Tag Archives: hiden

Hidemine Jibiki – Hakko-ryu, Daito-ryu Aiki-Budo, and “The Road to Softness”, Part 1

地曳秀峰

Hidemine Jibiki Hidemine Jibiki (地曳秀峰) started out as a student of Karate with Shotokan Karate Founder Gichin Funakoshi (船越義珍). From there he moved on to Hakko-ryu Jujutsu (八光流柔術) with the Founder of that art, Okuyama Ryuho (奥山龍峰), and then Daito-ryu Aiki Budo (大東流合気武道) with Tsunejiro Hosono (細野恒次郎) and Kotaro Yoshida (吉田幸太郎). He ended up in the Chinese internal martial arts as a student of Wang … Continue reading Hidemine Jibiki – Hakko-ryu, Daito-ryu Aiki-Budo, and “The Road to Softness”, Part 1 »

An interview with Aikido Shihan Hiroshi Isoyama, Part 1

Hiroshi Isoyama and Steven Seagal
A few weeks ago I was watching Michael Schiavello’s interview with Steven Seagal in which he named Hiroshi Isoyama (磯山博) as the Aikido instructor who has influenced him the most.Hiroshi Isoyama sensei began training in the Iwama Dojo in 1949 at the age of 12 as a direct student of the Founder of aikido, Morihei Ueshiba. Over a long career in the martial arts, he has been Chief of Defensive Tactics for the Japan Self Defense Force Academy, and also instructed the U.S. Army in self-defense tactics. I still remember his comment about starting to teach Aikido to the military – "They didn’t believe that Aikido works – I made them believe".
His trademark Ganseki Otoshi demonstrations are always a crowd pleaser at the annual All Japan Aikido Demonstration.
This is the first part of an English translation of an interview with Hiroshi Isoyama sensei that first appeared in the February 2009 issue of Gekkan Hiden ("Secret Teachings Monthly"), a well known martial arts magazine in Japan. It was also published in a collection of interviews with students of the Founder published in Japanese as 開祖の横顔 ("Profiles of the Founder") in 2009.There was a short introduction to this work in the article "Morihei Ueshiba – Profiles of the Founder".
I previously posted an English translation of the interview with Nobuyoshi Tamura sensei from that collection in two parts (Part 1 | Part 2).