Glossary of juggling terms
Alphabetically,
In a more reasonable order,
cascade
The cascade is the easiest juggling pattern with an odd number
of balls; every throw is from one hand to the other, at the same height.
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5
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3
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fountain
4
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(4,4)
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The fountain is the even-number counterpart to the cascade;
now every throw returns to the throwing hand. This separation into
two halves is what leads disappointed onlookers to complain that
it isn't "really juggling four". (What is it, then?)
Note that this pattern has two variants, the synchronous and asynchronous
fountain. ("The fountain," without adorning adjective, is taken to mean
the asynchronous version.)
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shower
The shower is the pattern most often learned by those who
are unfortunate enough to learn in isolation from other jugglers.
The dominant hand makes a high throw to the weak hand, which claps
the ball back into the dominant hand. Since one hand does almost
all the work, it is much more difficult than the
corresponding cascade or fountain.
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51
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(4x,2x)
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71
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It is extremely regrettable that "shower" is also the fairly standard
name of the most common passing pattern (which these authors prefer
to call a "2-count"). Not only is the 2-count more precisely described thus,
and wholly unlike one person showering, there is needless confusion
introduced when trying to describe the perfectly natural passing pattern
that mixes the two.
a reversed [whatever]
3r
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A reversed pattern is the "same" pattern (in particular, has the
same siteswap) but with the balls caught in front of the body and
thrown from the outside. This is a bit more difficult, because the most
dangerous point in the arc - the place where the balls might collide -
occurs longer after the juggler lets go of the ball.
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(Unfortunately "reverse" is also often used to refer to left-right
reflection of an asymmetric pattern, such as a shower. We have tried
to call this "backwards" the few times that it is relevant in this tutorial,
as in "to shower 4 backwards".)
half-shower
A half-shower is a pattern in which each hand throws at its
own fixed height, but the lower throw is not so low as to be
actually handed off. This pattern is usually done half-reversed,
that is to say, with the high throws caught inside and thrown outside.
(Otherwise it is called an inside half-shower.)
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53
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33r
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multiplex
23[43]
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[34]
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To multiplex is to throw several balls at once from the
same hand, not necessarily
all to the same height. It is much easier to juggle many balls through
multiplexing (enough so that the IJA does not count
multiplexing records in the same category as non-multiplexing records).
One hears the phrases "a multiplex," "a multiplex throw," and "a multiplex
pattern" (one containing a multiplex). The picture at right is the
earliest known depiction of a left-handed multiplex by a Cyclops.
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shower-box
The shower-box (or simply box; in German it is known
as the viper) is a very common three-ball trick, in which one ball
is never thrown up, the defining characteristic of a
baby-juggling pattern.
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(4,2x)(2x,4)
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numbers juggling
Numbers jugglers are not (necessarily) siteswap aficionados,
but those hardy souls pressing the limits of human capabilities to
track many objects at once. There is one living 10-ball juggler,
a few 11-ring jugglers, and a couple dozen 7-club jugglers.
The IJA and Juggler's World
The
International Jugglers Association
was founded in 1947, and publishes the magazine
Juggler's World
quarterly.
A sample batch of cool patterns
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