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I was performing with a young lad last night ( I think I'll put this in innuendo bingo myself ) who, while technically brilliant, did not have the first clue how to entertain a crowd.

Some of the stuff he was doing with cards I can only dream of, real knuckle busting moves, but he didn't crack one joke, make eye contact with his spectators or have any interaction with the crowd at all, but just mumbled his way through his 10 minute routine.

At the end of the evening he was buzzing, saying how well it'd had gone! He didn't have a clue that he hadn't actually 'entertained' anyone, he was just pleased that all his moves/flourishes etc had worked!

Is this what to expect from the next generation of magicians, as the only audience most of these kids perform to are down a webcam?

I think this is the sort of thing that comes with experience. I assume that this lad is quite young and hasn't performed for many people.

I know when I first started out, I'd learn the moves but not really have any presentation to go with it. The more he performs for real people the more he'll realise that he's not getting the reactions that he's expecting. When this happens, he'll start to look at what he's missing and with any luck will realise that his performance is off.

I think that with new age technology, yes, some of the entertainment essence of magic may be lost. You can literally find 1000s,maybe even millions of videos on youtube of simple effects, most of which are by kids who haven't practiced and are just trying to get some attention.

However, I think that this topic is alot more beneficial than useless. If you are serious about it, you can gain respect, subscribers and magical knowledge by practicing, posting videos and asking for improvement tips.

And, onece in a while, you come across someone who posts magic onto youtube who are absolutely brilliant and are extremely skilled at what they do. This era is allowing magic to spread to places it hasn't been to before, it is getting more and more popular, reaching out to more audiences and developing more respect.

However, it may be the case that it backfires, with endless 'Tutorials' and 'Explanations' being posted.

about the tutorials and exposures.. so many complaints were made to youtube so a large majority of them have been removed. yey!

Ive been seeing a lot of things on this forum about beginners not learning to practice the presentation and I just wanted to say thank you right now. If I hadnt come here thats probably what Id be doing, sittingat home practicing the moves. But because of TM I have started thinking about presentation even before I buy the effect. So again, thank you

The youtube generation is taking the magic out of magic. Its been said 100 times that people don't really care what they see, its how you make them feel. whatching most of these you tube performances makes me feel dirty. They're going through the motions but have no feeling or passion for what there doing. This world needs less kids trying to impress random strangers by hacking apart tricks, or even skilled card handlers who make a video with some words on the screen, and more story tellers who use tricks to create magic.

Don't be too hard on the youtube kids, most of them are just that, kids. They're doing exactly the same thing that I and alot of others did when we were kids.

Although my stage was the school playground it's not all that different to what these kids are doing. At that age, it's going to be very difficult to get a booking and they can't go into a pub and just start performing. All they're looking for is an audience and youtube provides that.

As they get older, they'll start performing more and more for real people and this is when they'll start to learn the presentation side of things.

I'm sure that my school playground performances were just as lacking in any real presentation as the youtube performances. But as I got older I learnt how important the presentation was and I'm sure that many of these kids wioll learn the same thing.

thats a really interesting way of looking at it. Come to think of it your absolutly right, I was doing the same things back in grade school. I guess its just the larger audience, and the fact that there exposing better tricks then most of the pick a card from one of these three row tricks that I knew when I was 10, that upsets me. Thanks for remiding me of that point of view.

But even in school you were interacting with other people when you were showing your tricks. On youtube there's no interaction at all, so the standard of performance and level of entertainment will inevitably drop

Carlos75, I understand your fears and agree about the 'in your face' yet soullessness (is that a word?) of e-mail etc.
I would however like to point out that this particular young lad in your example may just have been overconcentrating and nervouse. Given time as said in previous answers he may come to a point were he forgets the magic and concentrates on the performance.
As someone who has gone from wooden mechanical performances to (I hope) interacting with audience performances in just the last couple of years I would say that the only way of getting performing/interacting experience is to do it. So the first few shows of mine must have been exactly the same as his, awfull if technically correct.
The funny thing is, it was only when I mucked up on several occasions that I finaly proved to myself and started to belive that it was the interaction and not the magic that mattered (they still enjoyed themselves and I was still alive the next morning ).
He may just need more experience/guidence.

connor o'connor wrote:Carlos75, I understand your fears and agree about the 'in your face' yet soullessness (is that a word?) of e-mail etc.
I would however like to point out that this particular young lad in your example may just have been overconcentrating and nervouse. Given time as said in previous answers he may come to a point were he forgets the magic and concentrates on the performance.
As someone who has gone from wooden mechanical performances to (I hope) interacting with audience performances in just the last couple of years I would say that the only way of getting performing/interacting experience is to do it. So the first few shows of mine must have been exactly the same as his, awfull if technically correct.
The funny thing is, it was only when I mucked up on several occasions that I finaly proved to myself and started to belive that it was the interaction and not the magic that mattered (they still enjoyed themselves and I was still alive the next morning ).
He may just need more experience/guidence.

Pretty much exactly what i told him over a pint after the gig

Carlos75 wrote:But even in school you were interacting with other people when you were showing your tricks. On youtube there's no interaction at all, so the standard of performance and level of entertainment will inevitably drop

I think you're partly right and so is Lady of Mystery.

These kids will probably mature and learn that they need to put much more effort into performing. As far as I'm concerned, the only possible problem is that, unlike some teenager messing around in the playground, the lousy performances and exposure (accidental or deliberate) can be seen (and reseen) by a much larger audience. I'm not convinced this matters much anyway.

I don't think there's a problem for magic. The guy you performed with will soon discover that there's a lot more to it than moves.

There are some excellent points so far in this thread, but one important one that's missing is 'what's the effect on the audience'? What I mean is that although it's probably true that this kid will get better (or, more likely, move on to something else in life) the audience won't necessarily see that. they'll just be left with the impression that 'that's what magic is' which I think is a great shame.

Of course, the same could be said for experienced magicians, who are just not very good. In fact, I worked with someone like that very recently, and I'd rather have worked with one of the 'flourish monkeys'.

The other problem, of course, is that sometimes bad magicians/inexperienced youtubers (let's lump them together for the moment) are not only damaging the public image of magic, they are also taking employment away from those of us who rely on magic as our only, or main, income.

I worked a while ago with a 'youtuber' and I was astonished that the agency I worked through would have booked him, as they have a good reputation. I asked him about it, and he told me that he'd been booked direct by the client since he 'could undercut anyone'. Obviously, this didn't lend to an enthusiastic spirit of collegiality for the rest of the night - espeically as I kept wondering which of my respected peers COULd have been performing - both earniing themselves money AND creating a great buzz about magic among the audience.

Lee

Good points, Lee, but undercutters are not really a result of YouTube. In this case, it was merely further evidence of that guy's degeneration!

Some years ago, Lee Earle wrote about clowns undercutting magicians for kids' parties. Why pay more for a magician, when you can get magic, jokes and face painting for less money?

Perhaps we now have different sorts of clowns.

I always find the direct to the camera videos dull, dull, dull unless it's an effect where a spec doesn't have to be involved. Either way, people's reactions add to the performance overall. It's like a singer performing to no applause.

When I film effects (particularly card ones) I always have a spec there, whether it's someone I know who likes my magic (I always do an effect they've never seen) or a stranger. Part of magic is being able to interact with people to create maximum emotional impact of the effect.

These kids on you tube are not promoting themselves to get bookings. They're just trying to say 'look how clever and great I am'.