#Tatsuki Machida

[hoshidensha-art]

Annual Tatsuki Machida birthday art!! Inspired by the opening pose of his 2013-14 short program, East of Eden. Still an inspiration after all these years~

(Experimented with a more realistic style, black line art, and rendering with this cool marker brush I found! Also I've been reading a lot of Steinbeck lately, hence me picking this specific program to illustrate this year hehe)

[thegayfigureskatingagenda]

This essay is a beautiful tribute to Tatsuki Machida and a brilliant analysis of his short programme East of Eden (2013-2014 season):

Machida skated this programme as a homage to Michelle Kwan whom he held a deep admiration for and who skated the programme more than a decade earlier. If you are a fan of Machida and/or Kwan or just enjoy figure skating meta, I highly recommend reading this.

As a fan of both figure skating (including meta) and Yuri!!! On Ice, reading this article was a delicious double-serving. Machida is rumoured to be one of the figure skaters who inspired the character of Yuuri Katsuki, especially as Mitsurou Kubo is a huge fan of him. Machida's career had some striking parallels to Yuuri's and discovering these, makes my nerd heart beat faster.

Like Yuuri, Machida has the skill to make music with his body. His skating is just mesmerising. I wanted to honour this and thus had Yuuri skate the two programmes Machida skated in the 2013-2014 season in my canonverse AU A Song of Fiery Birds and Endless Winter, in which Yuuri and Viktor meet 2014 Winter Olympics. And we all know which fictional skater Yuuri holds a deep admiration for.

But I digress. Read the article. It's excellent.

[hinami0118]

2014.10.26

Figure skater FA

[capitanogiorgio]

DAI AND TATSUKI ARE GOING TO REUNITE ???????

[madetolove]

Tatsuki Machida's The Firebird

[thegayfigureskatingagenda]

Tatsuki Machida's Études No. 1 "For Charlie" is the first of a series of basic programmes to teach skaters how to incorporate elements like spins and jumps into a performance and to me it's one of the most beautiful routines I've ever seen.

Honestly, I was so sad when I discovered him and found out he retired long ago and didn't expect to ever hear from him again. I'm beyond thrilled to learn that he hasn't hung up his skates and started this project. And I'm thrilled to see his beautiful skating again.

[hoshidensha]

A little late, but happy birthday to my favourite (underrated) figure skater, Tatsuki Machida! ♡

Beethoven’s Ninth is still one of my favourite programs and costumes of his, and I tried to do it justice with a proper exhibition background here. Bc I swear I read an interview somewhere where he said he would’ve added so much more to this program if he wasn’t limited by the competition program requirements 

[hinami0118]

2014.10.24

Figure skating FA

[stepffan]

Some thoughts on Lambiel's choreography - part 2

With Part 1 out of the way, let's look trace Lambiel's choreographic career from the beginning.

[[This is by no means a comprehensive list, just for reference.]]

Lambiel started in 2010 with Denis Ten (Primavera Porteno by Astor Piazzolla for 2010-2011 season) and Daisuke Takahashi (La Valse d'Amélie by Yann Tiersen, an exhibition program for 2010-2011 season).

But the program I really want to talk about is Tatsuki Machida's FUYA, from the 2012-2013 season, and how it very clearly illustrates some of the Lambiel's choreographic lexicon.

Lambiel worked with famous flamenco dancer Antonio Najarro on his Poeta program, and many components of the Flamenco dance tradition find their way into his programs. Machida's arm movements at the beginning of FUYA are clearly informed by the flamenco tradition. He begins with precise and isolated hand gestures, making use of every finger as he opens and closes his hands in the same direction of the wrists. That gesture of opening and closing around a circular rotation is then repeated in the arms. He sweeps his arms in an arc, starting and concluding in a crossed position in front of his torso.

In flamenco vocabulary, braceo (which in Spanish means "to wave" or "to swim") refers to the arm movements, and floreo (meaning "to flower") the hand. They are two distinct and isolated concepts.

Similar principles of movement are at work in the opening position of Lambiel's Poeta -- the small, isolated hand rotation, that flows into the larger movement of the arms.

An interruption to discuss arm movement -- when we look at arm movement, we are looking at 3 main segments -- the hand, the forearm, and upper arm. There are 3 main joints - the shoulder (joining the torso and upper arm), elbow (joining the upper arm and forearm) and the wrist (joining the hand and forearm). The shoulder joint can rotate like a ball; the wrist joint, on the other hand, is a hinge that allows the connected segments to either bend or straighten on a two dimensional plane. The elbow is complicated. It is a hinge joint, but allows for the wrist to rotate, without rotating the shoulder joint. Thus, the appearance of the hand/wrist rotating is actually created by rotating the entire forearm at the elbow joint, and not the actual rotation of the wrist joint. Any movement of the arms can be broken down into a combination of movements along those joints. An arm movement looks "big" when movement flows from the shoulder joint all the way down to the wrists in a chain, in the opposite direction from the wrist to the shoulder, or when movement of the elbow joint flows out in both directions. It can be made "small" or "isolated" when that flow is broken or stopped by a joint along the chain (i.e. the elbow). The speed and rhythm of those bodily movements is one element of the skater/dancer's "musicality."

Generally speaking, Lambiel's choreography tends to highlight movement of the forearms and arms. Here, the hands and forearms act like arrows, broadcasting the direction Machida will turn.

Compare this moment to the parallel arm movements here in Geissel Drama, or at 1:32 --

I'm tired and have to go back to school tomorrow, so I'll end this post here. Part 3 will continue on FUYA and what I like to call the Lambiel Pop Star Sensibility.

[back to Part 1]

[intyalote]

it’s been nearly 10 years and this 3Lz landed right on the beat into that step sequence is still some of the coolest skating I’ve seen.

[figureskatingcostumes]

Tatsuki Machida performing in Prince Ice World 2018.

(Source: sn_figure)

[flapper-dai]

フィギュアスケートLife Extra /  華麗なるスケート衣装の世界 3/31

[harimaron]

Day 29 - a retired skater/team you want to see make a comeback:

1. Tatsuki Machida - it’s probably not going to happen but I can dream? I chose this video (below) despite its lower quality than the higher quality Japanese commentary ones just so English-speakers can hear this commentary about him - absolutely gushing over this short program. This is right after Yuzuru set the world record at the Olympics being the first to get over 100 points in his short, and here we see Tatsuki getting over 98 points, which comes so incredibly close and is so high for this time. Spoiler alert: he placed first in the short at this competition. Here is his flawless East of Eden SP:

2. Stéphane Lambiel - I know he is a beloved coach right now, but I would LOVE to see him come back and do either Ice Dance or Pair Skating! He would be so good at it. Hey, Daisuke Takahashi did it! - and hey, I wouldn’t mind a team of the two of them! but ISU wouldn’t be able to handle that. ;)

These videos exist:

Stéphane Lambiel and Yulia Lipnitskaya at Hyoen 2019: 

Stéphane Lambiel and Deniss Vasiljevs at Carnival on Ice 2018: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwsnTDPXMQQ

Stéphane Lambiel and Daisuke Takahashi at Christmas on Ice 2016:

31 Days of Figure Skating | @anythinggoe

[hoshidensha]

Quick portrait of my fave figure skater, Tatsuki Machida, for his birthday on March 9!

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