Yesterday my itinerary had me doing my show that was written for an audience that’s kindergarten to 6th grade for an group of seventh to eight grade kids. No younger kids, just the middle school kids. When I noticed this show on my schedule, I was dreading it.
The show went great!
What I did was start by mentioning that this show was written for younger kids, but if they stuck with me, they’d like the show. The show was rocking! I mostly did the show as written; I did cut a few things that I knew wouldn’t hit for this older group.
This is a good example of why I disagree with people who say, “it’s the journey, not the trick”. The trick needs to be good, and so does the journey. Just because one is great, doesn’t mean the other can’t also be great! Sure, it takes a bit more work, but it’s worth it!
One of the tricks that I made for this school assembly tour is a snake box. This is essentially a “snake basket“, however, I’m not using a basket as I think that’s an old trope, and one that kids don’t have a point of reference to. The routine in my show started out as a card trick, but it’s now something more, and something that plays bigger!
I was thinking about Terry Lunceford’s The Viper trick and it’s great. If you haven’t seen it, here’s what it looks like:
It’s a great routine for its time. Personally, I think that trying to use a phobia someone has for a laugh is an older style of performing and not modern. Doing a danger trick is one thing, a French Arm Chopper isn’t a common fear, but snakes are.
My snake basket does have the snake jump out, but with only me onstage, and guess what, it gets a great reaction!
As someone who has an irrational fear of something, I try to show some compassion to people in the audience and not put them in a position where they will laugh at them being scared.
That’s just my opinion. I still think it’s a great effect, just not the part where you jump scare someone in front of an audience.
On this school assembly tour, I’m controlling my music with a Flic Buttonthat’s taped to my handheld microphone.
I don’t hide that I’m pushing the button, or that the button is there. I did try to make it less obvious by covering some of it with black tape. After just about every school assembly, I’ll have a teacher or staff person ask me how I’m controlling the music!
Initially, when I started this tour, I was using a combination of the Flic Button on the microphone and my Media Star as an ankle switch. I’ve phased out using the media star ankle switch, and I’m just using the Flic Button on the microphone.
Today is the beginning of the last week of this school assembly tour. It’s crazy how doing 2-3 shows a day for 3 weeks (so far) will tighten up a show. That is if you actively try to make the show better, and not just go out and do it.
These shows are supposed to be 40 minutes long. For the first week or so, I was constantly cutting out bits or routines, and the show seemed to consistently run long. That was because what I was cutting wasn’t working; however, at the same time, I was making what was working better!
To me, the real value of taking a tour like this is taking a show from OK to great in a short amount of time! It is a lot of work to do this; you have to objectively look at the show, and every day, try to find something to improve or cut.
On this school assembly tour most of my audiences are seated in bleachers, with me standing in a basketball court.
On the West Coast, most school assemblies have the kids seated on the floor with my back to a wall. The kids on the bleachers are a better setup. It gives them tiered seating, like in a theater. This makes it easier for everyone to see everything.
The big challenge for me is getting them to pack kids into one section. Here’s an example, let’s say these are the bleachers in the gym and it’s a small school with about a 150 kids.
They will come in and some classes the top row, some the bottom and the rest in random spots in the middle. That’s spread out over all the bleachers. That doesn’t give you a crowd, it gives you 7 groups. It’s hard to get any energy going. When I try to pack them into on section of the bleachers, they always fight me on it. Telling me they won’t fit (they always do), or that they keep the grades separate because the older kids get bored. I bet the do, because they’re not part of the crowd! It’s easy for them to disengage from what’s happening if they’re off in their own corner. It takes a lot of work to convince these schools to move the kids into a crowd, but it’s worth it.
Traveling around the country doing a magic show is a ton of fun! However, it’s not all fun. Two days ago, I got a flat tire. My rental car didn’t have a spare; many new cars come with an inflator and a can of tire sealant. Which is way inferior to a spare tire! This is only good for a small leak; if you get a big blowout, you’re stuck.
Two days ago, I hit something in the road, and my tire got a small hole in it. No big deal, I was able to take care of it with the tire sealant and make it to my next gig on time. After that show, I went to a tire shop in a small town. I told them what happened and that I used tire sealant to get back on the road.
They examined the tire and told me that they had sprayed it and couldn’t find anything wrong with it. I was shocked at this! I saw where the hole in the tire was making bubbles from the tire sealant on the side of the road. It was really a strange interaction. I know you’re not supposed to drive with just the sealant plugging the hole in a tire for very long. When I got to the next city, I went to a Big O Tires, which is a national chain, not a small shop as I had been to previously. They found the hole and plugged it.
While chatting with the guys at the Big O Tires, they were amazed that the people at the other tire shop didn’t clean out the sealant before looking for the hole. I agreed! Now I’m back on the road and feel way safer about my car!
The moral of this story is that I need my car to get me to the gigs. If I had listened to the first small town tire shop, which I knew was wrong, I probably would have had another flat tire! Keep your car in working order.
I’ve had a few magicians ask me if I’m going to make parts of the school assembly I’m out performing available to magicians. The answer is YES, I’m making the whole Amazing Americans school assembly available!
This show runs approx. 40 minutes and is about some people who have made the USA and the world a cooler place! This show is great for a school assembly or library shows. It was originally written for the USA’s 250th birthday, however there’s no mention of that. This is a technically “history” based show, not a patriotic show, so it can be booked this year and beyond!!
In this download you’ll get two videos, and two pdf’s in this set.
Video of the show at a school assembly
Video walkthrough of the shows props and tech
PDF of the script
PDF shopping list of all the commercially available props in the show.
Right now I have this as a pre-order for $60 until 4/30, after that the price goes up to $75.
The ending of my opening magic routine in the school assembly show wasn’t hitting as hard as I thought it should. Originally it was: Educational content Educational content Show ice cream and put into cup Spoon manipulation Ice Cream in a cup turns into streamers
I think it wasn’t hitting as hard because there was too much time between putting the ice cream in the cup and it changing to streamers. I realized I could logically do the spoon manipulation, then put the ice cream into the cup. I gave it a try at a show yesterday, and it made the ice cream changing to streamers play much better. The new order is:
Educational content Spoon Manipulation Educational content Ice cream goes into a cup, then changes to streamers
It’s way better, and I also like having two shorter educational chunks than one longer one. This morning, I rearranged the video that goes with my show to reflect this in hopefully a more seamless way than yesterday.
A while ago I created an ice cream cup that holds a throw coil packet. It’s really nothing crazy, just a cup with a little hole and tab to hold a streamer securely. It turns out it was something that a lot of people needed and many magicians are using it!
