Juggling in the West

Juggling combines object manipulation with body movements. It requires tossing, balancing, leaping, and contortion techniques, as well as spatial skills. Generally speaking, the more extreme the move, the more popular it is with audiences.

Juggling got its start in the Middle Ages as a type of street show in which performers sang, danced, did tricks, and told jokes. By the middle of the 18th century, juggling had become a profession, and jugglers had begun working for circuses. In the 19th century, they also began performing in the then-popular musical theaters, doing routines between acts. By the mid 20th century, the popularity of new media such as television and film was making it more difficult for professional jugglers to earn a living.

At the same time, people living in wealthy societies tend to yearn for adventure, with the result that the number of amateur jugglers has risen sharply in the last 50 years. In the United States and Europe, juggling has its own stable subculture, with magazines, competitions, celebrations, and online chatrooms. In the West, juggling is believed to improve health, concentration, and hand-eye coordination, and to encourage social interactions. Over the last 30 years, the revival of the circuses and the increasingly multidisciplinary nature of the performance arts have provided jugglers with greater access to resources and better career prospects.

Contact juggling

Contact juggling became a hot new technique the instant Michael Moschen, an American juggler, introduced it. Radically different from traditional toss juggling in both conception and form, contact juggling requires jugglers to keep one or several balls in constant contact with their body, regardless of how they move it. Jugglers must remain cool and collected to keep the ball balanced as it spins around.

Cyr wheel

The Cyr wheel is a very recent addition to the field of juggling. Daniel Cyr, a Canadian from Montreal, developed and introduced the wheel in 2003 at the Festival du Cirque de Demain in Paris. He has received wide praise for his work training performers and developing routines for Cirque du Soleil's Nomade and Rain shows in the years since then.

Cyr argues that his wheel is an extension of the human body, and that its structure and principles are so simple that performers who have mastered only the basics are capable of developing incredible, previously unimaginable moves.

Currently, there are about 100 people worldwide working on furthering the development of the Cyr wheel's potential. The National Circus School of Montreal and some European circus schools also now include it in their curricula.