Tai chi enthusiast and rock legend, Lou Reed passed away today.
Tai chi enthusiast and rock legend, Lou Reed passed away today.
That's terrible news
Nice tai chi slide show http://vimeo.com/62099503
"The true meaning of a given movement in a form is not its application, but rather the unlimited potential of the mind to provide muscular and skeletal support for that movement." Gregory Fong
R.I.P. Lou.....
Quote:
Originally Posted by RD'S Alias - 1A
I have easily beaten every one I have ever fought.....
Oh man. Bummer.
That was a nice slide show T.M.
Here's the Rolling Stones write up with a link in the article to 20 of his tracks: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/ne...at-71-20131027
R.I.P. Lou Reed
I will remember him as an earnest Tai Chi practitioner.
May June 2003
Sep+Oct 2007
Gene Ching
Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
Author of Shaolin Trips
Support our forum by getting your gear at MartialArtSmart
He had a good run.
RIP Lou.
Kung Fu is good for you.
Lou Reed 1942-2013
In addition, we're running some meme quotes from Lou Reed on our fb.
Gene Ching
Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
Author of Shaolin Trips
Support our forum by getting your gear at MartialArtSmart
For those that didn't know about Lou Reed's "eputation for being difficult in interviews. His NYC gruffness was legendary among reporters" that I mentioned in our obituary for Reed above, see below.
Contortions of angst with the tai chi master
IAIN SHEDDEN THE AUSTRALIAN OCTOBER 29, 2013 12:00AM
Lou Reed in Sydney with his tai chi master Ren Guang Yi. Picture: Jon Fotiadis. Source: News Limited
THERE were few more daunting prospects for a music journalist - or indeed any journalist - than an interview with Lou Reed. He had no time for critics and addressed questioners with a mix of contempt and mild amusement.
Even on his last visit to Australia in 2010, when he co-curated the Vivid Live Festival with his wife Laurie Anderson, most of the questions at the launch media call were addressed by her, with Reed, looking thoroughly bored by the process, delivering the occasional, dismissive line.
I had the pleasure, such as that was, of interviewing Reed three times for The Australian, twice in person in Sydney and once by phone, all of them in the latter half of his solo career. The phone call was relatively uneventful, but an audience with Reed in person was a much more confronting affair.
The first, in 2000, lived up to the fear and dread that consumed me before it. The few journalists summoned to his hotel and asked to wait outside his room had the demeanour of patients in a doctor's surgery about to receive important test results.
"How am I supposed to answer a question like that?" he said a few questions in, responding to my inquiry about how he felt his music might have been different without the drug addiction and alcohol abuse that were part of his make-up in the late 1960s and early 70s.
At the time of the interview Reed had been sober for 20 years and it was a subject no longer relevant to him, but since he hadn't been in Australia for 16 years it seemed worth asking. In response he started asking me how the same abuses might have affected my writing career.
Ouch.
The more we talked about music, however, the more he opened up and by the end he was quite pleasant, particularly when addressing the music he was performing on the tour.
"I don't look back - at all," he said. "To me, it's a waste of time. I can't imagine why people do it. There are better things to do than look back, for me. I have no interest in it."
The second and last face-to-face interview came three years later, when Reed came to Australia to tour, with his tai chi master, Ren Guang Yi, who not only travelled with the singer as part of his entourage but also appeared on stage during the performances.
Reed wasn't doing any interviews but I managed to convince his people to let me talk to him - purely about his ongoing experience with tai chi, to which he had been a fanatical devotee for many years.
When we sat down together and I explained what I wanted to ask him about, he said simply: "I don't want to talk about that."
Armed with the experience of my previous encounter, I replied that, supposing he did want to talk about it, what would he be able to tell me or show me about the significance of tai chi.
For the following 20 minutes he had me in all sorts of positions on the floor in front of him, giving me a tai chi for dummies experience. "You don't want to lock that knee ever," he said, standing over me as I tried to assume a crouching tai chi pose. "You want to know why? Because if I kick you I will break your leg."
To hear the words "I will break your leg" coming from the mouth of one of the musicians I had most admired for 30 years was a surreal and unsettling experience, but one I knew would be available for endless retelling.
Reed wasn't without humour, however, and our last exchange, once I had gathered my wits and my limbs into some sort of order, proved it so.
Had he ever thought to use his tai chi skills in a violent way? I wondered. "Particularly in newspaper interviews," he said.
Gene Ching
Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
Author of Shaolin Trips
Support our forum by getting your gear at MartialArtSmart
RIP Lou Reed
Stickgrappler's Sojourn of Septillion Steps - my new site
Stickgrappler's Martial Arts Archives - my old site
I'm told that Lou made a video of himself doing Tai Chi just minutes before he passed. He gave it to his wife, Laurie Anderson, to pass along to his master, Ren Guangyi, and said that after practicing, he felt no pain.
Lou Reed was intensely passionate about Tai Chi. Let there be no doubt of that.
Gene Ching
Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
Author of Shaolin Trips
Support our forum by getting your gear at MartialArtSmart
From Tony Visconti (a Tai Chi brother of Lou Reed):
This is from Master Ren and Stephan Berwick. We all loved Lou for his music and bigger than life personality. But here is that Taiji side of him I've been rattling on about.
Stephan Berwick
Master Ren and I wanted to express our feelings about Lou's passing, because while so much is being written about him, we have found little that really celebrates his love of Taijiquan. Please feel free to pass around - we want everyone to know about how important Taiji was to him.
___________________________________
Lou Reed - the Warrior Prince of Taijiquan
On NPRs Fresh Air program today, Lou was commemorated by his previous long-time publicist, Bill Bentley, in a report entitled, 'Never Back Down', who aptly described Lou as a "Rock & Roll Warrior". For me, his Taiji brother and for his beloved teacher, Ren Guangyi, we would also describe him as a Taiji Warrior who represented the highest ideals of martial arts.
Lou energized and inspired us with with his enduring love of Taijiquan - to which he credited for the health and vitality he displayed for years. To that, Lou worked consistently to spread the powerful message of Taiji, a martial art that gave him so much joy and well-being, that he truly wanted the whole world to experience what Taiji gave him. With Ren Guangyi by his side, he exposed parts of the world never before privy to authentic Chen style Taiji with over 150 live performances globally, featuring Ren performing Taiji live with Lou's band. From this extraordinarily prescient work, Lou promoted Taiji in unprecedented venues, including a performance on the David Letterman show, a concert at the Winter Olympics closing ceremony in Turin, Italy, and a pioneering display and instruction of Taiji at the Sydney Opera House. With press appearances, personal testimonies, a pilgrimage to Taiji's birthplace, Chenjiagou, and most recently his affection for our film collaboration, Final Weapon, Lou spread the message of the wonders of Taiji to millions. HIs appearance in Final Weapon and his generous sharing of his music gave me the once in a lifetime opportunity to employ his music as the fuel for our cinematic capture of what he always described as the visceral power of Taijiquan.
So for me and Ren, two martial artists who found deep inspiration and support from Lou, we are eternally grateful for his sharing, blessing, and sheer love for an art understood best by those in the know. With his decades-long commitment to Chinese martial arts and his final ten years devouring Chen Taijiquan like only a warrior can, he was a knight errant for Taijiquan of the highest order who was also a real martial arts tough guy with genuine Taiji skill.
All of which we were most privileged to see when Lou carried his classical Chinese weapons with him. I recall a verse of his that described himself as flying with a sword strapped to his back. This is exactly how Ren and I remember him - a boundless Kung Fu Warrior Prince with the fearless heart of a lion, who soared with a sword on his back, and possessed the soul of a kingly father.
And as brothers in arms in martial arts, Ren and I always had his back when he was here and will continue to do so. We will never let anyone forget his legacy of creativity, courage, inspiration, and warmth embodied by his incredible, enduring passion for Taijiquan.
Ren Guangyi & Stephan Berwick
Gene Ching
Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
Author of Shaolin Trips
Support our forum by getting your gear at MartialArtSmart
Quite a legacy...
Lou Reed Lives on…in a spider
By Gwen Pearson
10.28.13 11:47 AM
G, H adult male Loureedia annulipes from Israel; (photo by Martin Forman).
One of the giants of music passed on this week, but I wanted to mention that he has been immortalized in spider taxonomy! Loureedia is a genus of velvet spiders that live underground, and named for the leader of the 60′s Velvet Underground.
Lady Bird Spider, Eresus kollari; photo by Fritz Geller-Grimm
Velvet spiders get their name from their lovely fuzzy coloration; you might have seen photos of the adorable Lady Bird Spider, pictured at right. Most velvet spiders are cryptic sit-and-wait predators in deserts. They typically live in silken tubes underground or under objects.
Mr. Reed’s namesake spiders do have a suitably rock-n-roll lifestyle; They decorate the roof of their underground burrow with their prey remnants, and juveniles feed on their mother’s corpse before dispersing. Loureedia spiders are found in Israel, which is an homage to the rocker’s Jewish roots. You can read the full paper online, but it’s a bit dry if you aren’t deeply interested in spider anatomy:
Miller J, Griswold C, Scharff N, Rezac M, Szuts T, Marhabaie M (2012) The velvet spiders: an atlas of the Eresidae (Arachnida, Araneae). ZooKeys 195: 1-144. doi: 10.3897/zookeys.195.2342
I haven’t been able to find any commentary from Mr. Reed about his spider namesake, but I like to think that the author of “Walk On The Wild Side” would appreciate a bit of nature. Although the “wildlife” mentioned in his song isn’t quite the same.
Gene Ching
Publisher www.KungFuMagazine.com
Author of Shaolin Trips
Support our forum by getting your gear at MartialArtSmart