Page 29 Summer 1991
Some
interesting patterns have four jugglers in the middle and four
outside. With all moving to their own right, they can pass every
right hand to a new juggler. Or they could pass every other to make
it a little easier, or pass two clubs
to each juggler to allow time for getting to the next
juggler. If you eliminate the movement from this pattern, you can
have each juggler just feed the two nearest facing jugglers, say
starting on the left. Then maybe start moving after some number of
passes. DOUBLE
FEEDS AND MULTIPLE FEEDS If
we add a fourth juggler next to the feeder in a basic feed, we get
a double feed (jugglers 1 through 4 of Fig. 2). The old feedee
opposite the fourth person becomes a second feeder in the pattern,
passing to the original feeder and to the new person. The two other
jugglers of the original pattern are not affected and keep passing
as they were in the original feed.
In
fact, we can keep adding one more juggler at a time opposite an end
feedee to turn that feedee into a feeder. In this way you can add
any number of people and everyone gets to feed except two people,
one on each end (see Fig. 2). THE
COMPLETE
FEED We
can change a big double feed like Fig. 2 so that almost everyone
feeds three people instead of two. But there's no reason to stop
with three. In
the complete feed there can be any number of people in each of two
rows with everyone feeding. Each person feeds all the people in the
opposite row plus some number of phantoms" on the ends of the
row. If there are X people in your row and Y people in the other,
you do a normal feed of those Y people plus a total of X-I phantoms
on the ends. See Fig. 3, in which all the passes of two jugglers are
depicted.
A
phantom is an invisible juggler off one end of the opposite line
whom you feed by doing a self. It's important to actually visualize the
phantoms as you feed back and forth past the real jugglers and the
phantoms. This allows you to keep track of where you are and when to
resume passing with the real end juggler after you've fed some
phantoms.
Unless
you are on an end yourself, you have phantoms on both ends. In fact,
you have exactly as many phantoms on your right (off the end of the
other line) as you have people on your left in your own line, and
the same number of phantoms on your left (off the end) as people on
your right in your line. Visualize your phantoms' positions and just
do a feed of all positions and you shouldn't have any trouble
keeping the pattern going. Everybody should start feeding, say, at
the extreme left (with a phantom for most people, a real juggler for
only one person in each row). Try the complete feed first with just
2 people on each side - everyone will have just one phantom, on
their own end of the opposite side. THE
AMOEBA In
the amoeba, everyone takes turns being the feeder, in a fairly
simple sequence. When you're feeding, you make exactly one sweep
right and left of all the other jugglers. When you start sweeping
back to the left after having passed to the feedee on the extreme
right, that feedee comes over and stands to your right in
preparation for becoming the next feeder. You make your final feed
to the person on the extreme left and then you go stand on the end
next to that person. Mter your last pass, then next feeder takes
over, starting with the person you ended with, and then sweeping
right and left once in a normal feed. So everyone comes from the
right, becomes the feeder and goes back to the left to become a
feedee again. THE
FEED WEAVE The
feed weave is a fun moving pattern. The formation has one person
feeding three. The feeder just does a normal back and forth feed of
those three positions, but the excitement comes from the fact that
the feedees are constantly changing places while juggling.
All
three feedees do the same thing, following each other around in a
figure eight as they all go sequentially through the three feedee
positions. Each feedee does a 6-ct (passes every third right) while
moving around, with each pass coming from a different position in
the feed (Fig. 4).
If you're the first feedee, on the feeder's extreme left, here's what you do. The feed starts with you. As soon as you have passed, start backing up slowly, waiting for the incoming pass. When you've got that club, move backwards and to your left into the middle slot.
After
you've gone past the juggler who is vacating the middle slot for the
slot you just came from, move
quickly forward, straight toward the feeder. As you go through this
middle position, make another pass and keep moving forward until you
catch the feeder's pass to you. Then quickly start sliding to your
left to get out of the middle, and back up slowly in the outside slot
As you're backing up on the outside, you pass again and continue
backing. Then start. moving to your right. Again, as soon as you've
gone past the juggler who is vacating the middle slot, move quickly
forward, straight toward the feeder. And again make a pass as you go
through the middle heading straight forward. When you catch the pass,
immediately slide to your right to get out of the way, and then back
up slowly in the outside slot, back to where you started. You'll make
another pass from that slot and keep on backing up as you continue the
weave.
Wherever
you start, stay in place until you make your first pass. At any given
time, the feedee in the middle goes forward and those on the outside
go backward. If you start in the middle, the thing to remember for the
start is that you go forward and then to the right after catching your
first pass.
The
feeder can help things enormously by leading the feedees as they move
forward and back. To do this, the feeder should throw short passes in
the middle (toward approaching jugglers) and long passes on the sides
(to jugglers backing away). THE
FEED LOOM The
feed loom is very similar to the feed weave in that the feeder feeds
three jugglers who are moving among the three feedee slots. In this
variation, however, the feedees never move forwards or backwards, only
sideways (Fig.5).
To avoid crashing into each other, the feedees choose three different distances from the feeder: close, normal and distant. Then they slide sideways past each other, always moving after each pass to an adjacent slot and making a pass from there before moving on. As in the feed weave, each feedee does a 6-ct while moving among the three positions, with one pass made from each position encountered. If you're the close or normal distance feedee, make sure, however, that after passing you don't move until any immediately following longer pass goes by in your next slot. |