” effect, or anticlockwise to keep the isolation effect.
2b Curl Here is our first palmspin which needs a bit of bodily flexibility. Hold two balls in the right palm, forearm pointing out in front of you. We’ll do this without spinning first. Twist the forearm anticlockwise, bringing the palm in so it comes to the place just vacated by the elbow, which goes out to the side. Now, bend yourself forward and to the left at the waist, and carefully continue the twist until your forearm is pointing out the side (raise your elbow to keep the bend in the arm). Your arm will be twisted, with the palm still pointing up. Bend further to the left, and continue the twist so the palm comes over the head. Be very careful here, as a ball on the noggin hurts. Finish off the twist by bringing the elbow down, and straightening yourself back up. Practice that for a short while, being very aware of any twinges in your side. If you feel these twinges, stop what you’re doing, and sit down for a while. Don’t continue the curl practice for a few hours. When you are competent with the motion, try carefully adding a bit of anticlockwise spin to the balls. You will have a little trouble with the spin when your arm is very twisted. Try varying the bend of the elbow and waist to find the most comfortable position for you.
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In the right hand, this is the anticlockwise curl (the direction the forearm spins) – as with all contact juggling moves, though, it can be reversed.
2b Isolated Curl As someone said at the first ever contact juggling convention (CJC2001); every move can be isolated. It is tricky to think of a rolling or spinning move where this is not true. To start learning the isolation, you should first learn to curl so the pattern stays in the same general place, without moving vertically, or horizontally – it is okay for it to spin for now. To do this, you will need to bend your knees a lot, so you may tire quickly (don’t practice this too much before a performance…). When you can curl this reasonably well, it is time to finish the isolation. The isolation is “simply” a matter of palmspinning clockwise where you are curling anticlockwise in the right hand – at just the right speed to keep the balls still. Reverse the direction as needed.
2b Magnetic Palmspin This move is really a 1b Palmspin in disguise. Spin a 1b Palmspin in the left hand. In the right hand, grip a ball with your fingers. Move the held ball in a circle mimicking the left hand ball. Keep the ball is near to a set distance from the left ball as possible. If done correctly, the left ball will look as if it is being controlled by the right. This illusion will work especially well if you can palmspin the left ball with the least amount of movement necessary from the fingers. The right hand does not need to stay on the right – you can move the hand around the left hand to any position you want – just keep the motion going at all times. You can even do it without a ball in the right hand, by pretending your fingers are controlling the left ball through some sort of telekinesis – but it looks best with the ball.
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3b Ratchet I think the effect of this is very surprising. Start by holding the balls in your right hand as if starting a clockwise palmspin. Start the clockwise palmspin. Isolate the palmspin, though – the whole spin – so your hand moves, but the 3 balls stay still. When you reach a point where you can’t move your hands any further – hold the balls, and spin your hands back to the beginning position. Then start again. If you know what a ratchet is, you’ll understand this move. If you have trouble understanding it, ask any mechanic to show you a ratchet in action.
3b Orbital Isolation This move is done practically the same as the 2b Orbital isolation, the only real difference being the amount of work needed to get one orbit finished. The 3b Orbital Isolation should be learned slowly before you attempt to do it fast. Concentrate on getting the isolation good when seen from all directions. That is a common pitfall for contact jugglers - when seen from above (as we usually see the moves), it is fairly easy to get the horizontal part of the isolation good, but it's difficult to get the vertical element nicely when you can't see it. You can get a good idea of how an isolation looks to the audience by practicing in front of a mirror. If the mirror is a sufficient distance from you, you will not be looking down on the balls, but will see the move as the audience sees it.
4b Stack Tumble This little move is very impressive, very simple, and can be expanded to many other moves. Start by spinning a 4-Stack in the left hand. Bring your right hand under the left so it is on the left side of the stack. 84
Pinky-lift the stack so the top ball falls off into the right hand. Continue pinky lifting the remaining balls - this is just to continue the illusion of fluidity. Bring the right-hand ball around the other side of the stack by either bringing the right hand under the left hand or around the front of the left hand. Note that if you bring the right hand under the left, you may block off the ball's visibility - get around this by exaggerating the movement. Bring the ball upwards so it slots into the pinky lifting in the left hand, and ends up as the top ball of a new stack there. For added kudos - continue the pinky lifting for a moment or two.
1b Isolation The 1b Isolation feels similar to the 1b Palmspin. The pressures are slightly different, but the movements are the same. Start learning this the same way you learned the 1b Palmspin – by moving from point to point. When you are moving from point to point, though – keep the ball still in space, and pull the hand under it. The points the ball moves through actually come to the ball, rather than the ball moving to the points. This, like all isolations, is easier to learn with a heavy ball, as heavy balls resist changes in their momentum much more than light ones. A ball has momentum whether it is moving or not, so physically, all you’re doing is moving your hand, trying not to apply any additional pressure to the ball. It looks very good when you isolate in one hand for a while, and then switch over to the other hand - you isolate the pass as well so the ball doesn’t move. The ball is usually passed from the index finger onto the opposite hand’s heel.
4b Curl This move can be seen in many different forms of object manipulation – ball spinning and plate spinning being the most common.
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Start off with a 4 Stack held in the right hand – do not spin it. You do not want to try this spinning until you have learned it still (acrylics hurt – especially on the head). Lean your body forward and twist the hand in until it is directly under the shoulder. Continue twisting the stack under until the arm is pointing almost directly right of you. That is an awkward position, so raise the stack (or lower your body) to ease the strain. Continue the twist slowly so the stack approaches a point a few inches in front of and above the head. When it reaches there, start leaning back, following the stack with your eyes as you pull it over your face and off to the right. Your arm should have the forearm facing up now, and the elbow pointing out in front of you. From there, simply continue the twist around until you are back at the starting position. This move poses strain in a few directions on the shoulder joint and blades; so make sure that you are limber before you attempt it. I disclaim all responsibility of you ignoring this point. Don’t come crying to me if you can’t go to work the next day because your arm doesn’t work.
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Basic Palmspinning (5 ball and above) While this chapter is titled “Basic Palmspinning”, it is far from easy. You should be accustomed to the moves in the 1-4 ball chapters before trying these. If you really want to do over four ball work, but find these moves difficult, don’t despair – remember that the first Basic Palmspinning chapter was about up to four balls in one hand. That means that by using both hands, you can do up to eight ball palmspinning without learning the moves in this chapter. This chapter is about the fundamental moves for five ball and above. Most of them involve combinations of various lower-number palmspins, so you may find one or two surprisingly easy. It is not essential to be able to perform large number palmspinning in order to be a successful contact juggler. In toss juggling, the difference between five ball juggling and seven ball juggling represents a huge difference in skill, but the average audience member will be more impressed with many tricks at lower numbers than the ability to do a few at larger numbers. 5b Cascade
5b Linespin A “linespin” is a palmspin with five or more balls which consists of two lines of ball, one held by the fingers, and the other by the heels of the hand. Hold five balls in two lines with both hands so there is a line of three balls at the fingers, and two balls behind them, each of them touching two of the front balls. Treat the two front left balls and the back left ball as 3b Palmspin pattern, and the other two as a 2b Palmspin pattern, and 87
rotate each anticlockwise until there is a line of two at the front and a line of three at the back. Then, treat the front right and two back right balls as a 3b Palmspin and the other two as a 2b Palmspin and rotate anticlockwise again until you’re back at the start again. Make sure that the balls are touching at all times. Surprisingly, this style of palmspinning wasn’t noticed until a new CJer, Shifty, who had been practicing only about a year, came up with a whole gamut of new moves like this one.
5b 2h Palmspin This palmspin is a circle of five balls following each other. There are two paths to follow in order to learn this spin. First off, it is very important to learn the 5b Linespin - this one is essential, as the 5b 2h Palmspin is, in a way, simply a variant on it. The second is the 4b 2h Palmspin (also called the 4b 2h Flatspin). Once you are comfortable with the 5b Linespin, simply try to keep the balls separate in the center. Start off simply - small gaps, so the ball starts off as two rows, grows into an oval spin, and gradually gets more circular. You may find it easier to perform if you overlap the fingers of both hands. If have found for example, that if I am spinning anticlockwise, it is easier to spin this pattern if I put the pinky and ring fingers of the right hand over the pinky and ring finger of the left. This idea will help woth larger patterns as well. If you examine the shape your hands make like this, you'll see a large depression the fingers help to make a bowl that the balls roll around.
6b Linespin This is simply two rows of three balls, treated just like in the 5b Linespin. In this case, the movement is a 3b anticlockwise palmspin, where balls get passed from one pattern to the other. Try it and see for yourself. This is 88
more obvious when you learn the 8b Linespin Stack – you really notice the balls moving out of and in to the pattern when there are balls supported on the pattern.
6b 2h Stack Want a surprise? Once you learn the 5b 2h Palmspin, this move is incredibly easy! Spin a 5b 2h Palmspin for a while. When you have it smooth, place an extra ball in the center, so it is held up by the base 5 balls. This is much easier to learn than the lower-numbered stacks, because the central ball finds it much easier to simply stay in the center than to make the arduos climb over the wall of base balls. You may find it easier if you overlap the pinky and ring fingers of both hands, and also notice how the heels of both hands interact. If spinning anticlockwise, the n the right heel acts like a boundary wall that stops the base from escaping over it, and the left heel is alternately raised and lowered in order to "pulse" the back balls along over to the right hand. The 6b 2h Inverted Stack is just slightly harder - in this case, the 6th ball is below the base ring of 5 balls. In this case, the 4th and 5th fingers are still overlapped, and the heel plays a much bigger role
6b 2h Triangle Palmspin This one can be a pain to get. When learning this, I found that the easiest way to spin the pattern was also very awkward on the arms. Start by placing three balls in the left hand so a ball is on the fingers, another is in the palm, and the last is held at the base of the forearm. Now, angle the hand inwards so the line of balls is parallel with the chest - you can use the chest to help balance them if you need to. Hold a 3bPalmspin pattern in the right hand, and bring it inwards so it slots against the left hand and the balls form a large triangle. Spinning this pattern is tricky - You have to somehow slip your hands under the pattern and slowly spin it around. It may help to remember that you only need to learn to spin 120 degrees around 89
the rest of the spin is the same. To make it even simpler, you can imagine the starting pattern - a triangle, with a base at the chest, another facing off to the right, and another facing off to the left and try to spin the pattern 60 degrees anti-clockwise so that you then have a line of three balls on the right hand and forearm, and a 3bPalmspin pattern in the left hand. The next 60 degrees is just bringing the pattern back to the start position again.
7b Linespin This is done the same way as the 6b and 5b Linespins, but starting with four balls at the front, and three behind. When spinning anticlockwise (reverse the tip for clockwise), I find this much simpler if you pull back the right hand so the tip of the right pinky is just next to the left pinky’s base. This seems to allow more room for the fingers to move. When the hands are right next to each other, it is difficult to control the back middle balls, as they pass over the heels of the hands, where you cannot easily control them.
7b Stack Linespin Spin a 6b Linespin for a while until it is very comfortable. If you look at it, you can see that it really cries out for a third dimension. Simply at a ball to one of the 3b Palmspin patterns, and you will add that 3rd dimension. When you start the spin, do it slowly – you’ll see that stack alternates between being supported by three, and being supported by four balls. This provides a little difficulty if your 6b Linespin is not smooth – the smoothness 90
the line.
is necessary for the top ball to keep it’s place as one ball is transferred in and another out of the supporting base. If you feel that this move is a little to asymmetrical, then there is a simple solution – the top ball can be moved along the top from one side to the other – the movement makes the top ball look like a small boat being buffeted along by large waves (or something…). The figure on the left shows the various places a ball can be stacked on top of the 6b Linespin I various configurations. You can move a stacked ball between those points as you spin
7b 2h Flower Propellor This move is a combination of the ordinary and inverted 6b 2h Stack. It is a 5b2h Palmspin with a ball above, and another below, the ring of balls. You will find it maybe a bit easier if you let the pinkys overlap.
7b 2h “Cheater” Flower Palmspin 8b Stack Linespin This is a 6b Linespin with two balls on top of the 3b Palmspin patterns. The back middle ball of the pattern is difficult to control when it is passing from one heel to the other. To minimize this, try leaning your hands downwards at the front, and bring the balls a little further forward so it is controlled more by the fingers than the palm. You can add further complexity to this by throwing in pinky lifts and thumb lifts every now and then – the 8b Stack Linespin is essentially two 4b Stacks, so anything that can be down with a 91
stack, can be done with this pattern as will (well, …almost everything).
8b Linespin For this linespin, it is probably best if you do it with smaller balls, as the pattern makes an extreme stretch necessary for the hands. Practice your 4b Flat Spins thoroughly before doing this. A solid 4b Flat Spin base will allow you to confidently place three balls on top of the pattern to form the 11b Linespin Stack – one of only two patterns that I know of which use eleven balls (the other is the 11b Blossom Palmspin).
9b Stack Linespin The 9b Stack Linespin is done by placing two balls on top of a 7b Linespin. Because the 7b Linespin is so large, the two balls have plenty of room to move. You can use the 9b Stack Linespin to move patterns from one hand to another. For example, try spinning a 4 stack in the left hand, composed of white balls, and a 5 stack in the right hand composed of black balls. After bringing both hands together to form the 9b pattern, you can end up with a 5b Stack in the left hand with a white top and black base, and a 4b Stack in the right hand – black top and white base. With care, you can move the base pattern into a 7b Blossom, which will allow you to rotate the top balls. Using that as a gobetween, you could finish the black/white move I described above, but moving the colours completely to either hand.
10b 2h Pyramid Stack 11b 2h “Cheater” Flower Stack
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Multi-ball Ball-Rolling Again, these moves are ordered by approximate difficulty. Don’t be afraid to try moves, which I might say are harder than others. What one person finds difficult, another might just breeze through.
2b Folding Butterfly This is probably the ideal introduction to 2b CJing. At all times, you are only moving one arm at a time, making it easier to control. Start with a ball in each palm. Both arms point out in front of you. Butterfly the right arm in so the cradle ends up resting at the left elbow. Butterfly the left arm in so it’s cradle ends up resting by the right elbow. Butterfly the left arm out to it’s original position. Butterfly the right arm out so it ends up in it’s original position. Now repeat on the other side. As you can see, the instructions are easy to follow. The move is very simple, but can look complex if you learn to do it smoothly and quickly. You can make the move a bit more difficult for yourself (and speed it up a bit) by doing the same move in this way: Start with a ball in the left palm, arm pointing straight out. A ball is in the right cradle, hand at the left cradle. Butterfly the right arm so it ends up pointing straight out. At the same time, butterfly the left arm in so the cradle ends up at the right elbow. Butterfly the right arm in so the cradle ends up at the left elbow. Butterfly the right arm out so it ends up pointing straight out. Butterfly the left arm out so it’s pointing straight out. At the same time, fold the right arm back in so it ends in the starting position.
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2b Asymmetric Butterfly Learn the second version of the 2b Folding Butterfly, and you’ve already performed the Asymmetric Butterfly. Start with a ball in the right palm, arm pointing out in front of you. The left ball is in it’s cradle, which is resting at the right elbow. Butterfly the left arm out so it matches the right arm’s starting position. At the same time, fold the right arm in so it’s cradle is resting on the left elbow. Now, do the same but in reverse. The reason you learn the 2b Folding Butterfly first is that after every Asymmetric Butterfly, you are given a small rest while the folding is completed.
2b Symmetric Butterfly This move should be simply a matter of performing a butterfly in both hands at the same time, but there are a few things that make that difficult. Because the Butterfly involves the elbow moving in front of the chest, having two moving at the same time poses problems; they tend to bump into each other if you try to make the Butterfly large, and the movement of the upper arms can feel very restricted if you don’t stretch your upper chest very often. To learn, start by learning with one ball in one hand, moving the other arm in the same way. Alternate which arm butterflies nearest the chest.
2b Back-Back Butterfly You will need to learn the 2b Symmetric butterfly in order to get this one. It is simple, though, so could probably be learned at the same time as the Symmetric butterfly. Start by placing a ball on each cradle, with the arms crossed. Butterfly both arms to palm position. Grab the right ball in a Thumb Hold, then butterfly the arms back, so the arms are crossed again, right arm in front, hands in Back-Back Pass position. Pass the left ball onto the right cradle, and butterfly both arms open so you have two balls in the right palm. Keep the original 94
right-hand ball in its Thumb Hold. Butterfly the arms crossed again, this time with the right arm at the chest, and Back-Back Pass the ball back to the left cradle. Now, do the same steps with the left arm.
2b Twirling Butterfly This little move is an example of how to make a very tight contactjuggling move. In most cases, all the Twirling Butterfly moves can be done within a space of about a foot cubed. Start by learning the one ball version. Then, cross both hands at the wrist with the right hand on top, like in the starting position of the one ball version, but this time, place a ball on the right cradle and another on the left palm. Now, ‘simply’ butterfly them. You’ll see that it’s difficult to keep the movement smooth and keep the wrists together. To do that, you need to move slower.
2b Circle Despite seeming impossible when you first think of it, the 2-ball Circle is very easy. Start with both hands held palm up, a ball on each palm. The heels of the hands should be close together, like you’ve just passed one ball from palm-palm. Butterfly the right ball to the cradle, while mirroring the hand motion with the left hand, keeping the left ball in a thumb hold. The left hand goes in front of the right. You should now be in backback pass position. Pass the cradle ball from the right hand to the left. You now have both balls in the left hand. Butterfly the hands back out so the cradle ball joins the other in the left palm. Immediately, palm-palm pass the original left ball to the right hand. You are now in the starting position again. The hardest part of this move is when you butterfly while holding a ball in both the cradle and palm – do you allow them to touch? That’s an aesthetic question, and is up to the individual performer.
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Personally, I don’t allow them to touch, but that makes the move trickier to get smooth.
2b Back-Palm Shower This little move is similar to the 2b Palm-Palm Shower, and looks harder than it is. Start with a ball in the right palm, and another in the left cradle. Cross the hands at the wrist as if you were going into a Back-Palm Pass. Back-Palm Pass the cradle ball to the palm of the right hand. Immediately, toss the palm ball over it so it is caught by the cradle of the right hand. You can repeat this over and over, or move into a Palm-Palm Shower and through that to a Back-Palm Shower in the opposite direction. I like to throw in a few rounds of this move when I am doing a 3b Back-Palm Mill’s Mess
2b Forearm Roll Start with a ball on each palm. The left hand’s fingertips touch the right elbow. The right arm is pointing straight out in front of the body. Roll the right ball towards the elbow. After starting the roll, roll the left ball towards it’s elbow. The right ball reaches the elbow, and is passed onto the left palm. You are then able to turn the left arm so it is pointing straight out. The original left ball reaches the left elbow as you are turning the arms, and you balance the ball on the elbow while completing the arm’s turn. Bring the right arm in so the hand touches the left elbow, and pass the elbow ball into the palm. From there, you are in a position to repeat the move with the opposite arm.
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2b Train This move was created accidentally by Ferret. A “train”, in the CJ world, is any roll where 2 balls are rolled as one – one ball follows directly behind another. The original move was a forearm roll with two balls, but this can also “easily” (with practice) be done as a backarm roll, and I’m sure with enough time put in, a chestroll would be possible.
2b Backarm Roll Transfer This move is similar to the 2b Back-Palm Shower. It's almost a stretched out version. Start with a ball in the left cradle, arm parallel to the chest. Stretch the hand out a bit to the right. The left hand is held palm up, with a ball in the palm, stretched out under the left elbow, as if you'd just caught the ball off a left Backarm Roll. Now, roll the left-cradle ball down the backarm and off the elbow. Try to control it so it moves at an even speed. As the ball comes off, reach up to catch it with the right palm, and toss the palm ball over the dropping ball so it lands on the left elbow and rolls to the left cradle. You are now in a position to repeat the move again. To smooth the catch on the elbow, try to toss the ball so it never actually stops on the elbow. It lands already rolling for the cradle. This is accomplished by tossing so the highest the ball goes is just enough to bring it over the elbow. To make the move more symmetrical, and prepare for the three ball version, try this variation (it's great for practicing the move, as well!): Perform the 2b Backarm Roll Transfer as described above. When the move is complete, butterfly the left hand out so it goes palm up. bring the right hand around so it is almost parallel to the left. Continue the movement of the left hand towards the right, and butterfly the right hand over the left so you end up in the opposite of the starting position - right hand stretched out to the left, left hand under right elbow and stretched out to the right.
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Perform the 2b Backarm Roll Transfer again (opposite of above). Butterfly both arms back to the starting position again. This is a very smooth 2b move that is great for practicing your Backarm Rolls - especially those difficult rolls from the elbow to cradle.
2b Simultaneous Back-Forearm and Fore-Backarm Rolling It is possible, but difficult, to do both the Forearm to Backarm Roll and the Backarm to Forearm Roll at the same time. To do this, you should be very proficient at the BackarmForearm Roll and the Forearm-Backarm Roll. Proficient enough to perform both while butterflying a ball in the hand of the same arm at the same time. Start with two balls in the right palm. Roll one of them to the elbow, and Forearm to Backarm roll it, butterflying the other ball at the same time. Then, as it is reaching the cradle again, toss the cradled ball over the rolling ball so it continues rolling towards the elbow. Stop both balls at the elbow and cradle respectively. Backarm to Forearm Roll the elbow ball, butterflying the cradle ball to palm. As the rolling ball is reaching the palm, toss the palmed ball over it so it continues rolling towards the elbow. You know what to do from there. A “cheater” way of doing this is to not try rolling both at the same time – wait for whatever ball is rolling on the arm to arrive and stop at the hand before tossing the other ball over it. This will allow you the ease of only having to control one ball at a time (sort of), but with the satisfaction of having done a really difficult move. For an even easier version, don’t toss the balls over each other – simply palmspin them. On the cradle side, this is very difficult, but not impossible!
3b Forearm Roll Cascade This is an extension of the 2b Forearm Roll. It is done in almost exactly the same way. In fact, I originally called this simply a 3b Forearm Roll before noticing that the balls were cascading. 98
Start with one ball in the right palm, another at the right elbow – the right arm pointing out from the body. A third ball is in the left palm, beside the right elbow. Roll the left ball towards the left elbow, passing the right elbow ball into the left palm to replace it. As the ball is rolling to the left elbow, bring the left arm so it is pointing out from the body, like the right arm’s starting position. The right arm comes in at the same time so it’s hand is beside the left elbow. That’s it! Just repeat the same movement with the arms reversed, and you are cascading using Forearm Rolls. This is more obvious if you use different coloured balls.
3b Backarm Roll Transfer Once you have learned the 2b Backarm Roll Transfer, the three ball version is a simple progression. Start as with the 2b Backarm Roll Transfer - a ball in the left cradle, and another in the right palm. Add a third, which starts in a left Thumb Hold. Do a 2b Backarm Roll Transfer. The thumbed ball is held still all the while - this makes the move even easier - you only move two balls at a time. To make this a proper three ball move, you should find some way of bringing the third ball into the mix. Luckily, the very act of making this move symmetrical does the job. The simplest way of reversing the positions of the balls and hands is to butterfly the left hand out, and palm-palm pass one of the left hand balls to the right hand, then butterfly the right hand so one of it?s balls goes to the cradle. You will end up in the opposite position as the start. From there, you simply repeat the above in the opposite direction. The way I prefer to swap the directions for this move is to butterfly the left hand well out to the left side. Turn the right hand over, so it's ball goes into a Thumb Hold. Now, roll one of the left hand balls down the forearm, and over the forearm onto the right cradle. Then, raise the right hand above the left elbow, while 99
swinging the left arm round so the left hand goes into start position. When done smoothly, you can start the 2b Backarm Roll as the left arm is swinging into place. Makes it look smooth!
3b Folding Cascade This version of the Arm Roll cascades is much more obviously a cascade. In order to learn it, you must be comfortable passing a ball from the Elbow Hold to the Outside Elbow Hold. Start with a ball in the left Elbow Hold, another in the left Palm Hold, and a third in the right Elbow Hold. Forearm Roll the right ball to its palm. Butterfly the left hand to the right elbow. This also involves transferring the left Elbow Hold to the Outside Elbow Hold, so be careful! I found it is easier if you exaggerate the left elbow’s movement – you should be able to easily ignore the butterfly in order to concentrate on this (if not, you should be learning something different!). Pass the left cradled ball to the right Elbow Hold, and then butterfly the arm back to its original position. This involves a move from the Outside Elbow Hold to the Elbow Hold. Easier than last time, but still tricky – thankfully there are no other balls in the arm to think about! At that point, you are in the reverse of the beginning position, so simply start again but using the instructions for the opposite arms.
3b Backarm Cascade You will probably benefit hugely from learning the 2b Back-Back Shower before learning this move. You should also know the 2b Backarm Roll Transfer very well. Start with two balls in the right palm, held under the left elbow. The left hand is out to the right side with a ball in it’s cradle. Toss one of the right hand balls up onto the left elbow, and roll it towards the left cradle. Now, the fun begins! As the ball approaches the cradle, toss the already cradled ball over it so the rolling ball rolls into the cradle, and the tossed 100
ball lands on the backarm and continues to the elbow. This is where the 2b Back-Back Shower experience is important. The rolling ball drops off the end of the backarm. As you reach to catch with the right hand, toss its held hand up onto the left elbow, so it starts rolling towards the left cradle. Sound familiar? This is where the experience with the 2b Backarm Roll Transfer comes in. Once you learn this well, try the four ball version…
4b Circle Simply put, the 4b Circle is a combination of palm-palm passes, symmetrical butterflies, and 2b Genie Rolls. Ferret said once that he had a four-ball version of the Circle. It possibly looks like this. This is not a true circle, though, as not all the balls go right through the circle. Start with a ball in each cradle and another in each Thumb Hold. The hands are held in back-back pass position - whichever you feel most comfortable with. From there, do a 2b Genie Roll. If you find these difficult, try back-back passing one ball so it passes onto the cradle of the other hand closer to it's fingers, then back-back pass the other ball over to the now empty cradle. One of the balls will be rolling the difficult way, so I recommend you leave that as the last to roll, allowing you to devote full concentration to it. Butterfly both hands so you end up with two balls in both hands. It looks good to palmspin for a moment there, and helps as well with the circle (without palmspinning, none of the balls will ever complete a circle). Palm-Palm Pass two of the balls, so you have an interchange. Maybe you'd like to add a second moment of palmspinning before going on to the next step. Butterfly back so you are in the starting position. I like to make the palm-palm pass and back-back passes in this move fleeting moments of contact between the hands. The majority of time is spent with the butterflies and palmspinning.
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4b Backarm Cascade Make sure you know the 3b version of this well before attempting this. Once you do, though, its simple – it’s like a mixture of the 3b Backarm Cascade, and the 3b Backarm Roll Transfer. Start as before with the 3b version, with two balls in the right hand, held under the left elbow, and one ball in the left cradle, held out to the right. This time, though, also hold a ball in the left Thumb Hold. Toss a right hand ball onto the left elbow. Let that ball roll to the left cradle, then toss the left cradle ball over it so it rolls to the left elbow and drops off. Unlike the 3b Backarm Cascade, though, this time we don’t follow up the right hand catch with another repeat of the move. Instead, Swing the arms around, butterflying the left cradle ball so you end up with two palm balls in the left hand, and the right hand butterflies one ball into cradle, and the other into Thumb Hold. The swing ends with the left hand under the right elbow, and the right hand palm down out to the left. Repeat the moves mentioned, but with the arms reversed.
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Combining Ball Rolling and Palmspinning This section is mostly about moves combining ball-rolling and palmspinning, but there are also little pieces about going into ballrolling from palmspinning, and vice-versa. A simple way of combining ball rolling and palmspinning is to use three balls, and roll one of them while holding the others still (so you are only concentrating on one at a time). For example, try palmspinning three in the right hand. Pass one ball to the other palm, and butterfly the right hand so one ball goes to the Thumb Hold and the other is in the cradle. Now, roll that cradle ball up the arm and across the chest to the other cradle (which has it’s ball also in a Thumb Hold). Butterfly out, and pass the right ball into the left and start palmspinning again. Or, simpler still; palmspin three in the right hand. Forearm roll one to the elbow and pass to the left hand. Palmspin two in the right and one in the left for a moment. Pass another from the rigth to the left in the same way. Palmspin for a moment, then finish by passing the last ball the same way.
2b Palmspin Escape Starting with a 2b Palmspin, you roll one of the balls up the forearm to the elbow, and then roll it back down into the palmspin. This sounds simple, and is, really, after you’ve practiced it a while. You need to be smooth with your forearm rolls for this. It is easier to learn this from a pushing palmspin, as with a pulling palmspin, the ball you roll to the forearm will go over the base of the thumb, which could interfere with your balance. With a pushing palmspin the ball will go up via the heel of the hand, which is much smoother. With the 3b Palmspin Escape, the remaining two balls continue spinning while the escaped ball is rolling, but that is extremely difficult with the 2b Palmspin Escape, so just keep the remaining ball in the palm of the hand, waiting for the rolling ball to return. This affects the forearm roll, as you’ll have to be careful 103
not to drop the palm ball when you make corrections in the other ball’s balance. When the rolling ball is returning, bring the palm ball to the front of the hand, at the little finger side, to make room for the rolling ball to slide directly into palmspinning position at the thumb side.
3b Palmspin Escape This is a harder version of the 2-ball Palmspin Escape, and not because it involves 50% extra balls. The difficulty lies in the two balls you don’t ‘escape’ – what do you do with them? You can’t just leave them doing nothing while you roll a ball along the forearm! Well, you can, but it looks more impressive to keep them spinning as if nothing out of the ordinary has happened. This is what causes people to think of magic when they see contact juggling – that the balls seem to have a mind of their own, and all of them decide independent of each other what they are going to do at any moment. Because you keep the balls spinning, the tendons in the forearm move constantly, which makes the forearm roll much more difficult. The secret to bypassing this difficulty is to ignore the balls in the hand – after all, they’re only doing a 2-ball palmspin – even non-CJers can do that! Ignoring the spinning balls allows you to concentrate on the one ball that’s important – the rolling one. Your job is to get that ball safely up the forearm to the elbow, and back again – ideally pausing at the elbow a moment for effect. When you roll the ball back, judge the roll so it flows nicely into the pattern. The two balls in the palm should be at that moment held by two fingers each, with the thumb held aside so the rolling ball can flow in. Don’t pause the motion – allow the roll to smoothly carry through.
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4b Stack Escape The roll in this is the simplest part – the hardest parts are figuring out how are you going to take a ball out of the stack, and how are you going to place it back in again. To take a ball from the stack is surprisingly simple – learn the 4b Collapse And Rebuild move. Collapse the stack, which will leave you with a diamond shape with the shortest axis leading from the forearm to the fingertips. Squeeze the diamond in, and make the back ball roll out of the palm – you can now spin the three remaining balls while doing your forearm roll with the escaped one. Another way of releasing a ball is to allow one of the bottom balls to “pop” out of the pattern onto the forearm, and the top ball to replace it in the base. This may cause problems as you try to control the falling top ball and the rolling ball at the same time – especially if you like to continue the spin. Bringing the ball back into the stack can be done in a few ways. One way is to stop the palmspin, and roll the spare ball quickly up the forearm so it hops up on top of the other three, then the spin can be restarted. This takes a bit of judgement, and the position of the palm balls needs to be in such a way that the hopping ball is not knocked aside as it tries to regain it’s position – try to get two balls near the wrist so they “guide” the ball into position. Another way is to roll the ball back up to the palm so you have a diamond shape (stop the spin when the ball reaches the other three). Lift the front ball so it becomes the top ball of a new stack. Then the stack spin can be continued.
4b Flat Spin Escape I would say that this is harder than the 4b Stack Escape only because the 4b Flat Spin is more difficult than the 4b Stack. Start with a 4b Flat Spin – AntiClockwise in the right or Clockwise in the left seem the easiest – then “simply” roll one of the balls out of the pattern (which reverts to 3b Palmspin), up the forearm and then back down to reform the 4b Flat Spin. As usual,
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this is more aesthetic with the palmspin continuing all throughout the move, but decide for yourself.
Combining Chest Rolls with Hand-Hand Passes Michael Glenn (www.tryouttoys.com) does a lot of work in this area. The first time I saw him pass while Chest Rolling was when he started with a ball in the right hand, and a twirling fire-staff in the left. He started a Chestroll, and as the ball was traveling across the chest, he passed the twirling staff into the other hand, so the ball arrived at an empty hand. The key to this move is hidden in the paragraph above – “as the ball was traveling across the chest”. When the ball is traveling across the chest, the body controls it, not the arms, so you can do pretty much anything with the arms while the ball is still on the chest. A nicely done pass I saw recently (July 2002) was the passing of a 4stack from the left to the right hand, incorporating a chest roll. The stack was twirled in the left hand for a while, and then the top ball was dropped into a forearm roll. This ball was passed at the elbow to the right cradle, and straight into a Chestroll. As the ball traveled across the chest the remaining 3b pattern was passed immediately into the right hand. The remaining ball rolled down onto the now empty left arm, and the ball was passed from the cradle onto the 3b pattern. The pass of the 3b pattern was unfortunately not smooth, but the potential for the move was very apparent.
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Combining Toss- and Contact-Juggling The moves in this section could possibly be described as tossjuggling moves, but you won't find them in many toss-juggling books, as they each have a CJ streak. When creating a combination of toss and contact, it is good to take a fresh look at the toss move that you want to change – make a video of it or watch someone else do it, and mentally change one movement at a time into something involving contact juggling. In the rec.juggling archives (see www.juggling.org) you can find some descriptions of how people have combined contact and toss in the past – maybe pausing in the middle of a cascade to catch the tossed ball in a cradle and Chestroll it to the other hand before continuing, or rolling up the arm to the elbow and back before returning to the original move.
2b Square This move is most definitely a toss juggling move, but can be used effectively as part of a contact juggling routine. The effect is that two balls move simultaneously horizontally, then vertically – forming floor, roof, and sides of a box or “square”. Start with the right hand held shoulder-high in front of the right shoulder, with a ball held in the Thumb Hold (or just grab it normally, while learning). The left hand is held about waist high, palm up on the left with a ball in the palm. Bring both hands horizontally to their opposite sides, so the right hand is in front of the left shoulder, and the left hand is in front of the right side of the waist. Toss the left ball upwards so it will apex at shoulder height. The left ball is simply dropped. Quickly, move your hands back to the original positions, and catch the thrown and dropped balls. Now, you can repeat the movements. Someone on www.contactjuggling.org described this as part of the 3b toss juggling move The Factory. You could say that, but there are slight differences. The Factory is much more difficult, for one. I’d recommend learning the move in order to get this move 107
down, though. The Factory holds some possibility for integration into CJ… I must work on that…
2b Elbow Catch You will have to be very good at the Elbow Catch before trying this. Start with a ball in the palm, and another in the elbow of the same arm. Bend the arm slightly and straighten it with a jerk, causing the ball at the elbow to be tossed in the air (hopefully, towards the hand – work on it). As the ball approaches the hand, toss the held ball towards the elbow, catching the already thrown ball. This is the basic throw and catch of toss juggling. Catch the tossed ball on the elbow.
2b Elbow Catch Shower This is simply a variation of the 2b Elbow Catch where the ball at the elbow is rolled to the palm instead of tossed. As the ball reaches the palm, toss the other ball towards the elbow with your fingertips. If you plan on doing this quickly (in preparation for the 3b version, for example), it may be best for you to practice catching the ball further up the arm than the elbow. If the ball lands on the bicep (which is not horizontal), it will naturally start the roll without you needing to do anything yourself.
2b Elbow Toss Shower This is the exact opposite of the 2b Elbow Catch Shower. Start with two balls in the palm. Roll one to the elbow, and immediately toss it back to the palm. Just before you catch it, start the other ball rolling to the elbow. This is quite a bit more difficult than the 2b Elbow Catch Shower, as tossing from the elbow involves the whole arm, where tossing from the palm only involves the fingers. I’m sure that with a lot of practice, this could be done with three balls, but have not managed it myself yet. 108
3b Mill's Mess with Cradle To learn this move, you should first learn toss juggling’s Mill’s Mess, which any experienced juggler will show you. I’ll go through the CJ version step by step, but you will find it a lot easier to learn if you already know the toss-juggling move, as all that is changed is that the ball is “stalled” at the end of each move. The images show the transfer in one direction – learn it in both (reverse the instructions to learn the other way). Start with a ball (b1) in your right cradle, a ball (b2) in the right Thumb Hold, and another (b3) in the left palm. The right hand should be crossed over the left. Uncross your arms, tossing b1 in the air sort-of towards your left. Cross your arms the other way, tossing b2 a bit further left than b1, and catching b1 just after tossing b2. Now make sure that your left hand has b3 in a Thumb Hold, and catch b2 in the cradle. I have found that the threefingered cradle is best for this, as it absorbs the landing a bit better, reducing the ball's tendency to bounce straight off the hand. I have heard of some people who managed to put a butterfly somewhere in all that motion, but haven't figured out how to do that without coming up with a completely different move.
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3b Back-Palm Mill’s Mess After you’ve learned the 3b Mill’s Mess with Cradle, you will realize that it really is just a small extension that any toss juggler could do. Here is a slightly trickier one that can be performed very tightly and quickly. Start with a ball in the left cradle, another in a Thumb Hold in the left hand, and a third in the palm of the right hand. Both hands are in Back-Palm Pass position, with the right hand in front of the left. Back-Palm Pass the cradled ball (call it b1), and immediately toss the palm ball (b2) straight up and hold b1 in the palm. Uncross the hands, bringing the left hand face up so it’s ball (b3) is on top. b2 comes down and you toss b3 upwards before catching b2 in the palm and crossing the hands, right hand palm down, to catch b3 in the right cradle. The hands are now in the opposite Back-Palm Pass position, so you can immediately do the above movements again, in reverse. When I do the Back-Palm Passes in this move, I like to throw in a Back-Palm Shower or two before continuing with the rest of the move – it makes the move look more complex, and feels very nice. Another nice thing to do here, is to exaggerate the pass from Cradle to Palm, so the balls roll along the backarm from the cradle, and drop off the elbow. In that case, you could call the move the 3b Backarm Roll Mill’s Mess. Naturally, this move is a lot slower, and therefore probably easier to do.
3b Mesh Here's a little move that can be easily expanded on to make some very complex moves. I originally called it a Mesh because the movements reminded me of clockwork. I had a five-ball variation in mind, which would have looked very much like clockwork (and a bit like toss-juggling’s "5b multiplex cascade”). I'm not sure now that the five-ball version is possible, but you never know... Start with a ball in the Thumb Hold and cradle of the right hand, which is held about chest high. The left hand is held about stomach high, and holds a ball on the palm.
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Move the right hand in a butterfly-like motion so the cradle ball is brought into a Thumb Hold. The original Thumb Hold is thrown/dropped towards the left. It's difficult to control the dropping ball while performing the butterfly, but try to let it go at the last moment so it doesn't just drop straight down. As the ball drops, bring the left hand up to catch it, tossing it's own ball at the same time. The tossed ball is then caught by the right cradle, bringing you back to the starting position. In effect, you are moving all the balls around in a circle. After three Mesh movements, the balls are back in their original positions.
3b Forearm Shower This move is based on toss-juggling’s Shower. If you study a shower, you will see that the balls move in a circular fashion, with two tosses causing the pattern. The first toss is a high toss, which is the more visible one. The second is almost a direct pass from one hand to the other. This second toss can be replaced with a forearm roll. Start with your left arm extended in forearm roll position. Place two balls in the palm. The right hand should be next to the left arm’s elbow. Let one of the balls in the left palm roll down to the elbow and off into the right hand. As the ball is being passed from the left elbow to right hand, toss the ball that is already in the right hand up towards the left palm and catch the rolled ball. As the tossed ball is reaching the left palm, let the remaining ball there roll towards the elbow, which is where we started. At most, I’ve done this with three balls, but I’m sure it could be extended to four. After all, the only difference is the amount of balls in the air (and the added difficulty, of course).
3b Baby Pass Shower When you examine this move after you’ve learned it, you’ll see it’s just a variation of the Forearm Shower, with the tossing hand held on the opposite side of the arm. 111
Start in Baby Pass position, left hand up by right upper arm, and right hand beside left’s elbow, right arm under left. Two balls are held in the left hand, and one in the right. Let one ball roll down the forearm from the right hand on into the left hand. As it arrives, toss the already held ball from the right hand up to the left hand. Catch the rolled ball. As the tossed ball comes to the left hand, roll the remaining ball down the arm, starting the loop all over again. As with the Forearm Shower, I’m certain it is possible to do this with more than three balls. It has the added difficulty of being cross-armed, but the potential is there.
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The Head Head rolls are another one of those contact/toss crossovers that crop up now and then. Henry VIII learned to head roll (the juggling type), which shows that contact juggling is much older than most people realize. In this region, a lot of toss jugglers are a lot more experienced than most contact jugglers – the head is a difficult limb to learn to maneuver with. The head is probably the most difficult part of the body to contact juggle with. Every other part of the body is either very flexible, or is easy to balance on. The head is a stubby, bumpy place, and is difficult to learn to use. Practice all moves on the head with a large soft ball before you move onto a smaller soft ball and finally a small hard ball. I use my trusty novelty tennis ball to learn the moves, and then move onto a smaller bounce juggling ball, and finally my acrylics.
Butterfly W/ Head Butterfly This move can be learned before the Head Butterfly has been properly learned. In fact, I’d recommend it as a step towards learning all head moves. Start by Back-Back Butterflying slowly. After a few instances of the combination, butterfly the hand higher than usually, and bend your head and body so the ball can roll straight off the fingertips onto the temple. It is extremely important that you do this slowly. The temple is a very dangerous area to make mistakes. When you can butterfly and get the head into position smoothly, try to lift your head back into position so you are facing upwards and the ball goes into the Forehead Hold. It is not important that you be able to stop the ball at that point, but that would be a bonus. Allow the ball to continue over the head to the other side, bringing the head down and your other hand up so you are in a symmetric position to how you passed the ball onto the other 113
temple. Make sure to keep control of the ball as you do this – don’t just “drop” the ball off the other side. Roll the ball onto the other cradle, and go back to your BackBack Butterflies.
Neck Butterfly This move has more body movement than ball movement, so may not be best for your routine - unless your routine is dancing heavy or something. You will need to be able to hold the ball in the Chest Hold. This involves a bit of bending backwards, so watch yourself - a non flexible person can be hurt easily by overdoing this. Learn to balance a ball on the side of the neck (I call it the Side Neck Hold, because I'm fantastically creative). This is another flexibility hold, but I suppose this move can be used as a workout like those aerobics things that so many people are hooked on. Balancing on the side of the neck is easy once you keep your head bent - if you are balancing on the right side, then bend the head to the right - this creates a concave surface for the ball to rest in. Shifting from the side of the neck to the chest is a lot trickier - you have to lift your body sideways to give the ball some vertical motion, then drp your body while shifting it so the ball moves to the chest. Shifting to the other side of the neck is a bit trickier, as starting the ball in motion from the Chest Hold is difficult. Maybe it is best to learn as a smooth movement - when you can move from the side of teh neck to the Chest Hold comfortably, try continuing the motion of the ball by using the chest as a sort of catapult to keep the motion going so the body raises again and drops the ball into the opposite side neck hold.
Neck to Chest Circle This move is very difficult - not because of balance, which is the usual reason, but rather flexibility. If you are not flexible, this move will seem impossible to you. You must be able to balance a ball on the chest (sternum), the neck, and either side of the neck in order to so this. If you can, then let's go. 114
Practicing this move can get quite painful after a while. If you feel any twinges or unusual tiredness - stop and go do something else. Once you can do the Neck Butterfly, though, it gets a bit simpler. The most difficult part is to move from the Neck hold to the Side Neck Hold - the back muscles of the neck tend to be rather broad. The way to learn it, then, is like the Neck Butterfly. Learn to move from the Side Neck Hold to the Neck Hold - this just involves a drop and twist of the body. From there, raise the body slightly, then drop it quickly so the ball goes over that ridge - this is probably the most difficult part of the whole move, as you must then somehow stop the ball from going too far and falling over the other side. I'd recommend you practice this only a few times per day - too much, and you will hurt your back... or side... or abdomen...
Head Butterfly Remember the weeks you spent learning the Windshieldwiper and Butterfly with your hands? Time to revisit that, but with a twist. The obvious way to learn the Head Butterfly would be to start with a Forehead Hold and roll to a Temple Hold and back to do i on the other side. That is is actually the hard way to learn it. The easy way is to learn to move from either Temple Hold to the Forehead Hold before even attempting to roll from the forehead to the temple. The reason for this is that it is easier to balance a ball on the forehead than the temple, so it is easier to stop a roll on the forehead than on the temple. After you have learned to roll from temple to forehead successfully nine times out of ten, your temple holds should be good enough for you to learn it in reverse. Rolling from the temple to the forehead involves a sort of wave shape with the body and head - if you start with a Temple Hold on the right side of the head, then you move your body to the right, then carefully flick your head up straight and move the body back to the left - so the ball is "thrown" upwards, but just as the final throws when you were learning the Windshieldwiper, the throws do not cause the ball to leave contact with your head. If you have done it correctly, the ball should be in Forehead Hold position, and the body should not be offcenter.
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Rolling from the forehead to the Temple Hold is "slightly" trickier. When you try it the first few times, you'll notice the ball tends to roll straight off the head - either by the neck, or straight over the head. In the beginning, then, it is probably best to minimise the sideways motion of the ball - so the ball is only moving vertically. If you are rolling to the right Temple Hold, then start on the Forehead Hold, then move your body (not the head) slightly to the right, and bend the head to the left, moving the body further to the right so the ball practically stays in place, but ends up in the Temple Hold.
Arm Roll to Forehead Hold To get to the forehead strictly rolling the ball, you could learn to roll from a Neck Hold straight up and over to the forehead, but this is a simpler, more impressive way. Learn the Head Butterfly and Neck Roll fluently. This is important, as what I'm about to show is a variant of the same motions. First off, we'll trace our route. The ball will travel up the left backarm to the left shoulder. In the neck roll, you would now duck your head down - instead, duck it down only slightly and well to the right. Bend your torso to the right to emphasize the bend. The ball now rolls up the stretched neck muscles, behind the ear, and you straighten up into a Forehead Hold. Of course, that was the simplified description. You will have to practice each stage a bit at a time, being very aware at all times of your position in relation to the ball. If you straighten up too quickly after the roll, for example, you risk throwing the ball off to one side - do every move very carefully, and do not allow the ball to move one millimeter out of your control. If possible, perform the move slowly - this will help in the long term. From the Forehead Hold, you can do the exact opposite on the other side - rolling the ball down behind the ear and off down the right arm. Again, learn it slowly. A more impressive version of that is to do it from the opposite shoulder - roll the ball from the right cradle to right shoulder. Then allow it to continue into a neck roll to just before the left shoulder. From there, raise your left shoulder to halt the ball and then 116
reverse it's direction. The ball can now be rolled up onto the forehead as described before. You can then roll down the right side of the head, and reverse directions again to neck roll down to the left arm. This can surprisingly be done early on in your learning if you use a large ball.
Head Circle Like getting dizzy? This move is for you. You could even use it as a loosening up move for athletics. You could learn this before the Arm Roll to Forehead Hold, or you could learn this first. They both use the same moves - but I find that it is usually better to learn the moves cautiously than continuously - ie; in the former move, you have the familiar arm rolls and neck rolls with the occasional new roll to a Forehead Hold, but here, all moves are new to you - so make sure you practice the Arm Roll to Forehead Hold first. The Arm Roll to Forehead Hold has all the description you need, really - start on a Forehead Hold, roll to a Temple Hold, continue to a Neck Hold, and then carefully navigate the ball up the other side of the head back to the Forehead Hold. You could combine this with the Neck to Chest Circle visually, they run into each other, and continuing the workout theme, the Neck to Chest Circle gives the abdominal muscles and waist a workout while the Head Circle works the kinks out of the neck. If you want to be extra slow learning this, try learning to bring the ball from a Neck Hold to a Temple Hold and back, then repeat on the other side. Practice this in conjunction with your head butterflies, then when you have both solid, simply continue from one into the other.
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Combining Magic with Contact Juggling Many people think that contact juggling is a magic trick when they first see it, and most contact jugglers go to great pains to point out that not only is it not a trick, but that anyone can do it! This is one of the main differences between magic and contact juggling – magic is traditionally a secret art, and contact juggling is openly taught. In this chapter, I’ll show how to combine some easy magic effects with contact juggling. A lot of people do not like the idea of putting magic into their contact juggling, as it somehow makes it all look like magic, and in the process, belittles the skill needed to perform it. I believe, though, that a great contact juggling routine is about the routine itself – not the performer’s skill. As I said way back at the beginning of the book, my first experience of contact juggling was of a guy in a nightclub, who had a lot of skill, but no “stage presence”. Magic is all about stage presence; without the ability to direct (or misdirect) the audience’s attention, it just doesn’t work! Good contact jugglers that use magic in their routines include the UK’s Silver, and Canada’s Matt (chat with them at contactjuggling.org).
Through the Body This move involves an element of misdirection. It is incredibly easy to perform, but will only work right if you have the misdirection down pat. Start by performing a few rolling moves using the hands and arms. Use a few passes, and always watch the movement of the ball very obviously (this is part of the magic). The effect of the trick is that you finally pass from the right hand to the left (or left to right – whatever), bring the ball around behind your back, and push it through your body to appear in the right hand! 118
The secret to the trick is in the watching – if the audience pays attention to what you pay attention to, then you can fool them into seeing something that’s not there. The final pass, from the right hand to the left, is not actually a pass at all. You simply act as if you are passing, and instead, press the ball against your chest with the right wrist (to show the right hand is empty), and cup your left hand as if it has received the ball. Next, you quickly move the left hand behind the back (so the audience doesn’t catch on), and move as if to press the ball into the spine. Use a lot of body movement to accentuate the move. A second or so after you have done the pressing, with the left hand still behind the back, pull your right hand back to grab the ball and bring it forward. Because the audience has been watching what you watch, they see the ball pass through your body. You don’t even need to be completely smooth about this! One magic rule that I would recommend sticking to is never to over-repeat a move; if you repeat a move too often, the audience will see through the trick. On the other hand, if you repeat it once or twice immediately after each other, the audience will not have time to know what to look for. A usual-sized person can do this with a ball that’s up to about 3” in diameter.
Colour Change For this trick, it’s best to use balls that are just smaller than the width of your palm. For me, that means 2.5” balls. The smaller the ball, the easier the move, but the harder it is for the audience to see what’s happening, so make sure to use the biggest balls that you can. You should have a pouch for your balls held on the right (one of the Ferret’s pouches is perfect – as him about them at contactjuggling.org). The effect is that you show a coloured ball in the left open fist hold, wipe your right hand over it, and it is suddenly a different colour.
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The method is simple, but you must practice it to get it smooth – the tiniest sound or pause in the wrong moment might break the spell. First off, you should have a bit of body movement in your routine, so it doesn’t look strange when you turn 90 degrees to the right and your right hand is not visible. When you have turned to the right, the first ball should be in the left hand – bring it up into a long hold, such as a stretched 3Finger Hold. Keep your eyes on the ball while doing this, this distracts the audience while you dip your right hand into the pouch by your right side and bring out ball two in a Thumb Hold, keeping it hidden. Now, turn 180 degrees to the left, bringing the first ball down into the Open Fist Hold. To the audience, this is a stylish thing, so they still don’t know what’s going on. The right hand is held so it’s ball is hidden. Keep the hand kind of loose, so it looks like a natural empty hand. Looking intently at the first ball, bring the right hand up, and sit its ball right next to it, further up towards the wrist. Push the second ball towards the first, and pick up the first ball in the Thumb Hold as the second ball reaches the first ball’s original position. All the action is done with the palm and thumb muscles – the audience should see no finger movement. Continue the wiping motion to reveal the “magically” colourchanged ball, and immediately swing it around to show the audience closer, giving you a moment to drop the original ball into the pouch. Alternatively, you could keep the original ball hidden, to reveal it momentarily, as if you have just produced two balls out of one.
Scarf Balance This is an adaptation of the “Zombie Ball” trick (a magic trick) that needs nothing other than a ball and scarf (and a lot of perseverance). The original trick involved a stick with a ball stuck to the end of it. It could be worthwhile looking it up to see if you can get a better adaptation out of it than I did. 120
Basically, the zombie ball involved a ball that rolled along a scarf, ducked under it, and seemed to float at some points. I haven’t found a way to emulate most of it, but the rolling along the scarf can be done. Get a loan of a scarf from an audience member. It should ideally be very strong, and made of a thin material. Just in case, keep one with your other props. The secret to balancing the ball on the edge, is that you don’t actually balance the ball on the edge… you create a flat area that you can see but the audience can’t, and you balance it there. Hold one corner of the scarf at the base of the left thumb with the left ring finger. The left edge of the scarf is then held stretched between that point and the extreme tip of the thumb (between the thumb and index finger), and the rest of the edge dangles down. Hold the right side of the scarf in the same way in the right hand. When you stretch your hands apart, you will see that a large flat area, about three-four inches in width appears. With a lot of tension on the scarf, you can roll a ball back and forth along this area. Ideally, the scarf should be plain (no pattern), so the audience can’t see that there is part of it not shown to them. With a lot of practice at this, you can narrow the width needed, by holding the corners further up towards the thumb. With an extreme amount of practice with the above method, you can use a different method using a string and a scarf…
Sleight Of Hand The effect with this one is that you have a ball in the left 3-Finger Hold, you take it with your right hand, and then you open the right hand to show that the ball has vanished. You should practice this in front of a mirror in order that you get the angles and actions right. Hold a ball in the left 3-Finger Hold. The hand should be held in such a way that the palm of the hand is not visible to the audience. The easiest way to manage this is to face the audience, and hold the holding hand straight out in front of you. 121
ball.
Reach over with the right hand, and cup the hand around the
Carefully drop the ball into the left palm, and hold it there with a Thumb Hold. You should be extremely careful not to move the left hand while doing this (to continue the illusion that the right hand has the ball), so maybe you should use the right hand to nudge it so it drops (otherwise, you’d have to move your left fingers). Make sure that the ball is not visible to the audience, and pull your right hand towards you, still cupping the hold. The initial version I saw of this revealed the illusion by bringing the cupped hand up to the mouth, and “blowing” the hand open, to reveal the disappearance. That doesn’t give a hint of what to do with the hidden ball, though. A number of options sound good. You could forgo the revealing, and bring your right hand behind the back, going into the “Through the Body” trick. A better one, I think, would be to reveal the disappearance, then reach into your ball pouch (or box, or whatever), and take out an identical – now you can somehow reveal the hidden ball in a “multiplying balls” type trick, ending up with two balls where the audience thought you only had one.
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Wishful Thinking Most of the moves I could think of on the arms have been done before by people – it is difficult to think of any which have not been done. This is, I believe, simply because people practice with the arms more than with the body – not because the body is more difficult to use. With practice, I believe you could use any part of the body to perform almost any contact juggling move – one South African contact juggler (Hi Matte!) told of his belly-dancer girlfriend who could use her stomach to launch a ball right up the body to the shoulders. Another contact juggler told of his time playing with balls on his ankles, and successfully butterflying from one side to another. A lot of arm work depends on the forearm and backarm. Not much work seems to have been done on the more extreme positions, though – butterflying between outside and inside of biceps, rolling to a balance on the outside elbow so the hand is reaching behind the head (some interesting moves could be done like that – think contact juggling with your hands held behind the head), contact juggling with the hands behind the back, etc. Beyond the arms, we have the chest – as Mistress Meghan says, girls can have an advantage here. The chest, I’m sure, could be trained to handle two balls at a time – showering, “palm”spinning, rolling from chest to back of neck and back again. Below the chest is the waist, which our bellydancing anecdote shows can be used effectively. Try learning to butterfly from one side of the waist to the other. You can balance in the small of the back, then possibly bring the ball right around the body and back again (would look good while lying down, or breakdancing if you feel really adventurous). The legs can be treated like the arms – albeit very limited arms. The balls can be balanced or rolled between the knees and waist. Try rolling a ball right down from the knee to the waist, then pass to the opposite leg and down to it’s knee, then hop the ball back to the original knee. 123
The feet and ankles are similar to the palm, cradle, and wrist. You could balance on the inside and outside of the ankles, you can balance on the top and sole of the feet. You can toss from one foot to the other. All the points I have mentioned here can be linked. With a bit of flexibility and perseverance, you should find it possible to roll a ball from any point of the body to any other point. Enrico Rastelli, about a hundred years before this book was published, wore a green velvet suit, and rolled coloured billiard balls all over his body into pockets sown into it. This was before contact juggling was given the attention of hundreds of creative minds. Think what is possible now.
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Creating New Moves The best way to create new moves is to have to learn contact juggling from scratch with no references. Up until recently, most contact jugglers developed their skills in isolation, which explains the huge amount of diversity and new moves, which are always turning up. If you have learned everything in this book from beginning to end, then it is likely that you also have a few moves in mind that you're wondering why I didn't put in – develop those moves and release them to the community, as most likely they're moves that a lot of people overlooked. Or, you could develop them in secret and stun the world in a few years when you unleash your crazy ninja ball skills3 on the world. When I am thinking of new moves, it is usually from my history – coming from many different hobbies to contact juggling allows me to take moves I already knew from other disciplines, and adapt them to the contact-juggling world. An idea that could give some amazing new moves turned up recently (2001) on the contactjuggling.org website – there is a kind of dance related to break dancing which some people call "liquid hand dancing", or “liquid popping” – where the hands and arms are used to create mesmerizing fluid movements. If that could be combined with contact juggling – and I'm sure it could – it would yield some pretty impressive moves. Also, there are the “body popping” and “break dancing” dance-forms. They have great potential as well. Think also of rhythmic gymnastics. Although the ball moves in that art are relatively simple compared with CJ, it looks stunning. Never isolate yourself to such an extent that you will not look at any other art for fear of making your CJ more “impure”. Remember – Allah loves variety! I’m sure YHWH does as well.
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Paraphrase from Greg and Owen’s video – Contact Juggling Part One
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Practicing, and Conditioning In order for you to consistently perform your routines without fault, it is important that you take care of your body. As CJ contains a lot of precise movements, it is more difficult to regulate your diet and exercise. Exercise is a definite must. This does not mean that you should be getting up every day at 6am to run around the town. You should choose your own exercise, and make sure it fits your goals. If you go without exercising your arms for a while, then try to spin a 4-stack for a few minutes, you’ll find that it hurts. This will affect you most if you are a busker, or performing several times a night. Perhaps the best exercise a juggler can get is to juggle regularly – write up a list of moves you need to practice, and practice them regularly, trying to beat, or at least equal, your “records” each time. Personally, I have a list of moves I want to practice, and write down how many times in a row I get the move right. Each time I go through the list again, I try to beat my last record at the first try. If I don’t beat it, then I try to equal the record on subsequent tries (if I haven’t beaten it on the first try, I haven’t beaten it). This method will tell you soon what your strengths and weaknesses are, but there are flaws as well – if you are trying to beat your records all the time, then eventually, you will reach a point where you have a few days of practice to do before you reach the end of your long list of practice moves. Moderate. Decide a point at which you have achieved “perfection” in a move (whatever that is), and put it into a routine. Take note of the effects of anything you eat or drink. Coffee can make you shake slightly and lose focus, making it difficult to perform slow or involved movements. Alcohol can severely disrupt your control, causing ridiculous amounts of embarrassment as you fail even the simplest moves (don’t I know it…). You don’t have to give these things up – just be aware of these things so you can be careful of your diet in case you are doing a show on a specific date. 126
If you are on a special diet, you should be aware of any deficiencies in it. As a vegetarian, I become aware I have left something out of my diet when I lack the strength to carry out a practice routine despite exercising regularly. Carefully watching your diet can give advance warning of such potential problems. Practicing other forms of manipulation is good for conditioning your body for contact juggling as well – martial arts teach you precise movements, reflexes, and timing; skateboarding, acrobatics and BMX teach spatial awareness; magic, yoyo and toss juggling teach you to become more aware of the motions of the objects you are manipulating. In fact, even giving up the practice for a few days can help sometimes. When I was learning the 5 ball cascade in toss juggling, for example, I’d practice for hours each day, and never get more than 10 or 11 catches. I gave up one day and went back to regular juggling. Next week, I tried it again, and got 14 catches. While I was “resting” from the practice, my subconscious was working out the necessary movements. Two very good practice hints other CJers give are to practice blindfolded and to practice sitting down. When you practice blindfolded (or with your eyes shut), you are learning to perform the moves based on feeling rather than sight. This is important for when you decide to go onto multi-ball CJing. In multi-ball CJing, it is difficult to watch all the balls at the same time, so it is a great idea to have a subconscious feel for the move, so even if you don’t like closing your eyes, practice while watching TV or reading a book, etc. When you practice sitting down, you are forcing yourself to take command of the ball; the ball does not lead you around the room – you lead it around your body. A note on the sitting position – it is probably best for you to sit on your heels, with the toes crossed. If you sit cross-legged, you are inviting damage to your shins, and if you sit on a chair, then when a ball drops, it will roll further away from you.
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Always warm up before moving onto your more difficult moves. Start with basic one-ball moves before getting complex. This is for several reasons: If you go from a cold-start to a complex run, you are inviting tendon and muscular damage. You need to give your body time to adapt to 1 ball before moving to 2 or more. This is true of even the most experienced CJers – you will find yourself dropping if you don’t allow the body time to re-introduce itself to the feeling. If you never practice with lower numbers of balls, you will be skipping out on practicing the basic moves necessary for multi-ball work.
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Glossary Backarm – the opposite of the forearm. Body-rolling – a style of contact juggling, which involves rolling the ball over various parts of the body. Usually meant as parts other than the hands and arms. Butterfly – a movement of the hand where a ball is rolled between the hand and cradle. Catch – a ball is tossed to a part of the body, and brought to an immediate halt when it reaches it. Popular places to catch at are the elbows, forehead, and neck. Catching in the palms is not really impressive, so isn’t usually done. Contact Juggling – a form of juggling where the balls are rolled and spun around the body and arms instead of being tossed in the air. Cradle – a position on the back of the hand where a ball can be held on two or three fingers. Escape – where one ball is rolled out of a palmspin, and the palmspin continues with the remaining balls. Flourish – a small movement of the fingers or hands meant to impress subtly. Flyaway – a move where a ball is tossed from one position to be caught in another. Hold – a balance where a ball is held in a location around the body. This can be as simple as holding a ball in the palm of the hand, or as tricky as holding a ball on the extreme outside of the elbow. Inside – the side of something that is closer to the body. If you hold your right arm against the chest, and the left arm against the right arm, the right arm is known as the “inside arm”. Isolation – a move where at least one ball is held still in space while everything else is in motion. This can be amazing to see. Line – three or more balls moved so that there are always at least two of them in a straight line. Orbital – one or more balls spun around an isolated ball. The spinning balls seem to “orbit” the stationary one. Outside – the side of something that is further from the body. If you hold your arm up in a natural position, the soft part of the elbow is 129
nearer to the body, so the pointy side is known as the “outside elbow”. Palmspin – a style of CJ where multiple balls are spun in circles around each other in the palms of the hands. Some people can spin some patterns upside-down – the pattern is held by the fingers of the hand, which is palm-down. Pass – a pass is simply when you move balls from one place to another place. Usually, this is either from hand to hand or elbow to elbow, etc. Stack – three or more balls held so that at least one of the balls is supported by the others and not touched by the hand. Stall – a pause in a move, where the position of the ball is highlighted. Usually, the ball is held in an awkward hold. Toss Juggling – the usual form of juggling, where balls are thrown into the air so that there is usually no more than one ball in each hand. Transfer – a transfer is a pass that keeps a pattern. An example is a 3b Palmspin Transfer, where the Palmspin is obviously still a 3b Palmspin after the transfer. Walk –a mime that suggests the ball should be moving in a direction yet is isolated. See the various palm-palm, palm-cradle, etc, walks. Windshieldwiper – the movement the forearm and hand makes when moved in an arc, keeping the elbow in one stationary point.
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Bibliography There are not many books or videos on this subject, which makes it possibly easier for the aspiring CJer to get almost everything existing on the subject.
Videos “The Labyrinth”. Jim Henson’s film contains two scenes of contact juggling – the first has a little butterfly work, and the second is stack work. Michael Moschen does the ball work. “In Motion with Michael Moschen”. This contains two contact juggling routines by Michael Moschen. The first starts with 8 balls and moves down one by one to 1 ball. The second is a routine with 1 ball. “The Art Of Contact Juggling” by David Pennington. I haven’t seen this video, but have been told that it is a tutorial, teaching a contact juggling style, which can be compared to David Copperfield’s style of magic. “Contact Juggling: Part One” by Greg Maldonado and Owen Edson. This is a tutorial video, which is extremely simple to follow. I’d definitely recommend that every beginning Contact Juggler buy it. “Sphereplay” by Michael Glenn. Another tutorial, which is different to the above. Michael shows a one ball routine, then goes through it step by step.
Books/Magazines Contact Juggling by James Ernest. This book describes almost every move that Moschen has in his routine, but includes a lot of extra moves, and was the basis of the existing CJ community. Kaskade. This issue contains a very good article about palmspinning, with descriptions of many moves. A pattern with 11 balls is shown. I haven’t seen this pattern performed yet.
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Websites www.contactjuggling.org - this is the CJ community’s site. It contains a huge amount of submitted videos, and is almost fully interactive. www.contactjuggling.com - this is Rich Shumaker’s website. It has a very well done instructional video, some submitted videos, and a lot of forums. www.peapot.net - this site sells some very good juggling videos. The example clips of the “3b Different Ways” show some excellent examples of contact juggling and toss combinations. www.shiftys-spheres.com - This is the personal website of Shifty – a CJer who, despite only starting the art about a year previous to starting the website, has come up with some of the more interesting innovations in palmspinning. www.jugglingdb.com - probably the most comprehensive juggling site on the Internet (mostly toss juggling). This title used to belong to www.juggling.org, but they just don’t seem to have bothered updating in the last few years.
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Still To Do Finger Flip Finger Roll Pilf Regnif Finger Flurry Tripod Pickup Caterpillar Outside Elbow Flyaway 2b Stairstep 2b Tandem Spined Butterfly 2b Mineshaft roll 2b Blackstone’s Balls The Train 2b Back-Back Pass w/ Thumb Hold 2b Upsidedown Palmspin 2b Toss and Catch 2b Palm-Palm Pass w/ Cage 3b Propeller Isolation 3b Mesh w/ Arm Catch 3b Mesh Cascade 3b Mesh 3b Thumblift Isolation 3b Rockabye 4b Isolation 4b Vertical Isolation Floating 4 Stack (aka Half Diamond) 4b Twist 4b Snake 4b Rotating Columns 4b Propeller 4b Collapse and Rebuild 4b Pinky Lift 4b Asymmetrical Orbital 5b Propeller Blossom (5 Stack) 5b Pyramid 133
