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Hi all,

I'm planning on doing a memory demonstration for a presentation next month and I've been working on the peg system and can get to around 50 objects now. I want to give the thing a good ending, so if anyone has any ideas on an effective way to end a memory demo, I'd love to hear it.

I've decided to go straight through the list one by one, then do it backward, then have people name numbers and tell them what word corresponds.

To end, I'm thinking of either showing a prediction of either a part of or the whole list or having someone think of a word and braingame/burstbubble reveal it. Both have interesting implications.

I wouldn't do that last bit in your last paragraph. Keep it a memory demonstration not a trick.

The way to end the memory demonstration is to deliberately struggle to get one right. Make it always the same one every show, say number 13 for example. After going through the numbers backwards (this is the best way to finish) struggle with number 13 and then say "we'll come back to that later". Now after doing the backwards bit say "let me see if I can do the one I was struggling with" and then announce number 13 and show you got it right after all.

It is the same psychology as a circus juggle not being able to do some difficult trick then finally succeeding.

Incidentally don't do 50 objects. You will bore the hell out of people if you do that. 20 to 25 is more than enough. A superb showman might get away with 30 but I doubt it somehow. I have done it with 20 and that is plenty.

mark lewis wrote:I wouldn't do that last bit in your last paragraph. Keep it a memory demonstration not a trick.

The way to end the memory demonstration is to deliberately struggle to get one right. Make it always the same one every show, say number 13 for example. After going through the numbers backwards (this is the best way to finish) struggle with number 13 and then say "we'll come back to that later". Now after doing the backwards bit say "let me see if I can do the one I was struggling with" and then announce number 13 and show you got it right after all.

It is the same psychology as a circus juggle not being able to do some difficult trick then finally succeeding.

Incidentally don't do 50 objects. You will bore the hell out of people if you do that. 20 to 25 is more than enough. A superb showman might get away with 30 but I doubt it somehow. I have done it with 20 and that is plenty.

Thanks!

I was just saying my capacity is 50 right now. I was planning on 30, but if you think 25 is good, I'm sure you're right. And thanks again for the idea of struggling. Definitely workable with the presentation I'm going to do.

While I do use mnemonics as a method to effects, the concept of 'memory demonstrations' isn't congruent with my character so I don't perform them but I have to agree with Mark about 'struggling'.

Rattling off 20something memorised objects is always going to be an impressive feat, it lacks drama. Struggling to recall the order, partway through adds a moment of dramatic tension for the audience.
I can't take credit for the following analogy, I may have read it here or in a book or heard it discussed on a DVD:
Think of a circus tightrope walker. He/she is may be more than capable of jaunting back and forth across that suspended rope all night long, but that moment in the middle where they pause, falter and the audience gasps or holds its breath gives them the dramatic tension, that "Is he going to do it?" moment.
A memory demonstration really is the mentalist's tightrope act.

When I do this, I like to keep to 10 objects and then teach the audience a memory system and have one of them perform the same feat. My finisher is to explain how I wondered at how many things could be memorised using the system, going on to demonstrate how I've memorised the 50,000 entries in the phonebook.

It makes a nice ending, you demonstrate something impressive but then go on to teach how it's done. That give a nice bit of believability to the last piece, which in truth is nothing more than a dressed up booktest.

I would end by offering to recite the alphabet backwards. Then I would turn away from the crowd and go A B C. After I get the laugh (or groan) I would turn back to the audience and go Z Y X...

Don't end on a trick. It would demean what went before.

Surely it depends on how that trick's presented, if it's a believeable memory feat and doesn't come across as a trick then I'd say it's fine.

I used to do this memory act years ago. I got the idea from watching the Great Masoni and Shan. Masoni was Eric Mason (not the boon gimmick one) and Shan was his wife. They did a great memory act. She would sit there blindfolded and do the memory stuff. He would do the talking and write the words on a blackboard.

I liked this act but didn't want to carry a blackboard around with me but then Walt Lees told me that it wasn't necessary anyway. He just recommended that I give a notepad to someone in the audience and they would record the items. I was sceptical thinking a blackboard was far more spectacular but it worked amazingly well. I would simply keep referring back to the audience member to confirm the objects and numbers. I used 20 items and found that sufficient.

I worked with a girl who did the memorising. I didn't have a wife like Masoni did but an agent told me he could fix me up with an assistant who was used to performing. I thought he was referring to a dancer or something but it turned out to be a lady wrestler! An attractive girl but a wrestler nevertheless!

She did the memorising and I did the talking. I still remember that some idiot in the audience would always shout out "knickers" as an object to be written down. Not once in a single performance was this object not called. I suppose it shows the mentality of the people I was working to then.

I remember (no pun intended) that the slowest part of the act was getting the objects called out. This is the bit where you have to use the utmost showmanship to make sure the act doesn't drag. It is also a good argument for using 20 objects rather than 30 or even 25. I did know a character called Frank Rea who did 25 quite successfully but I certainly wouldn't do more than that.

We did the act quite successfully for a while but then my assistant had to go to India of all places on a long wrestling contract so that was the end of that. I tried to do the act on my own but that ended in disaster after one night I could only remember 14 of the 20 objects. Alas talking while memorising was beyond my powers. I am no Harry Lorayne I am afraid.

On occasions through the years I tried to revive the act but never found a good assistant again. And I also got deafer over the years and couldn't hear the bloody items being called from the audience.

I do look back with nostalgia over this act and it was quite successful and unusual for as long as it lasted.

I would reiterate not doing the trick suggested as it could look as if the whole thing was somehow preorganised and not a true memory feat which it actually is. In fact this demonstration will stand on its own very well without dragging it out with a trick. Keep any trick out. You don't need it.

And let me go over the sequence I used. The sequence you mention in your post sounds a trifle anti-climatic.

First after the objects were written down I would ask for someone to give me a number between one and twenty. The girl (who was blindfolded adding to the drama) gave the correct object. We did this a few times and then I would do it in reverse asking for objects to be called out a few times and she would give the correct number. Then we would finish off by telling the audience that she would now rattle off all the numbers and they could choose either forwards or backwards. They would always choose backwards. She would rattle them off quite quickly but struggle on number 13 even though she knew perfectly well what it was. And then after naming all the items I would ask her to try to do number 13 again. She would try hard and then get it. And this was a great applause cue.

On the rare occasion when she genuinely couldn't remember an object I turned it into a comedy thing. I would go and openly peek at the pad or actually remember the item myself. Or of course if using a blackboard all I would have to do was look at the item on the board. Then I would make a comedy code thing out of it. I did it impromptu and out of the top of my head as an ad lib. For example if the object was television I would say "I have seen someone do this on television" and really emphasise the word "television". She would then be reminded of the object and say it, thus getting a laugh.

I had to be pretty quick witted to come up with something funny as an obvious code but at least I didn't have to do it too often since this girl was pretty sharp at the memory work. In fact she was the only assistant I could find that was able to do the thing well so the act eventually disappeared.

Anyway I hope my observations on this might help someone who wants to do a memory act. You rarely see this nowadays. It would fit in well to a corporate mentalism show even nowadays.

hmmmmm that's a really interesting post, Mark. It's made me wonder if my phonebook stunt is really needed in my routine afterall. Next time I do it, I might drop the boktest and jazz up the item recollection part, see how that goes.

Well, bear in mind the memory act runs around 15 minutes so you may not need a lot of extra material anyway.

I did at one time try this act with Michael Close's wife who used to work for me. She hated doing the act and said it put too much pressure on her. I suppose having to remember 20 objects in public can be a bit of an awesome responsibility. However, she did come up with a brilliant idea which I have never tried.

I think this might be quite an awesome thing to do in a hypnosis show if there was some way of presenting it in such a way that it does not drag. Hypnotists have to be very fast paced once the action gets going.

You have a stooge in the audience that you have trained to do the memory trick. You get them on stage during the hypnosis show and they play along with all the skits in a moderate way. You don't want them to stand out as a particularly good subject and draw attention to them. They are just good enough to be kept on stage but they don't go as crazy as some of the other genuine subjects do.

Then as a grand finale to the show you chatter about how memory can be improved under the power of hypnosis. You "hypnotise" the stooge and he or she does the memory demonstration. I reckon this could create a sensation for the right person.

There are ways I have thought of to speed up the action. It would involve having a blackboard or easel on stage and whenever you dismiss a volunteer from the stage as a bad subject you make them write 5 objects on the board at random while the hypnosis show continues. If you send off three or four people like this the each time asking them to write down five objects at random a lot of the slow stuff can be out of the way before you get to the memory climax.

Anyway, this is just a thought for what it is worth. I have never done it but I suspect it could work well.

Perhaps that's it, perhaps I'm rushing through the first part of my routine and not performing it to it's potential which is why I feel I need the second part.

I'll have to go away and give it some thought, see what I can do with it.

I think the big question is:
-- Are you intending to do a straight, honest demonstration of memory skills and mnemonic systems (say, for a presentation at school or work) and just want to make it more interesting to watch?
-- Or are you doing a mentalism show where anything goes as to procedure, and the apparent result is all that counts?

Because there are some good apparent memory effects out there, if that's what you're after. "Deep Sea Digits" springs immediately to mind.

One of the most entertaining memory acts I've seen was a comedian who'd memorised all the area codes for the country. Doesn't sound that exciting, but he did a lot with it. Plenty of jokes about each area and chatting with people about whether they'd lived in these areas.