Cup Plucking

Adam Adler demonstrates cup plucking with three shaker cups.

The following article first appeared in the Nov/Dec 2006 issue of JUGGLE magazine, the official publication of the International Jugglers' Association. The publisher has kindly given permission to reproduce it here.

 

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Cup Plucking

 

Adam Adler shared a whack of shaker cups variations I hadn't seen before. I was particularly intrigued by Cup Plucking, as it involves a momentary grip on the cup I was not familiar with.

 

Begin with the white cup in your left hand. Your right hand holds the black cup. The striped cup nestles inside the black cup at the start.

 

Toss the black cup up and over to the left hand as a flat. In this case a flat means that the cup does not have any spin, and the striped cup remains nestled inside the black cup so the two fly together.

 

As the pair of cups begins to descend pluck the striped cup out of the black cup with your right hand. Insert your fingers into the striped cup, with your thumb on the outside lip of the stripe cup to reduce the risk of grabbing the black cup by mistake. Catch the black cup so it nestles inside the white cup. (see illustration)

 

Flick the striped cup from your right hand with a small, upward flick of the wrist, and catch the striped cup with a standard grip in your right hand.

 

That 's the essence of the pattern. Now try a mirror image of the same thing.

 

Toss the white cup and black cup up as a single unit by releasing the white cup with a flat throw from the left hand to the right hand. Pluck the black cup out of the white cup with your left hand. Catch the black cup in the striped cup. Flick the black cup from your left hand back to your left hand.

 

The white cup is now nestled in the striped cup, which is in your right hand. Toss both of these cups up and over to the left hand with another flat throw. Pluck the white cup from the striped cup with your right hand. Catch the striped cup in the black cup, which is in your left hand. With a small upward flick of the wrist let go of the white cup with your right hand and re-catch the white cup with a standard grip in your right hand.

 

Send the striped cup and the black cup from your left hand to your right hand. Pluck the striped cup out of the black cup as the black cup settles into the right cup, which is in your right hand. Briefly let go of the striped cup with your left hand, so you can re-grasp the striped cup with a standard left-hand grip.

 

Continue cup plucking for a while and you will see that the cups follow a sequence of six positions:

 

1)striped inside black in the right hand, white in the left hand,

2) black inside white in the left hand, striped in the right hand,

3) white inside striped in the right hand, black in the left hand,

4) striped inside black in the left hand, white in the right hand,

5) black inside white in the right hand, striped in the left hand,

6) white inside striped in the left hand, black in the right hand.