One of the casualties of the COVID-19 pandemic has been that magic clubs have not been able to meet in their clubrooms.
Hopefully this will start to change as other indoor venues, with appropriate social distancing measures in place, have started to open up again, and I see no reason why magic societies couldn’t recommence as well. Continue reading “Magic Clubs Are Not Just For Magic”
These days we seem to live in a very visual age where information is increasingly supplied in a graphic format consisting of drawings, photos or video.
Personally, I sometimes find pictures more difficult to quickly decode than words. You only have drive into some of the motorway service areas in the UK to be confronted by a barrage of clipart images purporting to make it easier for you to drive into the correct area.
For me, the interpretation of the drawings sometimes takes longer than a simple word would. Maybe it’s just me. I appreciate that a drawing takes away the need to understand language which can be helpful for overseas visitors, but if the pictures aren’t that good or accurate, they can be misunderstood or simply take longer to interpret! Continue reading “Friends, Romans, Countrymen, Lend Me Your Ears”
In the January 2020 issue of Magicseen I have written a piece on how to go about deciding on the right fees for your shows.
It’s a common worry, especially for those new to paid work, about where to pitch their fees. They don’t want to charge too much, but by the same token nor do they probably want to ask for too little, and finding the right balance and assessing one’s personal value as a performer is a challenging task.
In David Regal’s excellent book Interpreting Magic, there is a quote from Derren Brown on this subject. Derren was reflecting on how as a jobbing close up performer in Bristol, he was commanding £300 fees. Yet the moment that he was seen on TV, his agent hiked his charges up to £3000 per show—overnight! Continue reading “Commanding Higher Fees”
I don’t know whether it is a coincidence, but over the last 6 months or so I have had conversations with a number of magicians who have been bemoaning the fact that the number of shows they are doing these days is less than they have had in previous years.
Often these magicians seem surprised at the downturn and have attempted to either come to terms with the new reality, or have wanted to understand what is causing the reduction in bookings in order to try and arrest the decline.
When you are involved in magic on a regular basis, either as a performer or even as an informed observer, it becomes increasingly difficult for magic effects to recreate in your mind that stunning feeling of total wonder that it can cause in the uninitiated.
If you think back to when you were a child, perhaps, and you experienced magic for the first time, those feelings of awe, amazement and the thrill of witnessing the impossible, would have really excited you. But as with any experience, the more you have it the more likely it is that you will become gradually immune to the effects of the situation, and so it is with magic.
Einstein said, “Insanity is doing exactly the same thing again and again and expecting to get a different result!” Actually, he didn’t really say that, but for some reason it is attributed to him. I suppose whoever did express the idea originally thought it would carry more weight if it appeared to come from a genius such as Einstein.
This does, however, throw up two interesting thoughts. The first is whether the saying itself is actually true, and the second is whether statements or ideas carry more or less weight and validity, depending on who expresses them.
Continue reading “Advertising – The Importance Of Who Says What And How Often They Say It”
Are you a passive or an active consumer of magic? In other words, does your magic interest simply extend to reading magic mags and watching magic online, or do you actively seek to get out and perform?
Personally, I have always been a performer, right from when I was a child. Assimilating magic knowledge was not an end in itself for me, but a means to enable me to put together an act and then perform it somewhere.
I’ve always felt that there is not much point in finding out the inner secrets of magic, of attending magic lectures, of reading books on the art, and of turning up at the local magic club, if you are not then at some point going to use the knowledge that you have gained from immersing yourself in the art in this way for a practical end. Continue reading “Passive Or Active – What Sort Of Magician Are You?”
As I write this blog in mid-April I am about to embark on a two week trip to the States where I will be presenting 6 lectures in 8 days at different venues on the east side of the country, and then finish by attending the incomparable 4Fs Close Up Convention.
When you have overseas lecturers visiting your club and you are sitting at home and wondering whether you are going to make the effort to turn up to listen to him, have you ever stopped for a minute to consider what that person has had to go through in order to be there in your clubroom?
Continue reading “The Trials And Tribulations Of Lecturing Overseas”
I have always been of the opinion that who you mix with can have a profound influence on the type of person you are and the attitude that you portray. If you are surrounded by upbeat, positive people, the chances are that this will probably rub off on you and your glass will generally be half full. Spend most of your time with those who find reasons not to do things and for whom everything is a problem that can’t be solved, and you would do well not to become similarly negative.
As in general life, so in magic. When I think back to my early formative years in magic and the people who I met and spent time with during that period, I can clearly trace the positive impact that they had on me. Their knowledge, attitude and drive were terrific role models and had I not hung around with them but chosen the company of others instead, there is no telling what direction I might have ended up taking.
Continue reading “The Power Of A Positive Magical Peer Group”
It’s probably true to say that every entertainer experiences some form of heightened anxiety just prior to performing. It manifests itself in different ways ranging from a dry mouth, to butterflies in the stomach to even perhaps some sweating or hand trembling. It’s all part of the process of the body preparing itself for something that often takes us out of our comfort zone.
We label this feeling of unease as ‘nerves’, and for those who experience it severely, it can be a significant barrier to a good performance, because if you are unable to cope with these physiological side effects, you may become unable to present your magic adequately.
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