yep, that went well.

The kids festival this year was every it as good as the last. I again started preparing far too many effect and then made myself scale things down and also to make myself last all day I decided to have two sets so I could swap props half way through the day.
My main set consisted of :
Vanilla prepped with Wee Wee Mentalist
Vanilla preped with Here then There (which could be used for mind reading
Invisible deck
Elastic bands for Elastic trickery

The second set had a TT, and a change back with two sizes of red cloth.
Vanilla deck but intended for ambitious card.

And for the performance tent
Cup and Balls
Fly Stick
and One Upon A time.

The new elastic band magic went down VERY well with the kids. My first attempt fell flat but my Girlfriend suggested changing y patter, emphasising the where the band was (the ban flies into the hand of the spectator). I attributed the effect to the innate magical ability of the child I was performing to. again this went down VERY well. Empowering children, Silly Billy (David Kaye) has made the fee of his book and Essential Magic Conference worth the cost already there. One note however. I joked that the young boy (about 8) may find a use for controlling elastic by being able to control the elastic in his underwear from no on and magically dress himself. He laughed, his sister laughed his mum looked at me as if I was a terrible fiend. It seams in the prudish United States of America you can make underwear jokes to kids but here in the UK making such a joke has you branded as a pervert.

Wee Wee mentalist as ever rocked. as did Here then There. The change bag I combined with the TT and some cloth. I explained what happens to naughty children and placed the large cloth in the bag, waved my hands and turned the bag inside out to reveal a tiny piece of cloth, I then picked it up and vanished it with the TT. Two quite hard nosed 10 year olds suddenly exploded with excitement, and when I brought the cloth bag it was noted that I could not have just dropped the cloth on the floor and that my sleeves were rolled up and my hands empty. It didn't just baffle or amaze them it enchanted them!

Ambitious card got a look in using specially printed cards made by my good friend Darren Gooding which advertise his lecture on the mysterious Leopold Thorn . This was even filmed by a camera man, I fluffed one bit but made a joke of it being eddied out, even if it isn't I think it will come across as deliberate and the tricks flow remained.

All of this time I was telling people where the story tent was, explaining about the wonderful Willow maze and the story quests! I also told them when I was on. Part of me was almost wishing I wasn't as I was nervous about Once Upon a Time. BUT I don't want to get into the habit of 'Bottling out' and so dutifully informed people where and when I would be performing even though a cowardly part of me was almost hopping for an empty tent (this part is now well and trying dead I might add)

The story Tent is probably the most interesting pat of the day. I planned to show off the Fun Fly Stick and let the kids play with it (accepting that the Mylar component would get trashed). I also planned to perform 'One Upon A Time' by Guy Hollingworth. I may have blogged of this before, it's a way of telling fairy tales with a special deck of cards with pictures. Pumpkins become carriages and bowls of porridge become emptied as if by magic. I moved EVERYTHING I had to the tent, including my magic case and change of costume. I was initially dressed as a generic Cyborg Alien

I took the name Darth Dean fully expecting the kids to call me Daft Dean. I was not disappointed (thanks again to David Kaye's Seriously Silly) but in the tent changed into my normal more comfortable clothing

I got to the tent half an hour early planning to run through "Once Upon A time". whilst using basic slights the number of slights and having to remember where and when they are done makes this effect even more of a pitfall than the ambitious card. However after only being in the tent for a few minutes I had company in the form of a group of young children. I had a few choices.
Send them outside
Continue a silent run through with them in the tent
Quickly re-order the deck and just live without a final practise
I decided to take the last option. If I needed to practise again right before the gig then I should have practised more before hand. as nervous as I was I had to man up. I give the kids the Fun Fly Toy whilst trying to mentally prepare for a moment. Soon the tent was packed and it was time to begin. I was worried about nothing it seams. The kids were literally over awed at one point. One girl trying to understand how a puff of smoke turns into a fairy, or how the rats turned into the coachmen, a young boy exasperatedly yells "Because he's a magician, he can do magic!" Once Upon a Time almost took me to the 30 minute slot I wanted to fill. I could have ended it there but the kids wanted more magic and I planed to deliver. I explained how the cups and balls was the oldest trick in the world (A matter hotly disputed actually), They watched the effect with a genuine air of reverence, asking questions polity and seemingly flattered that I was willing to show them such a grown up and respected trick. I finished by putting one gaffed cup away and letting them play with the two remaining cups. They asked why I only had the two out and I just explained I only needed two for the next effect. They passed the cups around before handing them back. At this point I performed Solid Penetration and lets the cups fall through each other. They FREAKED out. They wanted more magic, in fact they wanted REPEAT magic. Wee Wee Mentalist is back in fashion it seams, that poor fellow deserves a raise.Out came the change bag again and the TT and hankies were shrunk and vanished. I then performed some more Elastic Band Magic before teaching a very simple band trick. As I was leaving a young lady asked for one final card trick, out came Cheek To Cheek. again, it performed very well.

And then a very tired magician clashed his outfits, his neodandy waistcoat and top hat blended with his cyborg hit-man jacket and he left the festival knowing his work was indeed done.

So what did I learn.
Practise is worth it, keep it up.
I am very good at handling kids and magic to any audience is rewarding.
MAKE A LIST of what I need,I left props at home that required a friend to nip home and pick things up for me (I owe him many beers)

Don't! Leave home without it!

I think we all have our favourite effects. it may be one we're very proud of because of it's technical skill. It may be one that we have spent hours honing the presentation of. It may simply be one that gets a HUGE reaction. Wee Wee Mentalist falls into the last category. Every Saturday that I work at Fabric8 I make sure to prep a deck with a few cards for Wee Wee Mentalist. The kids LOVE it (and the parents appreciate their children being entertained for a few minutes whilst they shop). I came to relaise I was hidding behind this one effect. Infact I would struggle for few seconds to think of an effect I could do with a vanilla deck. As a result I decided to force myself to try different things. I left the cards for Wee Wee Mentalist at home and instead launched into Card in Hand, Here then there and Ambitious card. WOW, huge reactions from all of these AND my ambitious card yet again proved itself to be a powerful effect. I left work thrilled and totally reinvigorated.

kids festival ahoy

I'm starting to get into a new routine which I enjoy. Waking up and making a cup of tea and then 30 minutes of going through 'The Royal Road to Card Magic'. This is a very old text on card Magic which Richard Paul Wilson (He off the real Hustle and not he with one foot in the grave) has made an accompanying DVD set. It's interesting because I now know a lot of slights and effects and so expected to not learn much new material for a few days. However chapter 1 taught me something I wanted to know for a while, a Full False Shuffle! I've been able to control the top packet of cards or the bottom packet of cards for over a year now, but this book/dvd shows you how to shuffle a deck without upsetting ANY of the cards order. Most exciting. THe first chapter also had an interesting mental effect I 'll try out on the next available muggle. Is there a danger that 'll learn too many effects and get myself muddled? Unlikely, after all I can contain whole universes of information regarding Science fiction so now I can fill my head with something more, well I wont say useful as my knowledge of sci fi and the parables within have gotten me through some tough times. I certianly don't plan on becoming a trick-a-holic though. I'll just run through the course a few times and just select the effects that work best for me.

I have 10 days before the Kids-festival. That's ten days to work on 'Once Upon a Time' and 10 days to work on my thread work. well I won't be complaining of being board any time soon :)

that went not so well

I had a rather shortish notice gig again. 2 weeks notice. I used the time to run through my regular routines and learnt a new effect "Cheek to Cheek" . I had a few misgivings when I realised the event (A stand up comedy night) did not seem to be attracting many pre bookings. When we arrived I got kitted out and stocked up paisley magic waistcoat with decks....

Vanilla deck set up for "Do as I Do", "direct mind reading" and "Out of this world"

Invisible deck (to use with the above for an overall rapport, spiritual feel)

Cartomancy (with scratch cards and leaflet)

Vanilla deck with a "Wee Wee Mentalist" ready to go

Darkside -Serial Killer set up.

I felt like I was over burdened whilst also ill prepared. Maybe I was just hiding behind my props. I performed a few effects for the receptionist and the bar staff whilst waiting for punters to arrive, thee were well received. Interestingly enough, the bar staff reception to WeeWee Mentalist was OK, but not the usual blown away response I tend to get. Possibly my anxiety was colouring my performance, or maybe they just didn't like that sort of trick.

I continued to wait for the 'punters'. Comedians showed up with their support crew of friends and family but no actual public customers for a while. This was a problem as I'd intended to start table hopping BEFORE the show, to warm people up. Then the comedy began. There was not a single person there who was not a performer or there with a performer.

In the intermission I tried approaching the family of the acts. I performed Cartomancy to one group, this was well received but the other friends and family were nipping in and out of the green room. there was literally no-one to perform to. I approached the family of one of the events organizers, had a friendly chat and performed the serial killer version of Dark Side. The whole effect was lost when the spectator failed to realise the great big blood splat on their chosen card. Was this the lighting or was it because I failed to engage the spectator, to make them take an interest in the magic, or was h just a little Dim. We shall never know BUT it is something I'm going to take on board and take more care of lighting and take more care to ensure the spectator is on the ball.

Reading this it sounds like a bad disheartening night. but it wasn't really,. The comedy was good and it gave me a lot to think about

I Need to slim down what I carry

I need more confidence in my Vanilla work

I need to be aware of possible lighting issues

I need to make sure the participant is ENGAGED

I need to rehears more so that my 'patter' is fluid, BUT also that I have the confidence to change it on the fly without leaving out pertinent information for the effect.

housekeeping and catching up

It occurred to me that I've been serious about magic fr just over a year now, and if I learnt at a steady rate of one effect a week I'd now have over 50 effects to call upon. Many effects do not make you a good magician of course, BUT it makes it more likely that you'd have a strong effect suitable for any occasion. It made me realise I've not been practising and rehearsing as much as I should. I perform weekly at work on any young kids who need entertaining whilst their parents shop, but even then I'm just using the same old effects time and time gain. Basically I've fallen into a rut. I decided to take a good hard look at the problem. The solution has been remarkably easy.
1) My magic practise area always had junk on it making it hard to sit down and study

2) My magic case was frankly a disgrace with props and cards just shoved in out of the way. I've now sat down and re-labled custom decks and packs of gaffs to make it easier to prep in a hurry

3) Time, I've been busy with many things in my life, and magic has been put on the back burner

Points 1 and 2 are just matters of housekeeping ad I feel much better for sorting them out. The 3rd point is more involved. DO I just make magic more important and push aside all other aspects of my life? or is it better to become more organized in all ways myself, freeing up time for magic whilst not letting other matters build up in my head to become insurmountable obstacles later on? Slowly I'm putting all aspects of my life in order so on days such as today when I can't walk I can instead colla[pse in my chir at my desk and study and practice and rehurse. on that matter. I'm trying to dedicate at least 1 hour a day to dedicated magic work (as well as my usuall practise in front of the TV when watching things with freinds. this can be 4 different things

Research:- finding out what effects are out there, what slights there are or learning more of the history of our craft and those who have come before us.

Study:- Actually learning new effects and slights. Also making any gaffs or other equipment.

Practise:- Going through the motions of slights and effects (this often takes place whislt doing something else such as watching TV)

Rehearsal :- Running through a complete set from start to finish speaking allowed any patter and recovering from any mistakes and not just starting again from scratch. This is very important, often I like to just speak naturally and unrehearsed when performing however having a mental script made up of highlights can ensure no verbal misdirection is missed out.

I'm trying to go through all of these stages in all my levels of disability. I want to make sure I can perform any effect when I'm in pain or impaired in any way, whilst sitting or standing, be it at a desk or a bar or even on the floor. And if I can't rework an effect so I can perform it in any circumstance I need to note where and when I can and cannot perform it. WHY am I so concerned with practising in different states? If I can work out WHAT I can do, WHERE ever I am and to WHO ever I am performing to and in WHICH physical state I may be in, and then organize myself so I know WHEN I'm meant to be doing all this - I should be on the right road