Tag: juggler

Great Theme!!!

A couple of weeks ago I got to work with John Park who does the Funny Waiter Show. It’s a great theme for a juggling act. All of his props and tricks are waiter themed.

John is a very strong performer and keep the show going. He’s been a street performer for probably as long as I’ve been alive. He’s always working on his show, even thought right now it’s a great show, he’s always trying to make it better.

His show is a great example of adding a theme to your show to tie it together. A “funny waiter” is easy to theme, you don’t need pe0ple to get on board with a strange character or concept for the them. It also doesn’t feel like something that’s for kids. What I mean by that, is the character is an adult feeling character, it doesn’t feel like it’s geared for kids like a train conductor.

If you get a chance to see his show, you’ll learn a lot by watching it!

The Moisture Festival Podcast – Bri Crabtree

In this episode of the Moisture Festival Podcast we are joined over the phone by the hilarious Bri Crabtree. She tells us about how she had to hide being a juggler in high school from her classmates and what it is like to live in an artist workspace in San Francisco.

She discusses her career, what it’s like being a woman at a juggling convention and her fascination with learning new skills. She’s a comedian, clown, artist and an all around awesome person. We hope you enjoy the conversation as much as we did. 

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The Moisture Festival Podcast – Henrik Bothe

The Moisture Festival Podcast records from the Jupiter Hotel in Portland Oregon. In this episode, we interview Danish comedy juggler Henrik Bothe in room 219. Henrik talks about doing two command performances for Eddie Murphy, performing on the Gong Show, and the origins of his famous ‘Neon Man’ routine.

We also learn how Henrik came to be an animated gif for his plate spinning skills. A great talk with a multi-talented performer and one of the Moisture Festival favorites.

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The Moisture Festival Podcast – Tim Furst

Moisture Festival founder, Tim Furst, joins the Moisture Festival Podcast. Tim talks about how being a conscientious objector to the war in Vietnam led him to learn to juggle and, subsequently, perform in the famous juggling troupe the Flying Karamazov Brothers.

Tim Furst Juggler

We hear some great stories about Tim’s tours with the Flying Karamazov Brothers across the world, appearing in the movie Jewel of The Nile, and how the Russian government thought they were agents of chaos. Tim also talks about what separates the Moisture Festival from other festivals and why it has been so successful.

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Rhys Thomas – The Moisture Festival Podcast

In this episode the Moisture Festival Podcast hits the road to Portland Oregon and interview funnyman Rhys Thomas. Recorded at Sisyphus farm Rhys tells us about growing up a few miles from the Oregon Country Fair and how seeing variety artist at a young age inspired him to follow suit.

Louie Foxx, Matt Baker and Rhys Thomas

We get to hear about what the first Moisture Festival was like and what the criteria was to perform. Rhys also talks about traveling the world with his science show, getting armed guarded escorts in Egypt and how difficult it is to do balancing stunts on cruise ships. A awesome and hilarious conversation with one of the Northwest’s premier variety acts.

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Great Act, Horrible Conditions…

A few weeks ago I went out to the LA County Fair to see Patrick McGuire perform. Patrick is an amazing juggler and performer. I’ve only worked with him indoors in theaters, so I was curious what his outdoor show looked like. Here’s a video he posted on Facebook: I saw him on a weekday … Continue reading “Great Act, Horrible Conditions…”

A few weeks ago I went out to the LA County Fair to see Patrick McGuire perform. Patrick is an amazing juggler and performer. I’ve only worked with him indoors in theaters, so I was curious what his outdoor show looked like.

Here’s a video he posted on Facebook:

I saw him on a weekday during the day and he had rough conditions. It was over a hundred degrees out, there was no shade for the performers or the audience. The only shade was probably 150 feet away, which is where I watched the show from. To top it all off, there was a stage directly next to and slightly behind the one Patrick was performing on that was having a Mexican Battle of the Bands, which was insanely loud!


To his credit, he did his show, didn’t look annoyed and people watched. He didn’t get much of a response out of people, but they were into it and stayed for the whole show.


The moral of the story is that no matter how bad the conditions, the audience came to see you. If there’s nothing you can do about it in the moment, you need to press on and give them the best show you can!

Eye Contact…

Recently I watched a juggler perform at a county fair and as far as I could tell he never looked at the audience during the entire show. I get that to be a juggler you need to look at the props you are juggling, or manipulating, however the audience should still see your eyes at … Continue reading “Eye Contact…”

Recently I watched a juggler perform at a county fair and as far as I could tell he never looked at the audience during the entire show. I get that to be a juggler you need to look at the props you are juggling, or manipulating, however the audience should still see your eyes at some point.


Eye contact is very important to connect to an audience. Have you ever talked to someone that doesn’t look at you? It’s strange. When you don’t look at the audience, it’s like you are ignoring them. No one likes to be ignored, especially a mobile audience like one at a fair.


It also makes the audience feel like they are being talked at, not talked to. I go through spurts of when I fell like I’m talking at the audience. It’s because for whatever reason internally I’m rushing to get to the next joke. Lately, I’ve been doing a good job of holding back on the joke, sometimes it won’t happen because I’m letting the audience decide where I’m going…but you need that connection with them to happen, and it all starts with eye contact.

Cutting Up Jackpots…

One of the things that blows my mind is when I hear a magician say that they don’t hang out with other magicians or performers. You learn so much from other performers, more that that, there’s the sense of community. You aren’t alone out there doing you art, other people have the same struggles, and … Continue reading “Cutting Up Jackpots…”

One of the things that blows my mind is when I hear a magician say that they don’t hang out with other magicians or performers. You learn so much from other performers, more that that, there’s the sense of community. You aren’t alone out there doing you art, other people have the same struggles, and successes!


Yesterday there was a fun get together of variety performers. There’s nothing like getting a bunch of us together and swapping stories. In the carney world they call it “cutting up jackpots”. Hanging out with other performers is also good for your soul.


One of the things that makes it helpful is that I’m entering a new market and a lot of these people work this market, so hearing their stories of their experiences really helped me view my struggles in perspective.

Go hang out with other performers!