1996 notes on meeting Sherman Harrill

 

 

 

I just discovered some comments I made to myself about training with Sherman and what I described to Ernie in a letter I sent in 1996.

 

These impressions would be followed by a decade of clinics with Sherman, really a very short time, then, in 2005 after his death I created my Sherm-pedia to try and capture what I had seen. But just more words,  that would mean little to others. I think of how many people experienced Sherman over his lifetime, and there is almost no discussion about what he brought to the table.

 

Of course his direct students would not need to do such description.

He had a need to show what the kata technique application of Isshinryu could become. He was not teaching the full system with those clinics, just attempting to open the eyes at how Isshinryu could be used.

 

The perfect answer was how he created John Kerker, who IMO got the full transmission from Sherman, then IMO continued a slightly different path finding his own mission to use everything he got from Sherman, his own voice. Not an attempt to duplicate what Sherman did, rather focusing on a different sharing for different students, with the same goal in mind, letting those students learn what Isshinryu can be.

As I look back on these notes, many things were framed on how I saw things through my own lens of experience at that time. With much more experience with Sherman my opinions would become framed in a more mature understanding. But this does allow me to look again at what the first glance showed me.

 

Personal notes made in 1996 –

 

Mr. Harrill does about 15 clinics a year.

 

He drives a school bus an teaches around 20-25 students. In Carson, Iowa.

 

He does a lot with the Midwest Ueichiryu people, working with the 2^nd highest ranking dan under George Mattson.

 

He tells me US Ueichi-ryu do almost everything extremely hard (ie striking, etc). They’ve been having him help them to become softer.

 Yes, his ‘softer’ does not equate with Kung fu movement as T’ai chi. Rather its using very soft striking as punching.

 

Letter to Ernie Rothrock in 1996 – where I tried to explain what I was learning from Sherman Harrill

 

Then there is the clinic Mr. Harrill clinic. Now there is  where I am really worked up. Prior to that clinic. (having received a copy of the video tape Garry Gerossie had made of that day), I began to document the techniques from that first clinic on last May, 1995. Approximately 174 technique applications covered in 8 hours, ranging across the Isshinryu kata.. 

I have yet to do so on the 2 kata he covered in February. My next project, Having stated that attended his clinic on June 29. 

Most interesting, Garry Gerossie chose the kata and questions on same and Sherman went 8 hours again. Mostly concentrating on Seisan, Sunsu and Naihanchi and Mike, Young, Maureen and John and I worked to create documentation on what actually took place.  I think we concentrated on 75 bunkai applications from the February clinic, once I have completed my documentation it becomes an impressive analysis.

 

Without question. He could easily do 8 hours on any single kata. Now I am not building him up to be something he is not, i.e. the greatest, but he is definitely the most interesting Isshinryu practitioner I have met. Our clinics have only been on the art of application of Isshinryu technique.

 

As most of us present are not his students, we miss the arathon 8 hour sessions on kata practice, etc. which he held with Garry’s students the day before. And there were no bunkai there, either, that Garry tells me 

 

Having documented clinics a year apart (May 95 and June 96) he does not repeat many of his applications on the same technique, either. I don’t think his knowledge outside of actual Isshinryu is very wide, but he does know what could be addressed with Isshinryu.

 

Observations on the Harrill technique. He always explores a technique by my principles of analysis. (i.e. the Interior vs. Exterior Lines of Defense). When he looks at a technique, he looks at every part, {windup motion, each possible striking surface attendant, multiple targets within the technique can be utilized against}.

 

He shows a wide range of hidden striking techniques. His vertical punch is angled somewhat like Dillman’s. He strikes with the thumb side of the punch, raps with the knuckles, uses single knuckle strikes, uses the ‘Hidden Sword’, uses hidden thumb strikes, etc. He shows how to strike hard and then to strike soft with the same technique. Often showing how a soft strike causes a greater reaction in the target. He also shows many specific striking locations (head, neck, torso, arm and leg) with each strike.

 

Approximately 50% of what he shows is immediately useful and practical. The other 50% often causes you to scratch your head and question why you would want to go through that sequence, even though it matches the kata. On reflection I believe these complex forced sequences are more like the equivalent of 2 person forms, the values lies in the difficulty creating greater skill level in the practitioner, rather than the practicality for the adept.

 

Yet at the same time, often the completion of the more complex sequences the attacker is found in a most complex locking position and the continuation of the forms movement intensifies the pain of the lock. An example of this would be in Sunsu, the person is in a complex bent arm/bent wrist press lock and once in that position, the form’s next right forearm block followed by a left forearm block ratcheted he attackers locked arm in intense pain. Go figure.

  

The plethora of technique also is finding another expression.  When teaching the adults, I find myself demonstrating the applications when trying to get them to understand the kata technique. It definitely adds another layer of understanding to my own technique.

 

It is interesting to speculate what my Isshinryu would have been had been instructed by Sherman originally. I imagine I would not have experienced other karate systems. Well who knew?

 

My program stands on its own two legs without Sherman Harrill. Much of the applications I have developed are mot in his work as demonstrated.  I’ve come from different principles and I firmly believe in them too.  I imagine this technique will be used only for my senior students, as sort of a graduate work on Isshinryu.  It appears to me that this type of analysis belongs in only the most serious, senior practitioners. (Snob-ish aren’t I.)

 

*Note: At this time I was using the term ‘bunkai’ to describe what Sherman was doing at those clinics. Later I evolved the description to be that of kata technique application analysis, the precursor to the larger study of kata technique application realization.

 

On reflection I can see how Sherman initially affected me, only as time passed did I see what he was doing more clearly. As I really wasn’t his student and I only saw the application portion of how he saw Isshinryu there was never enough to base a basic change in the structure of the way my program developed.

 

Among my greatest things I was not able to experience was to really show him what I had seen. Only twice was I able to share slivers of what I was doing. One time I shared a small piece of three variations of one movement from Tjimande and of course he showed me a new fourth variation. 

The last time I saw him out in Chicopee while on a break outside I was able to demonstrate a small piece of my t’ai chi studies. I remember how interested he was as he considered what the application of that form could mean.

 

But things did not go that way. I gained so much from him, more than anyone could work on. And now 25 years later I am still working on what he shared and still learning.