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I've just been revisting some of my DVD's, particularly Daryls Encyclopedia Of Card Sleights. He mentions it briefly in one of his intros but does not teach or show it. It started me pondering the merits of the Classic Pass compared with other methods of controling a card. I have to admit my pass is average at best, partly due to lack of practice and I tend to rely on shuffle controls or cuts. I wonder if it's worth the practice to master. Even mastered you still have to watch your angles. I have spoken to other amateurs and it seems like mastering the Pass is almost like a symbol of status.

Any Opinions ?

Head. Wall. Bang!

The classic pass can be used to control a card to the top of the deck (or bottom, or even middle). Very rarely is it the best way to control a single card.

Sometimes the most efficient method of acheiving an effect involves passing the deck (see The Smiling Mule or Pass at Red by Roy Walton). Logically, executing a pass is the only way to do this. But if you don't need to pass the deck, why learn a pass? Status doesn't come into it.

A pass does not do the same thing as shuffles or cuts.
A pass does not do the same thing as shuffles or cuts.

(Can we make this a sticky?)

Easy Tiger !
I'm just interested in everyones opinion....I can see you have very strong feelings...I actually agree with you that I can see no point using a pass to control a single card when there are so many more ways to do it

Point taken. Sorry.

I learned recently that the best way to do the pass is by misdirection. that's my 2 cents. Now, I don't obsess over it as much.

A larger action covers a smaller one!!

Do the pass as you swing round towards the spectator and extend your arms out at the same time as if to turn attention to the deck. But by then its done. Under such big motions it is undetectable

I concur with the above. The pass is a very useful tool and has many applications but if you're just after controls there's easier ways of going about it.

Having said that I use the pass in a lot of my card routines and I never ever get caught even though I'm not the best at it because I've found various ways of misdirecting in each of the tricks that make sense within the structure of the routine. For me the major benefit is that as far as they're concerned you've never done anything 'funny' with the deck, there's no cuts or anything that they can backtrack to in order to work out how you might have found their card. It's not a move for everyone but learning it will be a definite advantage.

I, too, use the pass when I don't strictly need to, or when other methods would work as well. Sometimes it helps with pacing. You don't have to draw any attention to it and you don't have to mess with anything. Like bronz said, the deck remains un-funnied.

I've also not run into much trouble with misdirection for the pass. If it's a small group or a single person, I drop the deck to just above waist level, get general eye contact, and pass mid-sentence. My voice covers any accidental noise, which I'm getting better at. My angles are covered, and nobody is looking that way anyway.

I feel it's a good utility move to have in your repetoire. It can be employed in situations that other moves bog down.

hermann pass...genius...i much prefer that to the classic...

i don't use the pass. becasue im not very good at it, and my hands are quite petite. i use the turnover pass, i feel more safe with this type of pass because you don't have to worry about angles TO much and the whole motion is covered by your hands.

but i only do this if i have to, i like shuffles and cuts. i think "fancy" cuts make it look as if te card has truelly been lost in the deck and decreases suspicion.
but.. at the end of the day...what ever floats ya boat

Mikey.666 wrote: i only do this if i have to, i like shuffles and cuts.

I'm the opposite. Though I too have girlishly tiny hands, the pass just came naturally to me. And that's all it is, I reckon: what you feel best using. The method that feels most comfortable, natural, and unrisky to you will be best because of those very facts because they'll make your performance natural, comfortable and free of the terror of being caught doing the move. As for anyone who says that the pass is the 'mark of eliteness' or something, then they'd probably need to explain how my pass is perfectly (ahem) passable - and was almost from the first time I tried it - yet my DL is visible from the moon.

Pass the deck LIGHTLY. Lots of passes I've seen try and flip quickly, doing massive pinky movements and rapid zaps, trying to make the pass happen as fast as possible.

However, a nice S L O W and G E N T L E pass is very unlikely to be spotted, especially under misdirection.

Immediately after a pass, my new little move is to rotate the deck 180 in my palm (keeping it face or back down). ALWAYS do all this without looking at the deck.

After all, maintaining eye contact with a spectator is the ideal moment's misdirection, as you KNOW the speccy isn't looking at the deck.

seige wrote:Immediately after a pass, my new little move is to rotate the deck 180 in my palm (keeping it face or back down). ALWAYS do all this without looking at the deck.

This is similar to Sankey's habit of performing an all-round square-up after executing the pass. I've tried this and it works well. I keep oscillating between using this kind of cover and periods of passing without any superfluous motion (riffle, dribble, jiggle or squaring) to catch the eye. I think I like the latter better because it gives more of a feel of simplicity and elegance. Then again I have a more subdued personality when performing tricks so I think that way is a better fit for me.