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Thursday, January' 24, 2008
{The Blue Banner}
Features
Page 7
Club welcomes jugglers of all levels of expertise
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Practicing in the gym. Juggler!^ Club founder Britt Tyler juggles with atmi^ member.
Jugglers gather weekly to explore techniques, learn new tricks, hone talents
Erica Grabon
Staff Writer
EHGRABON@UNCA.EDU
While most students spend time juggling classes,
relationships and work, the students of the Jugglers
Club add to the act with clubs, balls and anything else
they can get their hands on.
“1 enjoy juggling with other people,” said Britt
Tyler, founder of the Jugglers Club. “It’s kind of like
playing music because you discover rhythms with
other people that you wouldn’t find by yourself”
Tyler started the club last semester. They meet
every Sunday at 2:30 p.m. in the Justice Center, and
every Monday at 4 p.m. in Highsmith.
The constant number of members is around four
or five, although almost 15 people, students and
nonstudents, came to juggle two Sundays ago. The
club is open to jugglers and those learning to juggle,
according to Tyler.
“I’m not much of a solo juggler. There are also lots
of patterns that you can do with other people that are
lots of fiin,” Tyler said.
Tyler brings in professional jugglers like Kevin
Bradley to teach students more techniques. Bradley
has been juggling for 28 years and learned to juggle at
age 9. Ingrid Johnson is another juggler Tyler works
with in a troupe outside of the .scHobl.
“The club here doesn’t perform yet,” Tyler said.
“The other group I work with has done other events
at Biltmore.”
The club has few members in the school, but more
students are finding out about it every day. Daniel
Larsson, a transfer student from Sweden, recently
discovered the club when he went to the gym to play
soccer.
“I saw this guy juggling, and I went to sec what that
was all about, and I got hooked,” Larsson said.
Larsson stayed for the entire session of the club on
Sunday, practicing with clubs and balls. Tie plans to
come back again to learn more.
“1 do pcrfomi a little bit with clubs, torches and
knives,” Larsson said. “The most I can juggle with
confidence is three balls, but I can juggle four for
about 15 seconds before 1 mess up. And 1 can juggle
five balls because that is a different system but only
for about 10 or 15 seconds as well before 1 mess up.”
Larsson, like others in the club, started juggling
randomly by playing with objects in his house and
teaching himself Johnson also started juggling in a
similar way by tossing around fruit in the kitchen.
Tyler, in fact, is one of the few who started out with
someone teaching him.
“When 1 was 13, my house was kind of crazy
because my family always took on different people to
live with us,” Tyler said. “A family friend lived with
us, and she taught me to juggle tennis balls.
He didn’t start practicing until later, though.
“When I was around 17 I realized you could do
tricks with juggling,” Tyler said. “Then when I was
18 my parents got me clubs, and I joined a juggling
club at N.C. State, where I started passing with other
people.”
Many of the members in the club bring their own
juggling tools with them, from clubs to balls to hoops,
and even a toy flying monkey. Other items include
clear acrylic balls used for contact juggling, like in the
movie Labyrinth, and a rolla bolla, used in balancing
acts, which consists of a board placed on a round
tube. Bradley brings in a unicycic for balancing acts
as well.
“There had been groups of us meeting in groups
around town,” Johnson said. “Most of us are here
through Britt.”
The troupe in Asheville is starting a circus in town.
which will consist of not only jugglers but acrobats
and other performers as well.
“Juggling to me has the perfect mix of challenge,
eoordination and art,” Johnson said. “It’s so good and
so fun. My favorite part about juggling is juggling
with other folks.”
The troupe eontinues to practice often by teaching
others, and none of them claim to have mastered the
art of juggling. Larsson said he loves juggling for just
that reason.
"It’s relaxing. When you’re juggling, you can’t
think at the same time,” Larsson said. “Also, there is
always a way to make it harder.
You can add another ball, learn another trick,
and if you learn one trick, you can always reverse
it and try it another way. There are always fields of
advancement.”
The .Jugglers Club meets every Sunday at 2:30
p.m. in the .Justice Center
and every Monday at 4 p.m. in Highsmith
What recent movies made impressions on you?
fc.f: V,.
Auston Pisani
Freshman Student
National Treasure II didn t
take itself too seriously. It
wasn’t one of those movies
where you take something
away from it; I just liked
it.
Christine Vispoli
Freshman Student
Juno appealed to my sense
of humor. The dialogue
flowed realistically, and
Ellen Page interjected sar
casm and spoke dryly,
which I do, too.
Forrest McCuller
Junior Student
Juno was funny, but I don’t
feel that strongly about it.
The plot was kind of thrown
together. I think the movie
was too short for every
thing they wanted to say.
John Buscarino
Junior Student
There Will Be Blood is my
favorite movie of this past
year. Daniel Day-Lewis
was so engaging. There
wasn’t much dialogue, but
I hung on every word.