Ninja Granny
Kath Revell
Tai chi, Qigong
& Somatics
Kath Revell
ninjagranny20@gmail.com
07729907056
BALANCE, RELAXATION, VITALITY
About
About Ninja Granny
Tai Chi & Qigong
I have been teaching and learning Tai chi and Qigong for over 30 years. Currently I have two sets of teachers:
Eva and Karel Koskuba from the Chinese Internal Arts Association (CIAA)
From them I am currently learning Bagua, which is a form of Tai chi done in a circle, and Yiquan, which is a very subtle, almost motionless form of Tai chi. They are disciples of Chen Xiaowang, the current Grandmaster of Chen Style Tai chi. You can watch a video of Chen Xiaowang here.
My other teachers are:
Tom Collingridge and Helen Kingdon from the Exeter School of Tai chi Chuan.
From Tom and Helen I am studying the Chen style Laojia form, which you can find out more about on my Tai chi page. They have filmed all the sequences of the Laojia form and they are available on their youtube channel here.
Tom and Helen are students of Chen Ziqiang, the nephew of Chen Xiaowang and the current Chen style international trainer. You can watch a video of Chen Ziqiang here
I have had many Tai chi teachers over the years and am grateful to all of them and to all of the students I have taught over the years, as I have learned something from every one of them.
My previous teachers include:
John Pollex a potter in Plymouth, who was my first teacher way back in 1991!! He studied with Gerda Geddes and we learned the Yang style 24 form.
During the 1990s we were lucky enough to have Master Zong Di from Shanghai in Plymouth as he was studying for a PhD. From him I learned Yang style 24 and 85 forms and Chen style 36 form.
I met Rose Oliver from the Double Dragon Alliance in 2005 and have been studying with her occasionally ever since. From her I learned the strengthening exercise Shen Jin Ba Gu, which is very popular with my students.
Hello, I am Kath Revell, aka Ninja Granny - I was given the name by some kids in the park when I was practising my Tai chi, so thank you for that, whoever you are!
Somatics
The first thing I noticed when I started practising Somatics was that my Tai chi improved! Somatics helps you to understand how your body moves, how it co-ordinates from the centre and works as a system. The second thing I noticed after taking up Somatics was that my long-term, chronic ankle pain, which had never quite gone away since the injury back in 1987, gradually got better.
I first came across Somatics at Port Eliot Festival in 2015, where Darren Gibbs from Active Somatics was teaching workshops. I was so amazed by the transformative effects of such simple, subtle movements that I enrolled on the Essential Somatics Clinical Somatic Education Professional Training course, run by Martha Peterson.
There are two pages in this website devoted to Somatics. The Somatics Movement classes, which are weekly in person and online classes. And the one-to-one, hands-on clinical somatics education sessions.
Members of Exeter School of Tai chi Chuan at Carmelite Retreat Centre, 2015