Magic at Severndroog Castle

Last night was definitely one of the stand out gigs of my career so far.
I received an E-mail about a month ago asking if I could perform for a birthday party with a steampunk theme at Severndroog Castle. I Initially assumed I got the gig because someone there had seem p me perform magic at a Steampunk event at Crossness pumping station.  One of the event organizers at Crossness now works at Sevendroog so I also thought he could have recommended me as well, Turns out I was wrong, the birthday girl had researched steampunk performers and I cropped up. This by itself felt awesome, it's nice to know I'm becoming highly regarded in the community.

  Whilst I've been fortunate to perform for birthdays and weddings I often find one or two things about each gig to make them novel. In this case as well as magic the lady requested one of my mad science demonstrations. I have never performed this to an adult audience before and I was intrigued at how it would be received. They LOVED it. much like a Tea and Sympathy event I was set up in a room and people were invited to come along and be part of a small show. I often worry about this, I used to feel like I was intruding on peoples time, that it is almost rude to ask them to actively seek me out. After many events however I must admit people love coming specifically for a small show and really feel (or should I say understand) that they are part of something special. Thanks to the interaction with people in this way I certainly feel like each show is unique and special.

  On the subject of the science show...

I need to "steampunk up" my Flying wand

I need to create an obviously  "McGyvered" electric motor robust enough to be a generator as well.

People are fascinated and shocked by the Iron extraction from Rice Crispies.

One other thing that made this event different was working with Dan. Dan is a superb juggler and staff performer who is also learning magic. He's a ridiculously fast learner and has a most charming presentation style. We have worked together before several times before. However previously we worked at events he got bookings for. This was his first time in "My World" working in a  table environment for a birthday party where most people were acquainted and from a simuler background.
Before hand he had worked in a "festival environment" with lots of walk about performing with short stand up and walk around effects. Whilst I was performing "walk about" magic to meet and greet the guests he was juggling rings for groups of people before the weather made this impractical and he switched to magic as well. We did get an amazing whip performance in (he is a qualified whip master and it shows).

  Up close I used Elastic band magic (tescoes elastic bands are rubbish, must get new ones)

  Wee Wee Mentalist followed by "do as I do" and "ambitouse Card" "here then There and some Mind reading.

 All of these went down very well and I received a lot of comments along the lines of being far better than other magicians seen else where. I also received a lot of comments stating hoe good Dan was at both juggling and magic. He has developed his own set and style that comp-liments my own very well. He's not a direct copy of me and puts his own spin on everything he does and people love it.

After the walk around intro we went into the science. After which we set up a second table and we each performed our own close up table set. I went for more "rapport" effect with groups of women, mind reading, cartomancy and other empathic effects. This then climaxed with "out of this world".
With gentlemen I slipped into my old gambling routines. I had forgotten how powerful these are! The "poker hand" trick were I ask questions to build a physiological profile of someone before arranging the cards in an order I feel they would choose resulting in them getting a full house in poker has a really powerful effect. Revealing that they had given me a Royal Flush in the process just ads to the fun. Dan  performed his own material and he was getting the full range of positive reactions from the logical "you can't just have done that, that's amazing" and complimenting his intelligence and skill to the emotional gasps comments of how he made people feel they were seeing real magic.

So in summing up. Dan's performance style and abilities  compliment mine and Darren's very well. I think he's an amazing addition to the team. He also really loved being part of "my world" and wants to perform more up close and intimate table magic.

Table magic and walk around magic are VERY different. There are the practical difference of what you can achieve with a surface to work on, but also it's the setting. The intimacy afforded by removing background noise and allowing people to focus on our little velvet covered world of secrets allows for a much stronger emotional involvement in our magic. I am very proud of the fact we can perform more or less anywhere and I have enjoyed the huge amount of festival work we have done lately, but I have missed close up table magic and it felt good to return to it.

Things learnt. Card magic can have it's own beauty and charm.

People love being taken out for their world and into our sphere of magic and the effects we produce in them will stay with them for the rest of their lives.

Dan is an amazing and charming performer in his own right and I think the three of us will be able to go on to do even greater things.