talkmagic.co.uk

I may be jumping ahead of myself as I'm still waitng for my Coin and card books to arrive and haven't tried any magic as of yet but I want to get on here and chat and discuss!

My question to all you magicians out there is how do you plan your routines??

What factors do you take into account?? Hmm maybe a bit vague a question...

I've got a number of different ways of doing it. Sometimes I'll write a story and base the routine around that story and using tricks that fit with the story.

Sometimes I'll write a routine to music and then I'll look for tricks that ifts in with the mood and pace of the music.

Other times I'll just gather together a load of tricks that I really like and look for ways that they can be linked together.

But what ever I base it on, I always try to start with something that's going to grab an audience's attention. From it's an upwards slope with a dip or two in the middle, depending on the length of the routine to allow the audience to get their breath. Leave the biggest and best for last, but always keep one trick held back for an encore trick in case it's asked for (which sometimes it is and sometimes it isn't).

The most important thing though is that there is a logical progression between the tricks and they're not just a load of random tricks thrown together.

Hope that helps a little

I echo Lady of Mystery's sentiments here and may I also add that it is very important to find magic that suits you as a person.
We as magicians have all been attracted by a demo of a trick and loved it so much we've bought it there and then with little thought of where you would use it and whether it suits us as a performer. I'm only just getting wise to this myself and still afford a slip up on this or two. So it is always good to see yourself first as a performer and then a magician and working the effects around you rather than yourself around the effect.

Lady of Mystery wrote:I've got a number of different ways of doing it. Sometimes I'll write a story and base the routine around that story and using tricks that fit with the story.

Sometimes I'll write a routine to music and then I'll look for tricks that ifts in with the mood and pace of the music.

Other times I'll just gather together a load of tricks that I really like and look for ways that they can be linked together.

But what ever I base it on, I always try to start with something that's going to grab an audience's attention. From it's an upwards slope with a dip or two in the middle, depending on the length of the routine to allow the audience to get their breath. Leave the biggest and best for last, but always keep one trick held back for an encore trick in case it's asked for (which sometimes it is and sometimes it isn't).

The most important thing though is that there is a logical progression between the tricks and they're not just a load of random tricks thrown together.

Hope that helps a little

Interesting! I haven't really thought about it much as it's all new to me and I'm interested in the different aspects of magic

I like the idea performing to music....never thought of that!

greedoniz wrote:I echo Lady of Mystery's sentiments here and may I also add that it is very important to find magic that suits you as a person.
We as magicians have all been attracted by a demo of a trick and loved it so much we've bought it there and then with little thought of where you would use it and whether it suits us as a performer. I'm only just getting wise to this myself and still afford a slip up on this or two. So it is always good to see yourself first as a performer and then a magician and working the effects around you rather than yourself around the effect.

Hmmm another interesting point "very important to find magic that suits you as a person"

I think that I'd be best suited to an impromptu performance with mates or family rather than a pre arranged show?! I don't know really but that's what I can see happening way way way down the line....I can see that even then I would need to plan for that..

Even 'impromtu' stuff needs to be practised and rehearsed to a certain extent.

Mandrake wrote:Even 'impromtu' stuff needs to be practised and rehearsed to a certain extent.

Yeah that's what I thought.....but it sort of seems wierd beacuse it's impromtu

As with all magic the performing but it usually the bit that needs the most practice and thought and often is the most neglected....I've be guilty of that. Probably still am

^^^

[Whispers] Greedo's gone all foreign on us guys - he usually makes much more sense than this [/Whispers]

A nice place to start, which is what I first did. Is to go through what ever book youre using and make a note of all the tricks that you like to perform. Look at them and try to string about 5 together into a routine.

An example of one of my routines is to start with a 4 ace production. When I've got the 4 aces I move onto a trick that uses them (in my case, it's the invisible palm). I then put the aces to one side and have the spec pick a card from the pack, the 4 aces all then turn into the specs card. Eventually the chosen card vanishes from the pack and appears in a seal deck with a different colour back.

They're all pretty nice tricks on their own, but when strung together they work so much nicer.

Lady of Mystery wrote:A nice place to start, which is what I first did. Is to go through what ever book youre using and make a note of all the tricks that you like to perform. Look at them and try to string about 5 together into a routine.

An example of one of my routines is to start with a 4 ace production. When I've got the 4 aces I move onto a trick that uses them (in my case, it's the invisible palm). I then put the aces to one side and have the spec pick a card from the pack, the 4 aces all then turn into the specs card. Eventually the chosen card vanishes from the pack and appears in a seal deck with a different colour back.

They're all pretty nice tricks on their own, but when strung together they work so much nicer.

Cool, sounds really good and well thought out! How long are peoples routines generally and do they contain loads and loads of tricks or do it just depend on the performer??

i worked out what sort of performer i was/am, what skills i wanted to show, and which i wanted to suggest...

then i usually pick a premise, a "what if..", or i see something in a film, or book and say to myself - "hmm, i wonder if that'll work if i changed this that or the other"...

then i just kinda work backwards...

For a beginner I'd say to learn a few self workers which you can perform pretty soon after learning. This will build confidence. Then begin to integrate more complex moves that use sleights.

A word of warning though, do not perform a sleight in front of people until your comfortable with doing them. I made this mistake and it took me a while to build my confidence again. Lay people will notice if your being coy and making suspicious movements.

Oh and try to not learn to many tricks at the minute- no more than 5 I'd say. As it is better to know 5 tricks very well than know 20 quite well.

Other than that have fun, thats the whole point at the end of the day.

this probably won't help at all but as most of my tricks are prop based i lay them out on the bed and put them in an order that flows by visualising the performance and payoff of each trick same as i do when loading my cd's for a party in the order i want to play them.

same with close up i'd probably go scotch and soda, spellbound to half, coins across, coin to pocket, spellbound to gold, strike vanish with haunted key.
haunted key, linking key, silk vanish / transpo to hopping half set.
hope this helps as i usualy by props to compliment each other.

If I ever make sense then this is purely coincedental and I cannot take responsability for such rare occurences