talkmagic.co.uk

What with all the big name magic suppliers focusing on card magic and to a lesser extent coin magic I was wondering if people thought that older tricks are being forgotton and wither this was a bad thing or not.

Cards are undoubtable the favourite medium for the magician to show off his skill. Since the invention of the playing card in the victorian era magicians have looked at ways of manipulating them for the entertainment of others. Many famous magicians have built their entire reputation on them. However it isn't until recently, i feel, that the other types of magic are being pushed aside in favour of cards and the tricks they can do. Tricks like the professors nightmare, the rice bowls and even the cups and balls seem to be archived in a "not relevant anymore" file, Coin magic is another medium that seems to have lasted the test of time where others have fallen by the wayside. Gone are the days of the magician on Tv performing classics to the amazement of millions now it's a lot more in your face and MTV style magic that gets the press.

You have to ask yourself tho is this a bad thing? should we be worried at the pace in which classics are being brushed aside? undoubtable the classics can teach us a lot about performance skills and manipulation however people today are far more cynical and likely to be bored with the classic tricks. people are certainly more aware of magic than ever before, more magicians than ever are household names so is it a bad thing that we are dismissing the older forms of magic, replacing it with a fresher approch.

your thoughts as always are very welcome

They're not being forgot and never will be, because as you said, they have withstood the test of time. However pushed aside they may be in this "street magic time", "Street magic" will not withstand the test of time and will die out, in a year, in 2, or in 20, it will die out and people will be once again focusing stage and parlour magic, and will be coming back to Cups and balls, coins, and still cards for close up.

And the thing is, the magicians who believe that street magic is taking over stage magic and that audiences preferr cards is completely wrong. Audiences enjoy both, and enjoy them both equally. With street magic (which I believe is the "hip" word to call close-up magic) the audience is unprepared for what is about to happen to them, and connect you to everything they've seen on TV and thought was fake. And with stage magic, they come to see you and are in a relaxed and prepared state of mind. Ready to be amazed by the first effect you perform. And are generally a "good" audience. I just worked a festival yesterday (just thought I should mention it was my third show ) and when I asked for a volunteer I had about 40 kids jumping up with their hands waving and begging to come up...you'd never be able to do something like that doing street magic.

So basically the point is (which I have horribly tried to explain in the above paragraph which I rewrote sevral times) audiences like both forms of magic, and because they like both, stage magic will never die out. Audiences also like everything in both catagories of stage and close-up and will not care what-so-ever what you perform, whether it be cups and balls, cards, coins, silks, dove acts, escape acts, ANYTHING as long as they are amazed. Cards seem to be what magicians are now wanting to utilize the most because that is what they believe the audiences like the most, but soon enough, when they get good enough to the point that they'll start doing shows professionally, they will realize that the audiences just want to be amazed, and that showing them 10 consecutive card tricks will not accomplish that. Hopefully I've made some of the members on here (although I do not know many anymore as I was gone for a while) "see the light" and realize, that you CAN do cups and balls, that you CAN do the cut and restored rope, that you CAN do a coins across routine, and still get good, even great reactions from the audience.

Best of whishes to everyone who managed to sift through that awful post of mine and make some sense of it ,

~Magically Dave

I'd say they're not being forgotten. Derren Brown is currently touring with a Q+A act, table lifting/turning etc.

I'm guessing the only person who said yes buys all of his/her effects from David Blaine/Criss Angel types.

Mandrake, can you give me the IP of the person who voted yes please .

Honestly though, whoever voted yes, please justify your reasoning for choosing yes; I promise, for the most part, that we won't bite Heck, you may just have some semi-good reasoning for it that we should all hear.

~Magically Dave

The classics will never die. Paul Potassy got standing ovations from inebriated audiences at 2am in the morning in European night clubs. He did Sympathetic Silks, the Razor Blade trick, the Torn and Restored newspaper and many others.

well said. A classic never dies.

They just get revamped and made more modern or different handlings are developed. The majority of effects are re-worked or originated from an earlier idea or effect.

When you consider Scarne on Card Tricks, Practical Mental Magic, 13STM, RRTCM, etc. are all still in print, and how Ellusionist "repackage" classics for top dollar, it's clear that older tricks are still going strong.

I don't think that any of the old classics are being killed off. Card magic has been around for hundreds of years, much further back than the victorian era. And many of the techniques and slieghts uses today date back to the beginning.

There is a trend towards close up and cards at the moment but it's a just a trend. These things tend to go full circle and in 10 years or so, there might well be a post on here about how the old classic card tricks are dying out in favour of these new fangled stage illusions.

Mopst of the tricks around today are just a new, repackaged version of something much older.

Many of the classics are so old that modern audiences have never seen them - so they're new.

When did you last see the egg bag on TV, for example?

Have a flip through Tarbell for more "new" ideas than you can use in a lifetime.

Barry

John Lennahan apparently has a large sign on his wall which reads: 'Classics are classics for a reason' which says it all for me.

magicofthemind wrote:Many of the classics are so old that modern audiences have never seen them - so they're new.

When did you last see the egg bag on TV, for example?

Have a flip through Tarbell for more "new" ideas than you can use in a lifetime.

Barry

I think this lends weight to the idea of buying a good book and learning the underlying tool kit for producing effects. You only need one book covering your field of interest and plenty of time to study and practice. The list of tools available slowly expands, but like the OED, never contracts.

Older tricks are being forgotten?

That's Ellusionist rapidly going out-of-business then (Joking, obviously!)

Figo wrote:. Gone are the days of the magician on Tv performing classics to the amazement of millions now it's a lot more in your face and MTV style magic that gets the press...

You have to ask yourself tho is this a bad thing?

Well yes it is.
maybe the new breed of "mtv" magicians are driving out the "gentlemen" magicians of old. i would imagine it would be a lot harder for the latter to get the tv gig these days, the old gent in a waistcoat can perform amazing sleights and make things appear, disappear, transform and levitate . but the mtv dude in his tight jeans and t-shirt can pull his own eye out with a fork (and then sell the gimmick on ellusionist for a fortune), thats what's going to get the veiwers so he's the on that gets the gig.
there is a lot less magic on tv altogether these days and this has to be bad, but i suppose thats another point. i for one would love to see not just more magic on tv but more magic that aims for wonder rather than just shock.