Last updated 18/03/08
First get yourself some inspiration
- The Ministry blog contact juggling archive
- InIsolation DVD promo
- The Ministry’s own featured videos
- The Ministry’s own video archive
Next get yourself a ball
If you are only going to have one ball for Contact, we recommend a Contact Ball. Perfect for a beginner, and for training 1 ball Contact all the way up to advanced moves. Size? probably 100mm/4″ is perfect, unless you have very small hands, in which case a smaller 85mm/3.5″ is an alternative. Certainly don’t start with anything smaller or lighter. There’s more details about balls and recommended ball sizes here. However, this ball is not the only one we recommend. Check our Articles and Reviews sections for more information about balls.
Contact Juggling Lessons
You’re going to invest a lot of time into learning contact, and the better the lessons that you can get, the more effective your practice time will be. So investing a bit of money to get some good quality teaching is a good thing, it can save you months or years of frustrating practice. The best option is certainly being taught in real life but for many that’s not an option. Below are some Online, DVD and Book Contact Juggling lessons.
Free Online Contact Juggling Tutorials
1 Ball Tutorials on the CJ.org Wiki. Most of the top of the list are by Brinechild, who recommends that you do them in this order: Isolated walk * Isolations * Enigma
www.contactjuggling.org also has a growing forum for the Online Ball Contact Juggling Community where you can ask questions and chat, as well as moves, videos and essays sections. In French the forum is Jongle.net and in Italian go to Giocoleria.org. A great way to get in some of your ‘real life’ teaching.
You might also want to look at Kae’s unfinished book – Free to download. It’s not even half finished or polished, and still teaches the first move as the butterfly (Ewww!!). But still it has some good solid explanations of moves, and a lot of moves that were not in the Ernest book (below). Definitely worth a download.
Contact Juggling Books, DVDs and things to buy
Around 2000, Greg Maldonado and Owen Edson released an instructional DVD called “Contact Juggling” Very similar content to Ernest’s book (below), with the addition of 2 moves: Held isolations and the Enigma. Probably the best teaching aid for learning 1 ball Contact Juggling available today. For a good sequel beyond the basics, we would suggest that you can do better than “Contact Juggling part 2 - DVD.”
The best DVD available today for inspiration is undoubtedly In Isolation. Buy it for the well filmed juicy footage of manipulation, but don’t expect a huge amount from the short teaching section. This one is for inspiration.
The Visual Encyclopaedia of Contact Juggling by Matt Olsen is a 4 DVD set, Part 1 thoroughly reviewed by Brinechild on CJ.org wiki. More reviews coming.
For those who can read German, Bjorn Bottcher has recently released “Die Kunst der Kontaktjonglage” which we can’t review because we can’t read German, but judging from the pictures it seems to have quite a lot in it.
Try Out Toys have produced the Sphereplay DVD and the Playing in the Multisphere DVDs, Which have an emphasis on the fun side of contact. Review of PiMS in the CJ.org Wiki.
Nowadays, the original spiral bound book Contact Juggling by James Ernest is starting to show its age, both in it’s content, and it’s style of teaching! It teaches the butterfly as “the first move” to learn, saying that is will take 20 hours to learn (eeek!) That’s not a beginners first move - that’s crazy.
You will find an impartial reviews section of books and Media in the wiki of CJ.org, which we have been assisting Brinechild to expand.
Are there any secrets to learning Ball Contact?
- Get a good teacher/ Good lesson/ good advice and you can save, month or years of practice time.
- Enjoy your drops, every drop. 
- Join the secret cult of the Magical Hoopla of Destiny TM
How to learn Multiball Contact?
You don’t have to learn 1 ball Contact Juggling before learning palmspinning and Multiball. Check out our How to learn Multiball Contact article.
Anything missing? or any comments? Please add below and we will keep this page updated.