Gao, Yi Sheng
Gao Style Bagua
Gao, Yi Sheng, courtesy name De Yuan, (1866~1951), was born in Shandong Wuli county, Dashan village, Dazhuangzi (?).
Gao first learned Shaolin Da Hong Quan from his family and later learned Xingyi from a famous master, Li, Cun Yi. At the age of 30, he met Zhou, Yu Xiang at the Wafang village in Wuqing. Zhou was a skilled disciple of famed master Cheng, Ting Hua and renowned for his palm strikes, with a nick name of Jue Zhang (Terminating Palm).
After Gao was defeated by Zhou for three consecutive times, he asked to become a student of Zhou, but Zhou refused due to their close age. Instead Zhou brought Gao to Beijing and introduced him to Cheng (nicknamed Glasses Cheng). Cheng was the disciple of master Dong, Hai Chuan from Nancheng and trained with him for two years, acquiring the skill of eight palms. During the Boxer's Rebellion, Cheng was killed in a conflict with German soldiers. Gao was later introduced by Zhou to study Bagua under Master Yin, Fu and trained alongside Zhou for more than a decade. Subsequently, he traveled to and lived in the Zhou village in Shan Dong, near the Jiaoji railroad, teaching Bagua. There he met Master Song, Yi Ren from Guanghua, receiving knowledge regarding the 64 Post-heaven (entwining dissolving) palms and realizing that Bagua is only complete when both pre-heaven and post-heaven palms are acquired. Gao then returned to Tianjin and taught Bagua with both pre-heaven and Post-heaven 64 palms in a courtyard at the British Municipal Extension. After spending several decades of researching and fighting, he organized the many loose attack patterns and single drills of Cheng style Bagua to form his own unique training methods, creating the Gao style Bagua system. This system contains the circle walking pre-heaven palms and the straight stepping Post-heaven palms, with the pre-heaven palms constituting the prerequisite conditioning aspect of training and the Post-heaven palms training the applications.