Recently I posted a picture of my gear for a 90 minute theater show that I drove to:
and now here’s two 45 minute theater shows AND a week of my personal stuff (clothes, laptop, etc):
When flying to a gig, there’s a lot of things that I don’t bring. For example all of my stuff that has a base can use a microphone stand for a base which the venue can provide. I also have versions of a couple of bulkier props that pack smaller, and that saves a lot of space. Also the flying version of the show is a lot more organized, as space is the most important thing.
I finally finished the book Professional Secrets by Geoffrey Durham. I don’t know much about Geoffrey, other than this book has been out of print for a while.
The thing that I liked about this book is that it isn’t just tricks, it’s got some of how he got to the tricks and they why he does them the way that he does them.
It’s laid out in a way that I think is similar to the Tommy Wonder books where it goes essay, trick, essay, trick. I really like that format as it helps you get inside the author’s head a little bit more. It also highlights why some seemingly small changes to a standard trick can make HUGE differences.
This book is selling for a couple hundred bucks on the secondary market, however if you can find a deal on it, you should check it out!
Last week I had an ad pop up on my social media for The Good News Magic Show. While there’s no mention of religion in the ad, I did have a feeling that this was going to be a “gospel” magic show.
I don’t think I’ve ever been to a gospel magic show, I’ve read about them and maybe seen a magic lecture that had a gospel element to a trick or two, but I’ve never seen a full show out there in its element.
When I arrived it was at a church, so that confirmed what I thought I was going to see. The show was a family show (not strictly a kid show). The format was interesting. The show’s first maybe 15-20 minutes was just magic, then there was a quick bible message. After that each trick had a talking point that carried into the bible message that followed after the trick and tied the two together. For example one of the tricks themes was that a mess was made, then the message was “if your life is a mess, Jesus can help clean it up“. It’s a format that’s similar to what I use in a themed school assembly, except I do the content first, then the trick, so they can see the content in action.
From a show perspective, it was a pretty standard magic show. It was fine, but I’m not the target audience for this show and the audience seemed to like it and ultimately that’s what matters.
After the show we (Luke hammer and me) chatted with Greg for a bit.
The other performer (Tony) in the show mentioned to us he’s more of a “balloon guy” and does magic for the show.
Here’s what I liked and what magicians can learn from shows like this. When Tony and Greg were doing the message part of the show they told personal stories and those were things the audience could connect to. In my opinion that’s what’s missing from most magic shows.
I’m always interested in what magicians shows look like when packed up. Here’s what my 90 minute stage show looks like (when travelling by car).
For this gig I packed everything I needed. If I was flying to the gig I wouldn’t bring many things like mic stands that I use for bases for props. I have the venue provide those. Then there are things like the crank organ that I wouldn’t take if I was flying.
I’m really glad that in 2020 I learned to do stage make up.
Coming out of comedy rooms, it’s something that people don’t really do. What I do is very basic, it’s just to take shine off of my face, so nothing crazy. It does make a huge difference when performing in the lights at a theater.
If you don’t know how to do it, learn to do it! I asked a friend of mine who is a stage actor and he referred me to someone who gave me a lesson.
A couple of nights ago I made it out to Magic Uncorked in Portland, OR. It’s a magic show in a wine shop that happens semi regularly. The show features three performers and is a lot of fun!
I’m new to this area, however it seems that magicians are really out there supporting magic, there were about six of us that weren’t performing!
Its a great venue and the performers were John Stevens, Moto, Craig Martin and hosted by Dave, who is a magician and co-owns the wine shop Ora et Labora.
The show started at 6pm with drinks and roving close up magic, then the parlor style show started at 7:30pm and went till just past 9pm. For $35 a ticket that included a drink, it was a great deal!
If you have shows in your area, go out and support them!
At a recent gig they requested I do a trick with a donor’s check. I decided to do a Bank Nite type of trick where the check was put into an envelope and mixed with other envelopes. One envelope was selected and the rest were shredded and the selected envelope had the check.
Pretty standard in effect, but I didn’t want to deal with an electric shredder, so I used a manual shredder.
The shredder above says is has a capacity of 2 sheets, however it worked just fine with and envelope with a check sized piece of paper in it. It played fine, and the manual shredder is a great prop to have around. I think this premise is an easy way to customize a trick for an event.
Thanksgiving was a few months ago, but I want to say that I’m thankful for this this thing to come into my life!
It’s a wireless HDMI system. This allows me to not have to run a cord from my camera onstage to where ever their HDMI input is. I’ve used it a lot since I got it and I just upgraded it. Before it had to be plugged into power, but I bought the batteries for it, so now I don’t need a power outlet. My video is pretty much 100% self contained now, I just have the output wires from the camera to the wireless HDMI. It’s soo much more mobile now and setting up so soo quick!
Another batch of Applause Please 2: The Encore will be ready soon! This is the prop that I use for the object in light bulb effect. Traditionally this effect uses a lamp onstage, but I’ve changed that lamp to an applause sign!
I don’t have these in stock all the time as the outer applause box I don’t make, Phil over at Ackerly Builds currently makes them for me. That means that I get them in batches of about a dozen and those are then all gimmicked at the same time and offered for sale at the same time and usually sell out pretty quickly.
A few weeks ago we went to see a silent movie with the music played by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. This show was sold out and it was a ton of fun.
When watching the movie one of the things that surprised me was the length of time that the title/dialog cards were shown for. It felt like they were either shown way too long or not long enough to read them.
When I was a kid in a high school journalism class we were told that you were supposed time yourself reading the words and add two seconds and that was how long you displayed them.
What does this mean for magic?
Well when you talk, especially telling jokes you need to make sure the whole (or most of) audience has caught up to the end of the set up before you do the punchline. For a magic effect, you need to display at the end long enough for the whole audience to realize what happened and process the magic effect.
