While going through some old archival footage (left over on some old hard drives I have), I came across this gem of a video of Bruce Lee demonstrating Tai Chi Chuan (Tai Ji Quan).

Bruce Lee & his father, Lee Hoi Chuen, practicing Tai Ji in Hong Kong. (1958)

Most probably know that Bruce Lee had been taught some of the fundamentals of Tai Ji (more specifically, Wu style) from his father Lee Hoi Chuen. Towards the end of his life, the elder Lee, also studied some (Yang-style) Tai Ji with Liang Zi Peng, who was also a teacher of other internal martial arts (namely Yi Quan). Because of this connection, it has been suggested that Bruce had received some additional training in internal martial arts from him.

The story goes that Lee Hoi Chuen had asked Liang to show Bruce some gung fu during one of his trips to China since Bruce was such an avid practitioner of gung fu.

It is said that Liang taught Bruce some of the basic principles of Yi Quan… to me this is interesting since Yi Quan is known to be a principle based art that eschews forms practice, and believe one ought to not be bound by any one method… sound familiar?

If you’re familiar with Tai Ji, you’ll recognize the section above as the pushing movements leading into the “single whip” posture (which looks to me like Wu style because of a smaller frame).

As a side note, did you know that while in Hong Kong, Bruce Lee had also received some training in Choi Lai Fut under Chen Nian Bo, as well as Jing Wu martial arts by Xiao Han Sheng. He had also received some training in Hung Gar. This was of course in addition to his Wing Chun training.

Also, during his time in Seattle, Bruce was under the guidance of Master Fook Yeung, a well-known master of Red Boat Wing Chun.

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