Bunch of questions bouncing around in my head about these new play styles. Are the 'new new' string tricks going to branch kendama play like 5A yoyo or become part of the 'mainstream'? Do you think they will be included in competitions and will they be their own class like Freestyle? What do you think of the new styles? Are you going to try to add them to your repertoire? Do you know others currently pushing the boundaries in these styles? Adrian Esteban - String Tricks Bryan Figueroa - Astro Tricks
That backwards tama stringing is really cool. Bryan's tricks are always rad, hadn't seen that insta post, thanks for sharing it here! Definitely some very yoyo-inspired stuff here. Yoyo-inspired isn't new in an of itself, but it certainly is gaining more mainstream traction amongst dama players recently, I think.
In my opinion, this new string style will not "branch" kendama play since Kendama was never really divided into distinct branches like yoyo's 1A-5A system. There's a new school and old school divide for sure but that boundary isn't well-defined until now. It'll probably never break into mainstream either, since it's basically yoyo players implementing their knowledge on a kendama; not everyone has that skillset, and not everyone can learn it using a kendama alone. That being said, I am actively trying to implement this new style into my game. Made an original trick just today called the "3-Whip."
I mean to be fair, Adrian E has definitely inspired a lot of people to get wild with the string. If anything, I think the 'mainstream' meta of dama tricks has just expanded, it was fairly narrow for a while there with newgen tap/juggle stuff
Personally, I'm happy to see string variations finally getting a bit more popularity. Adrian and others have certainly pushed the creative envelope recently. I don't see it "breaking away" or really becoming part of comps (if you had a three-finger stringer against an eight-finger stringer, then there could easily be unfairness in trick selection). On a side note (and putting on my dusty "old-school" cap) it's interesting that the popularity should happen now. With modern shapes basically having three big cups and high-friction paint reducing the balance element of lighthouse/ lunar/ etc., the extra-long string that players have adopted to make juggles easier seems to have found another creative use. Interesting times, and like Alex says, nice to have a change from the tap-jug-tap tramlines
@Donald Grant yes I'd agree about the prospects of including many of these tricks in competition. There is a related (and interesting) question about the fairness of looping a long string around the sarado before attempting a trick (thus shortening the string length). From what I've seen, most competitions are calling that a no-no, though there is some grey area (what happens if you accidentally get a loop around the sarado, but still complete the trick anyways?) Nothing wrong with tricks that don't fit the contest mould though, they're probably the more interesting ones, anyways.