Product: Sunrise Tai Chi (2005)
Rating: 5.0
Great Way To Start Your Day
"Sunrise Tai Chi" is an instructional DVD with Ramel Rones that contains over three and a half hours of demonstration, instruction, and follow along workouts. It is a very comprehensive program that teaches a Tai Chi form that he calls Sunrise Tai Chi that is a morning exercise sequence designed to awaken the senses, stimulate the mind, and fill your body and spirit with abundant energy. If you are looking for a Tai Chi program to start your day, this DVD instruction on Sunrise Tai Chi fits the bill very nicely. I also want to point out that Rones also wrote a book of the same title, and it and this DVD can be used together to enhance a person's learning.Again, this DVD contains a lot. Nearly four hours. There is a short introduction (about eight minutes) that features Rones doing tai chi outside with a voice over providing an introduction to tai chi. Next comes the first part which consists of demonstrations. You can watch all the way through, or with the easy and detailed menu, you can select which exercise you want to view. The demonstration portion of the program consists of twenty-five chapters and the movements demonstrated include sitting and standing meditation, organ massage, four gates breathing, tai chi ball, various stretches and loosening body parts, walking in place exercises, tai chi movements and the Sunrise Tai Chi form. These are all done in an outside setting with music and a voice over narrating certain aspects of the movements. The demonstration portion of the program is about sixty-four minutes long.Next comes the instruction section. This portion starts with Rones getting out of a bed, that has been set up in the studio. He then goes into the instructing of the various components in this morning routine. This portion does not have a voice over, but rather Rones talking and teaching to the camera. I like this kind of instruction much better and was glad that he instructs this way for the teaching section of the DVD. Again, like the demonstrations, you can watch the entire instruction straight through, or you can select from the menu which part or parts you wish to review. (You will want to use this, since this portion of the DVD is about two hours and twenty-eight minutes long.) The last few movements he teaches are done without the bed in view, and he does bring in a couple of assistants to help demonstrate the tai chi movements he teaches. The end of this instruction portion of the program shows Rones outside on a large flat rock, and then in a field, doing the Sunrise Tai Chi form with subtitles coming on the screen naming the movements as he performs them. This is the only part of the instruction where he does not teach, nor is there a voice over, just the music playing as he moves.If the above were all you got with this DVD, it would still be a great resource. But the DVD also contains three follow along workouts of different lengths. 20 minute, 40 minute, and 60 minute workouts are included, and you can choose them with flute/harp music or with piano. These follow along workouts show Rones doing the movements with some voice over. The DVD also contains the standard YMAA extras.This really is a detailed and informative instructional program on Rones' Sunrise Tai Chi, and I recommend it highly for anyone interested in a morning tai chi routine to get their day started.Reviewed by Alain Burrese, J.D., author of the Lock On Joint Locking Essentials series.