magic show tips – Page 173

Sit or Stand?

Last night I went to my local magic club and during the part where people perform tricks I noticed that some people sat and other people stood. This is a small thing, but an important thing when it comes to actually doing the trick.

If you are sitting when you do the trick, but practice standing, you’ll have a hard time as the range of movements in your arms is limited by the table top. If you practice sitting and perform standing, you upper body will now slouch.

Going from sitting to standing I think it an easier transition to do. However I recommend practicing to perform standing. Here’s why, you are more visible standing, and it’s more versatile. When you aren’t bound by a spot to sit, you can choose where you are going to do your magic trick.

I guess the main advantage sitting gives you is lapping, where if you are going to do that then YES sit. However if you do a more formal show, you should consider a more formal approach and do it standing. A great example of this is Shin Lim’s act:

Everything that would have been done sitting 20 years he’s doing standing and it really plays a lot better.

TLDR: Perform standing, unless you have a very good reason why to do it sitting.

See Shows!

If you know me, you know I frequently go out to see performers. I think it’s important to support variety acts, and it’s always inspiring to see good acts. I performed at an arts festival earlier this week and I went out and watched a bunch of the shows and had a blast!

I found it interesting that I didn’t see any other acts out seeing shows. This festival was an all day festivals, so there was plenty of time to catch shows. To me the value of these festivals isn’t the paycheck, but seeing, and networking with other performers.

Towards the end of the festival, I had one of the board members pull me aside and mention they the whole board noticed me at shows all day. They thought it was great that I wasn’t just there for my show, but to be part of the whole festival.

I think to grow as a performer you need to be exposed to other acts. Not just magic act, but all variety acts!

Modern Kid Show…

Recently I was performing on the East Coast and had a great time watching John Swomley perform his show for a room full of kids and their families at an arts festival. What I really liked about the show is that it wasn’t based on “look don’t see” type of tricks, where the kids scream … Continue reading “Modern Kid Show…”

Recently I was performing on the East Coast and had a great time watching John Swomley perform his show for a room full of kids and their families at an arts festival.

What I really liked about the show is that it wasn’t based on “look don’t see” type of tricks, where the kids scream and get out of control. That’s one of the things that I don’t like about most kid shows, they are living in the 1980’s where screaming is considered a good reaction.

His show had the kids laughing, not screaming. All of the magic was good, and it makes me happy to see someone doing kids magic correctly! There’s an old saying for kids performers, “It’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey.” What that means is how you get to the end of the trick is more important that the trick.

I totally disagree.

The trick has to be good. If the trick isn’t good, then the journey isn’t worth it. For example, if you drive to Disneyland, have a fun and exciting drive, pull into the parking lot, then turn around and go home without ever entering the parks, its’ a bad trip. Same with a kid show the trick has to be good. John’s tricks were good, and the journey was fun.

You may recognize John’s name, he makes a microphone holder called the Gim Crack:

This mic holder is awesome. Personally I don’t use a handheld mic often, but I always have a handheld mic nearby in case something goes wrong with my headset mic. I also always have a Gim-Crack within reach for when I have to use the handheld mic. It’s saved many shows! If you don’t have one, you need to have one in your case!

TLDR: Do a good kid show, and buy a Gim-Crack

Be Easy To Work With…

One of the things I started doing this years is not letting other acts take advantage of me. What I mean by that is when I’m sharing a stage with another act, I’m very flexible…until they get demanding.

In the past when I would share a stage with another act, I would assume we’re all professionals and you wouldn’t ask for things not necessary. I just worked in a show with an act where we both were doing three shows each alternating every hour, with 15 mins change over time.

I asked if I could keep my gear off stage in a small wing unseen by the audience and in a space they weren’t using. They said, “NO”. That’s fine with me if you need that space, I have no problem keeping my gear in a less convenient place. This particular stage has stairs across the entire front of the stage. They started laying out props on the stairs. I asked if they were going to strike them between their shows. They said, “NO”. I told them they would have to as I use the stairs and I don’t want to dodge their props, and have to worry about stepping on them. They said they didn’t have time to move them, and I told them that “it’s not my problem“.

Now could I have dodged their props as I used the stairs? Yes. Should I have to? NO. In a show like this one I’m entitled to backstage space to store my gear, and in a space that was vacant the whole show. By them not being easy to work with, I instantly became less flexible, while still within what my show was entitled. I didn’t ask for anything more, I simply took what I needed.

Guess what, my show was better than it would have been with me or someone from the audience tripping on their props in the dark. They learned a lesson, that when you are working with other acts, you need to be able to do a full strike in between shows unless you’ve discussed it before with the other act.

It’s being a professional

The moral of the story is be flexible, but don’t let anyone take advantage of you.

Hot New Tricks…

As I get older and more experience as a magician and performer, I’ve realized that 99% of advice given by magician to other magicians with crap. I’ve written about this before, and some advice I saw given out on an internet group recently got me thinking about it.

Someone was asking about where they could buy a trick they saw someone do on TV. Someone chimed in and said something like, “why would you want to do that, someone’s already done it...” I think this is good advice, however it comes from one of the people that preach, “stick with the classics, they are classics for a reason…“, which is horrible advice.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with doing the new, hot trick. That’s how classics, they have to start out as a new trick. There are many cases where someone has created a method for a trick way better than what you’ve come up with, or had the gimmick manufactured better.

At the end of the day, the person giving the advice is usually someone that in 10 years will be in the same place as a magician as they are now. Looking back at the local magicians that gave me advice when I was a younger magician, I think only a few are people whose advice I’d still consider.

TLDR: Don’t listen to bad advice.

T-Minus 3…

We’re coming into a new year and it’s a time that many people look back on their lives. It’s not just a time of looking into the past, but also making goals for the future. You can do this for your show, reflect on the old, and make plans for improvement.

Here’s how to do it. Watch a video of a recent show of yours and takes notes. What you are looking for are three bits in the show to cut from it. Look for things that no longer fit you, your performing style or society.

When I’m out seeing shows, I frequently see shows where the performer does an outdated line. They’ve probably never examined their show for outdated material, so the joke or bit is never noticed. Sometimes it will be a reference to a product, or TV show. Other times it will be a word that’s no longer socially acceptable. Maybe it’s a youthful reference that the performer told when they were a kid and they’re middle aged now. It could also be a joke or trick that for whatever reason no longer gets the reaction it used to.

Once you’ve found three bits, cut them from your show. Just stop doing them. Now you create new bits to fill any gaps that cutting the bits may have created. Pretty simple. You’ve now “freshened up” your show!

S. H. Sharpe…

Recently while travelling I started rereading the book Neo Magic Artistry written by S.H. Sharpe. This book is primarily about magic theory, however it does have a few tricks in the back. This book, which is several books reprinted as one makes a great point: “The greatest magicians have always been those whose work appealed … Continue reading “S. H. Sharpe…”

Recently while travelling I started rereading the book Neo Magic Artistry written by S.H. Sharpe. This book is primarily about magic theory, however it does have a few tricks in the back.

This book, which is several books reprinted as one makes a great point:

“The greatest magicians have always been those whose work appealed to their colleagues as well as the general public”

This is something I totally agree with. If you are an artist, you work should have something noteworthy to other magicians or magic enthusiasts. With all of the magic on TV and the internet, even non-magician audience members have become pretty educated about standard magic tricks.

TLDR: Your magic should appeal to magicians as well as non-magicians.

Magic Books…

TI’m a magic book guy, I love magic books. My generation of magic is at the tail end of books, when I was getting serious about magic videos didn’t really exist. The VHS tapes that were around were insanely expensive at $75-$100 bucks!

Being a book guy, that means you find a lot of hidden little gems of magic. Things that are cool and buried in a book. Someone once told me that the best things in books are the tricks with no illustrations. They are the things that the author wants in print to assert ownership, but doesn’t want anyone to do.

My book collection is pretty big and I like having a large selection of books to reference, or to read. I’ve also worked through most of the stuff in all of the books I own. Many years ago, Eugene Burger mentioned in an article in a magic magazine that he only had a few magic books. He loved books, read them, however he didn’t keep them. He gave them away after reading them.

I thought it was strange that he didn’t keep books. As I get older, and my performing style is more defined, the books that want to keep are probably less than a couple dozen. Most of these books would be books that had an influence on my, now that I really need to read them again.

This has made me think about the advice that you should “Only learn seven tricks”. This is advice that I don’t agree with. You can’t pick seven trick without learning hundreds of tricks to pick those seven. We no longer live in a time where you can make a career out of a handful of tricks. You need to keep learning and adding to your base knowledge to grow!

TLDR: Keep learning, but you don’t need to be a hoarder!

The $200 in 30 Minutes Pan Handler…

The other day I was having coffee at one of my favorite coffee shops in between shows. While I was drinking my coffee, I notice a lady sitting on a bench outside. She was chatting with everyone that walked by for a few minutes each. At the end of the conversation everyone gave her money. It took a few groups of people for me to realize she was a “pan handler“.

I wouldn’t call what she was doing “pan handling” as it was a higher level than simply putting out a cup and asking for money. The majority of people gave twenty dollars each, and I saw her get a fifty dollar bill!

So why was she making so much when the guy at the corner with the cardboard sign was making virtually nothing? Simple, she had a story and she pitched that story and didn’t ask for money until you were invested in her life. The guy at the corner with the cardboard sign doesn’t have a story and you aren’t invested in his life before he’s asking for money.

What does this have to do with being a better magician? In your show you can tell your story and get people invested in you, or you can do tricks. Both work, however one gets singles, and the other gets double sawbucks!

Ideas Become Reality…

I’ve been keeping notebooks for idea for magic since I was a teenager. Most of the ideas from the early ones are horrible, but every now and then I’ll flip through them and find something interesting. About 10 years ago I had an idea for a trick, but it was missing something that would make it functional.

I was running at the gym and notice something triggered an “ah-ha moment” that made the idea work. When I got home, I created the two parts on my 3D printer and printed them up. Here’s one of them in the CAD Program:

And here’s the other one that’s printed out:

Now that I have these two pieces, I’ve assembled the trick and am happy to report that the trick works!

The sad news is that in the 10 years since I had the idea my performing style has changed a lot and this really doesn’t fit how I perform. However it’s been in my head for so long, I’m going to keep developing it at home and try to figure out a way to make it work.

TLDR: Always keep an eye out for solutions to a problem