Profitable Performances Newsletter
May 2007
In This Issue:
1) New Book
2) Children's Magic: Visual vs Concept Tricks
3) Marketing Benefitss
4) Next Movie
5) MagicBase News
New Book: BAM! The Complete Course for the Borrowed And Memorized Deck
You are going to think this is the dumbest idea for a book OR you're going to think this is the greatest: My brand new book teaches you how to secretly memorize cards while performing other tricks. You can do some amazing tricks by just memorizing 4 or 5 cards in the deck. But you can do even more amazing tricks if you memorize more. The system that I teach makes it as fast and easy as memorizing could be. (I use this same system to memorize an entire deck in 5 minutes for my Super-Memory Demos. That means that I know the numerical location of every card in the deck. It's true!)
If you don't think you can do this, but you'd like to, then send me an email, and I'll send you a free chapter from my book. Send emails to Get@MemoryMagic.info.
Performing Tip:
Children's Magic: Visual vs Concept Tricks
I've been a full-time magician for 15 years, but it is only recently that I really understood what I'm about to tell you here. Here's something that happened to me:
I wanted to created a secondary birthday party show for repeat customers. So, I took what tricks I had available to make the new show. I didn't really know for sure how it would go, but I thought that I'd try it out. The first (and last) time that I performed this particular show, one of the kids said "This is boring!"
Well, I've never had a kid say that during a show before so it made me really re-examine the show. And I decided the kid was right about part of the show.
I had three tricks that I thought would be good choices:
1) I had a Prediction Trick. A child selects a face, and the face appears on this board.
2) I had a Transposition Trick that was too clever. I had two scarves: a red one with the word "Red" printed on it and a white one with the word "White" printed on it. After some difficulty in trying to get the scarves to change places, it looks like I failed, until I show that the "red" and the "white" WORDS changed places.
3) I had another Prediction Trick. One child picks a color, another picks a number which represents a color, and they match.
Now that I'm listing these here, the errors are completely obvious. But when I was planning, I didn't see it. Here's the problems:
They are all CONCEPT tricks, not VISUAL. Probably all prediction tricks are concept tricks. They are the type in which the magician is basically saying "I knew what you were going to pick, and this proves it..."
I think that most prediction tricks are bad choices for children. Kids need to SEE the magic, not to THINK about it. Now, I was thinking, "Well the kids can see that this face and this face are the same." That isn't what I mean by "kids need to see the magic." If the trick was designed so that one face visually changed into another, then that might be a good trick for kids.
So, I made the mistake of choosing two prediction tricks in one show. (One way to avoid this is to use MagicBase, and have all of your tricks categorized so that you can instantly see that you're doubling up on similar Trick Types. Although, I always use MagicBase to plan my show, I simply ignored the trick types. And, as a result, my show suffered.)
Finally, the colors-coincidence trick is almost like a prediction trick and, therefore, has the same inherent problems as other prediction tricks.
Now, I'm not saying that all concept tricks are bad choices for kids. I'm just saying:
1) You need to realize what is a concept trick
2) You probably shouldn't do more than one concept trick in a kid's show.
I really learned something. In fact, before this I had never even heard of the term 'concept trick.' But I think that it is something that every kids performer needs to be aware of.
Marketing Tips:
I just saw a great ad. It was an ad that sold BENEFITS. And if you want the benefits it offers, then this ad will catch your attention. It was for Special K cereal.
In the past, they caught my attention with the ad that said "The prize is inside." That was a great slogan, it really made the point.
But, in their newest ad, the slogan is "A slimmer waist in every box. The prize is inside." This was even better because it sold a very specific benefit: a slimmer waist.
The ad is the best. They aren't selling cereal; they're selling a smaller waist. Brilliant!
Fun Box : Next Movie
By the time that you read this, you will have already seen the movie "Next"- if you had any interest in seeing it. This note is for you if you haven't seen the movie yet: SEE IT! It is an excellent movie.
Speaking of Concept tricks (from above)- I really like movies that have a great concept: A central, simple idea that is extrapolated into all possible permutations. Next is such a movie. The character played by Nicholas Cage has the very limited ability to see 2 minutes into his future. Not anyone else's future, just his.
I've listed this movie review here because he uses his ability to perform as a magician in a lousy lounge act at a casino in Las Vegas. There is no magic to speak of in this movie. He's a lousy magician in a lousy act. And he's doing it on purpose because he doesn't want to draw too much attention to himself- because people are looking for him.
Anyway, that's the first few minutes of the movie. I'd probably list this movie review even if he didn't hide out as a magician though because it is so excellent. If you don't like Concept Tricks or Concept Movies, then you'll only LIKE this movie because it has plenty of action, and a nice love story. But if, like me, you do like Concept Tricks or Concept Movies, then you'll LOVE this movie.
MagicBase News:
Did you know that there are hundreds of owners of MagicBase in 10 different countries around the world? Here's a comment from a long-time MagicBase owner:
"I really like it, and have been using it for some time...Thank you again for a great product!" - Melanie Stark
MagicBase Tip: Sorting Tricks in the Routines Screen
The Routines Screen is where you can list every trick that you perform. But it is just an alphabetical listing of tricks. It doesn't separate the Close-Up tricks from the Stage tricks.
But I like to keep them separated, it makes it easier to find a trick when I'm planning a close-up show. So, I list all of my close-up tricks with the letters "CU-" in front of them. Then they all appear together in the alphabetical list, and it makes them easier to find.
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