Thanks.
I am wondering about his claim to the Taijiquan of Yang Luchan (no changes from Yang Jianhou or Yang Chengfu) and its legitimacy.
I shall look for a video if one exists. I'm thinking it should look more like Chen than the Yang of Yang Chengfu that we all think of as Yang style today. I would think lower stances and more obvious Fajin as well since 1 generation before it was Chen style and possibly Chen style before there was an yilu and erlu (14th generation Chen; Chen Changxing)
As usual, Xue Sheng, everything you say makes sense. If, however, you wade into Earl's "Old Yang Lu Chan form", it looks alot like the sequence of the Yang Cheng Fu form. Notice I said the sequence. Individual actions may be performed differently, however the organized structure of the form resembles the later Yang family forms. I think, for example, in this clip the first Grasp Sparrows Tail is explained at about 4:40.
Here is another thing to mull over. There is definitely a similarity to the "Old Yang" form Earl presented and the 99 posture form created by Chen Pan Ling. The CPL form is presented in an elegant way, with less fa jing, where as Earl's is a bit more wild and wooly, but they are close similarities.
A good friend of mine and I tried to get a handle on all this a few years ago and it pretty much all came to naught. I purchased Earl's video on vhs and still have it. I don't practice the form but I review his presentation occasionally.
Now of course the video I payed money for is divided up into Youtube sections (lol).
I will take a look and point out a few interesting things about it.