Going Mental

Today’s “Magic Friday” event was a real change of pace, I must say. Last week I did Vernon’s “Fingerprint Trick” and got a huge response with it. In order to keep things fresh and interesting I try not to do two card tricks on consecutive Fridays.
I am currently working on two beautiful Dai Vernon effects. “The Ace Assembly” (An earlier version of “Slow Motion Aces”) and “Silk and Silver” using the Cervon opening. Although I’ve never seen them performed, I can tell these are pure, beautiful and elegant effects. But they do involve some pretty hairy sleights. I am making reasonable progress with both, but they will require a lot more work before I can do them justice.
So all week I have been going through my collection of books trying to find the right trick for Friday.
In all my years of doing magic as a kid and as a young man I don’t recall ever doing a mental / psychic effect. With the exception of a trick called “Tarot Thought”. It’s a nice trick involving 5 tarot cards and 5 envelopes. Long story short; the spectator’s thought of card is divined from within an envelope behind the magician’s back.
I haven’t done that one for many years. Although it’s a good trick, I quit doing it because I felt it lacked directness. There were too many instructions for the spectator to follow. But now for some reason I thought a mental effect would be fun for a change. That is if I could find one that I could make fit my own style. By Tuesday I narrowed it down to two effects. Both of them are from Tarbell #4. I finally settled on “Himber’s Transcendental Book Test”.
In a nutshell; three books and two assistants are called for. Each assistant picks a book and some pages are randomly determined. The page numbers are added and subtracted to determine a page and line number in the third book held by a spectator. The Magi then becomes an actor and goes into psychic mode, gets some visual impressions, and after a bit of by play recites the arrived at line in the book. I was intrigued by the effect but not really excited about it. But the clock was a tickin’ so I figured I’d just give it my best shot and see what happens. There would be 5 performances as usual. But I had those blasted rising cards handy just in case…
1. The “Book Test” turned out to be a dud.
2. I turned out to be a dud. Or
3. I just plain chickened out.
I had three concerns about the trick. The first was that there might be too many instructions for the volunteers to follow. All my favorite magical authors warn against tricks that require too much concentration on the part of the audience. That makes perfect sense to me. Personally, I would rather be entertained than be put through a series mental calisthenics. I was also worried it might smack of a math trick. There’s nothing magical about counting articles into various piles, adding the year of your birth, multiplying by 12.7 and integrating the result along an inverted parabola. Yawn. My third concern was the fact that the proper working of the trick requires some quick counting, arithmetic, reading and memorization when only a quick and casual glance is allowed. I’m not the sharpest hammer in the woodpile so I was a little spooked by that last part.

So how did it go? It was great! I was as blown away by the response as my students were by the effect. I really didn’t expect this trick to play that well let alone pack such a powerful punch. In fact, I may have to look into one or two more mental effects. Who knows, Maybe I could apply some Vernon-osity to "Tarot Thought". Once again, where I was hesitant and ready to chicken out, I instead pressed forward and trusted my gut. And once again, the payoff was HUGE.
Acting!
Amazing!
Thank You!

The Fingerprint Trick

Many years ago I purchased “The Vernon Chronicles” and “The Dai Vernon Book of Magic”. I don’t know whether I was intimidated by the slights required, suffered from a lack of vision or just plain lazy, but I did not do much work at all from them. Maybe I thought I would become a better magician just by having them in my collection.


Fast forward to last August. I am so thankful that I had the wisdom to acquire these books. (If not the motivation to work from them). For the past 5 months I have been studying these and a few other books. Of course I knew and understood who Dai Vernon was and his standing in the magic community. But I never fully appreciated his genius until this year and my reimmersion into magic. For the past few weeks I had been working on “Ace Assembly”, an earlier version of Vernon’s “Slow Motion Aces”.


I felt like I needed a good 4 Ace trick in my repertoire. Since I was a kid I have been doing the version found in Bruce Elliot’s “Great Secrets of the Master Magicians” It’s a good trick. But I loved the idea of the aces traveling one at a time. Once I started working on it I realized this was going to take some serious time. I would continue to work on it but in the mean time what to perform on Friday? The Fingerprint Trick is in the same book and while I skimmed the effect earlier I looked a little more carefully into it. It did not take long for me to realize how strong this one could be. No freaky sleights, interesting plot and of course the “Vernon Touch”:
That is, straight forward and above board (seeming) handling. I had a few days to work the trick out and write my own script for it. I added a simple prop for 3 reasons. To create more interest, involve more spectators and most importantly, as a cover for the world’s clumsiest classic pass.
The first performance I totally screwed up. I lost count during the turning cards phase. It was no disaster since the chosen card was found as one of the five Candidates. I brought a back up just in case. The Rising Cards. I thought briefly about temporarily chucking The Fingerprint Trick and doing something easier. But in the end I decided to continue with my original plan. I’m glad I did because the rest of the performances were amazing! I did not expect the shouts at the final revelation of the chosen card. This is another winner! I love it! I am really learning to build effective routines from classic books and make them my own. There just is no feeling like that of artistic accomplishment!

Clean Cut

In 1977 I saw Mark Wilson do the color changing pocket knives on his wonderful show "Magic Circus". I thought for sure it was done with some kind of shell gimmick. Nevertheless My next order to Tannen's included a set of knives.

When I got them I was surprised and pleased. I still have them today. I never really built a routine around them but used them as a quick "impromptu" type effect. The problem, I felt was there was no real finish. Eventually I modeled a miniature knife. For a finish I would crush a knife down to size. I had a couple of other ideas which I never pursued. The color changing pocket knives eventually drifted out of my awareness. Until recently.
There they were in my dusty old trunk with all that other stuff. I found a basic routine by Harry Lorayne in Tarbell's #7. The routine was sharp, direct and I liked the pace of it. There is a good finish but it requires a third knife. At one point a handkerchief is introduced and used.

I liked the idea of using a handkerchief, but the handling did not fit my style. Eventually I worked out a different handkerchief switch based on an old Dai Vernon move using coins and a handkerchief. But in the end I decided that for me the routine was stronger without a handkerchief. This left me right back where I started. How to finish? Then it came to me. I incorporated a sweet move I learned from Patrick Page. This move is a clever card vanish that can be used to cleanly dispose of any small object. Patrick Page credits to move to Max Malini. This allowed for a surprise and very clean finish for the pocket knives.
It was fun watching my students almost figure out how the trick was done when I threw in a very "casual" move from Harry Lorayne's writing in Tarbell #7. He credits the move to Russell Barnhart. If you do the pocket knives look this one up! It is one of little subtleties that if done properly, throws off the wise and the clever. Together with the clean and surprising finish I am very pleased with the routine I have stitched together. After the appause died down I flat out asked my classes..."Is this one a keeper?" To which I received many "Thumbs Up".
Its been 20 years since I fooled around with the pocket knives. Now I've got a strong well-paced routine with a surprising and clean finish. All made possible by Mark Wilson, Harry Lorayne, Russell Barnhart and the great Patrick Page. Thank you gentlemen!

Dancing On The Ceiling

As a thirteen year old I did a birthday party for a young girl in my neighborhood. I did 20th century silks using a Tommy Windsor type popcorn box,

Chinese sticks purchased from The Coney Island Faker himself, Al Flosso, (I remember after demonstrating the trick for me I said “Pretty good”. To which he replied, “What do you mean pretty good!?)
I bought them right away. They served me well for many years! At the party I also did Zombie, and Card on Ceiling as taught by Bruce Elliot in “Great Secrets of the Master Magicians”. Good effect, easy sleights. Since then I occasionally performed Card on Ceiling but not that often. I suppose I didn’t want to have to play “help the magician pick up his cards”. Later I saw Whit Hayden perform it with the deck bound with rubber bands. (I regret I did not get to know Whit better while we lived in the same town!). Every time I met Whit he was kind, friendly and always professional. One class act guy! Not to mention, one of the very finest ring routines you'll ever see!
Since then I’ve seen other magicians perform Card on Ceiling in simular ways. I didn’t perform it much anymore. I could do a few nice card sleights but those paramount (and difficult) ones still eluded me. After seeing it performed by real professionals I felt like I was wearing training wheels and lost interest in performing the effect.
Since my return to magic last August, Card on Ceiling has been on my "must become proficient with" list. I chose it not only because of it’s powerful impact but also because it serves as another vehicle for the classic, professional quality sleights I've been working so hard to achieve. I knew my CP was up to scratch (could still use improvement)
and now it was time to test my one handed TP. So last night while sitting in the car while my kids were having piano lessons, I hatched an idea for a plot. The script pretty much wrote itself. I wrote the misdirection onto the script for the crucial moments and the story line was something people could relate to and allowed for plenty of humor. I felt like I had a gem! I got to school early and beat the devil out of a brand new deck throwing it at the ceiling.
The first performance was just lame. My fault. The tricked worked (Sort of. More on that later). But my delivery was crapola. The next performance was a little better. By the 5th and 6th performance the drama and humor were on track. And after throwing the deck at the ceiling the audience gasped and broke into applause as the signed card came floating down. Floating Down? Yes floating down. You see the acoustic tile ceiling would not do. But I did have a 5 or 6 inch wide beam across the ceiling I was going for. Being a computer lab it was also quite cold in the room which had a negative effect on some very old and cheap material I was using. Am I disappointed?
Not a wit sir! First, the audience did not expect to see a card stuck to the ceiling so there was no let down. (So to speak) The performances (except for the first one) were interesting and produced laughter. When the deck hit the ceiling the card released itself and (because of the extra weight) floated down flat and face up making it easy to pluck from the air and display with triumph. But the main reason I am grinning ear to ear tonight is because 6 times I successfully pulled off the CP and one-handed TP semi-surrounded by a demanding and skeptical audience. After months and months of practice I can now add these powerful weapons to my arsenal. Now I’m going to have to peel myself off the ceiling!

Friday the 13th

How appropriate! Today’s performances were really strange. I’ve been working on “Expansion of Texture” from “The Dai Vernon Book of Magic”. Over 100 years ago T. Nelson Downs credits this effect to Jose Antenor de Gayo. aka: L'homme Masque. It is also generally accepted that it was none other than de Gayo that taught the "Downs Palm" to Downs himself. Imagine that. The effect is also described in "Modern Coin Magic" by JB Bobo as "Silver or Copper Extraction". But it was Dai Vernon that improved the effect with his brilliance in simplicity and naturalness.
I really like the audible component of the effect. In fact, I changed the handling just a bit to capitalize on this aspect of the routine.

I have also been working on David Roth’s copper/silver routine.
I thought I’d do both of these effects today. I have been practicing the palm to palm change for months. I worked the Copper/Silver routine until I had it down. Or so I thought. Like many people, I get nervous when I perform. This usually goes away after a few minutes or until I start getting positive audience feedback. Anyway, I didn’t count on sweaty palms. The English Penny kept slipping during the effect. There were a couple of audible clicks (which I clumsily covered by making it seem like the coin struck my wedding band). After two less than thrilling performances of Copper/Silver I decided to cut it from the day’s program and just do the “Expansion of Texture” routine. Three groups seemed to accept the performance of “Expansion” as adequate. Another group was bored with it while the 3rd group was flabbergasted by it! Thank goodness for that! I've never seen the effect performed so at least now I know the effect CAN look as good to an audience as I imagined it would. The challenge is to be consistent about it.

As for the under-whelming response of the other groups, the common denominator is me, so I can only blame myself. I will spend time this weekend analyzing the effect and my performance of it. And more practice of course. I believe in the effect and I am confident I will be able to perform it beautifully and consistently. I am determined to make it my own and perform the routine as well as it can possibly be done. It just requires more work.

Note to self: This is new. In the past I would have been discouraged by a limp performance and given up on an effect. But now I am simply resolved to whip the effect into submission until it begs for mercy. Where was this determination when I was young?

As for Copper/Silver, I will try writing my own script for it and continue working on the palm to plam change and practicing it ad nauseam. To the degree that even the sweatiest palms will hold fast to the little buggers.

RING & STRING

Another magic Friday has come and gone. And so has another success. This week it was Jim Tyler’s Ring and String Routine. I started working on this last summer. I put it down for some reason and picked it back up a couple weeks ago. Last week I didn’t feel it was ready to perform so I did my own handling of Card Warp instead. This gave me another week to smooth out the Ring and String Routine. Good thing too. I think Mr. Tyler would have approved of my performance. Confident and smooth for the most part. At the start of the 3rd performance I handed the string to a football player to examine. While testing the string’s strength, he snapped off a third of it! Oh well, one must continue nonplused. As I was performing with a shorter string than usual the (borrowed) ring got a little hung up during the 1st and 3rd stages. This caused a very sleight pause instead of the normal flowing movement. No exposure though. The audience may have suspected a move was afoot, but there was no loss of surprise at revelation. I kept things moving and did not lose any entertainment value. The rest of the performances were smooth and successful. I love this routine. There are heaps of fun and magical moments in it. I still need to iron out some of the timing in order to fully exploit these moments. Tyler’s Ring and String is a joy to perform and a great audience participation piece. It was hard for me to learn, but now I will always have a length of string with me for that moment of opportunity.

Who Me?

The past couple of days I have been wondering what someone would think if they stumbled onto this blog. They would find a lot written about a very mundane topic. Me. I can’t imagine it would seem anything but boring and self-indulgent to anyone else. As I mentioned in the first post, this is really just a journal for me. I am trying to move myself up from a hack amateur to a competent sleight-of-hand artist. This requires a lot of self reflection. As a result, the focus of these postings is, well, of my discoveries, thoughts and progress. The rest of my life revolves around my kids, my wife, my students and my church. Writing this blog helps me discern, reflect and track my progress toward my goal. That is the only purpose of this blog. I am not trying to entertain or inform anyone about anything. For some reason I am more likely to journal my progress in this way. A notebook is too easily shoved under the bed or just plain ignored. But with this blog I feel more motivated to write. At any rate, I hope when the Spring arrives and my 36-week task is complete, I can write about magic and those who practice it instead of myself. Until then, if by chance you, person, friend, find yourself reading these words I beg your forgiveness. Please be patient with me. Soon enough I will change the focus away from myself toward magic in general. But for now I must confess these writings are serving the purpose well. I feel myself growing, becoming more self confident and more importantly, a better magician. This is so working for me.


Last August I was tinkering with Jim Tyler’s ring and string routine. (A real beauty). I picked it back up last week and have been trying to work out the rough spots. I planned on performing it the following Friday. By the time Thursday rolled around I had to make a choice. Should I perform the ring and string routine Friday or not. Mechanically, at least, I’ve got it worked out. But I just felt it needed more spit and polish to do it justice. It needed more work so I decided to let ring and string wait until next week. So on Friday I would perform “Card Warp” instead. Card Warp was one of my standards in the old days. The creator of Card Warp, Michael Weber, produces some of the most mind-blowing presentations imaginable. Years ago I devised my own finish to Card Warp. Not that it needed any other finish. But 4 out of 5 times people would make a request when I finished the trick. What I do does not necessarily make Card Warp a better trick. It just suits me better and as a result I get a huge return in entertainment value. So I brought it out of moth balls, as it were, cleaned it up, and added a bit business here and there for cohesiveness sake.



I was hesitant at first because I was afraid I was combining two effects. Card Warp and my own handling of a different effect. A very wise magician warns against doing this. And in my view, it is sound advice. I have never met Patrick Page but he has become my favorite magician. Patrick Page has the style and manner I most aspire to. I have adopted him as my own personal mentor. (Mr. Page had no say so in this matter)! I hope to someday attend one of his lectures or workshops. Until then, his books and other materials are mine to fetish and covet.


I digress. Mr. Page warns against combining effects, and I agree. Yet the response I got from my performances on Friday was astounding. The effect as I performed it seems stronger for me than Card Warp alone. And the finish I've come up with is not really something I would do as a stand alone effect. (Although I suppose one could). In fact, judging by the response I received from 5 different audiences, it may be one of the strongest close-up routines I perform. (Wasn't expecting that)!There is something else too. My handling of Weber’s Card Warp evolved over time. I’m sure I’m not the only one to think of handling Card Warp in this way. I’ll bet there are lots of pros out there that do. It’s just that over time I independently came up with a handling that answered the audience’s inevitable request. It also provides a mighty and totally unexpected wallop.

Since getting back into magic last August I have been working on perfecting my ability to perform classic routines of sleight of hand. I have been working from books by Vernon, Slydini, Hugard, Bobo, and Tarbell to name a few. I am so excited and having a fantastic time of it. But I was beginning to worry that I after so many years away from magic I might have lost my creativity. I’m glad I pushed and trusted myself to perform Card Warp as I visualized it. It really paid off.
If I am really lucky, I’ll get to meet Patrick Page someday. And if I ever do, I’ll perform this routine. I hope he would agree with me that I am not combining two effects so much as bringing a classic effect to a reasonable and entertaining conclusion. In the mean time, as a rule, I promise to never pull coins AND sponge balls from the same bagless purse. Or finish an “Ambitious Card” routine with “Card to Pocket” or “Wallet”.