McBride Magic TV

Who’s got two thumbs and has a monthly spot on Jeff McBride’s McBride Magic TV? This guy, that’s who! Every Monday, there is a new live episode of McBride Magic TV. The first Monday of each month is a free episode hosted by Jeff McBride. In the past, Bryce Kuhlman hosted a review segment on the show. He has officially retired, and I’ve taken over the spot. Once a month, I’ll be reviewing a product in my segment called “Gems and Rubble.” Check out past episodes at the link above.

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I’m an avid journal-writer-in-er . . . particularly when it comes to things magical. The problem is that sometimes I write down something that I heard/saw/read somewhere else. I write it down with the intention of using it in my own work . . . maybe a move that I learned in a book, or a premise I read about somewhere, etc. Sometimes it’s a principle I learned that I want to apply to my performance.

Most times, however, the things I write down are ideas and brainstorms that I had myself. Sometimes, when I read the entry a year later, I don’t remember which is which. This month we’ll be dealing with one of those unknown items. In my defense, however, I will say that this particular thing was recorded as a notepad entry on my iPhone from over a year ago. Typically the only reason I record something in my iPhone rather than my paper tangible journal is because I’m out and about or it’s the middle of the night and I wake up with an idea.

I used to write my middle of the night ideas in the paper journal, but I found that often I couldn’t read my own handwriting the next morning, so I’ve switched to typing for those cases. Here’s the point: the fact that it was in my iPhone dramatically increases the odds that it was an original idea of my own and not one I heard elsewhere. Typically when I watch DVDs or read magic books, etc., my journal is right there with me.

Anyway, having said all that, enjoy this probably original, but possibly stolen idea.

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Back in the day before I had children (nearly 20 years ago), I used to keep a pack of cigarettes in the house to practice cigarette magic. I had a lot of friends who smoked, so I bought what turned out to be one of my favorite magic books, The Encyclopedia of Cigarette Tricks By Keith Clark. I don’t smoke so a lot of the effects were ones I couldn’t do because they required lighting and smoking cigarettes, but there were still tons of moves and vanishes and effects that could be done with unlit cigarettes.

I had a lot of fun messing with my friends and doing some pretty cool cig magic. Then int 1995, along comes my beautiful baby girl Courtney. No longer do I wish to have cigarettes in the home. What I did have in the home that I didn’t before having children was crayons. And it just so happens that they’re about the exact same size as cigarettes. Chalk is also another good substitute. So I started practicing cig moves at home with Crayons. Then when hanging with my friends, I would apply the moves to their cigs. It was a sweet solution.

One day, it occurred to me that I could actually apply these moves to the crayons themselves not as a means to practice for cig magic, but as a means to practice crayon magic. Suddenly, I could show my daughter some cool effects when she was old enough to appreciate them. Over the years, I’ve done “cig” magic with restaurant crayons for my friends, family, waitresses and others. I’ve done crayon magic for my old children show I used to so. I’ve done crayon magic for the young children church in their nursery and primary classes.

So what’s this month’s free trick . . . well, it’s not quite a trick, but rather a suggestion that ultimately will result in many tricks. Go pick up a copy of The Encyclopedia of Cigarette Tricks and buy yourself a box of crayons and go to town.

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Larry Hass Reviews Stone Frixion Fire

At this point, you’re probably aware (since I announced it in a separate email) that Larry Hass, Ph.D. gave a glowing review of my Frixion book. You can view that review by clicking on the video icon. In honor of his glowing review I’m offering a 33% discount on the e-book that expires this Wednesday (9/14/11). Check it out here: Stone Frixion Fire

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I say it’s a process. Sometimes it requires a little bit of both.

Root:

Let’s remember our roots. This month’s root: Master Your Craft. To some degree, this relates with this month’s issue of No Stone Left Unturned. It’s about quality vs. quantity. In order to master your craft, you have to fine tune continuously. How does purchase vs. polish come into play? My take is that you’ll need to do both rather than settling for one over the other. There may come a time when you can finally “arrive” and no longer have to purchase, but for the most part, I think it’s a constant battle. Also, keep in mind that “purchase” in this case can be meant literally as in actually buying a new trick, but it also represents adding new tricks to your repertoire rather than polishing ones that you already do.

Here’s how I see it: as you begin to polish, you’ll discover that you no longer like certain effects being in your repertoire. At that stage of the polish, you’ll need to purge and “purchase.” Sometimes there comes a point where you’ve tried to polish an effect for years, then one day you just come to terms with the fact that just like Beavis said, “You can’t polish a turd.” You have to purge. Don’t be afraid of it. If you have the courage, ask my good friend Diamond Jim Davis about his love/hate relationship with the Drill Bit O’ Death. Do so, however, at your own risk.

As you grow in the art, you further begin to understand what’s “you” and what’s “poo.” Sorry about all the crappy metaphors. As you learn more about yourself as a performer, purge or polish. As you purge . . . you’ll begin to purchase and polish again.

Branch:

Let’s build our branches. Your challenge for the next 30 days is to practice the art of Polish, Purchase and Purge. Look at your repertoire. Decide which effects you like, and work on polishing them. Improve the script, the posture, the presentation, the patter, etc. Work on creating focus moments in the performance. As you go through your effects, be open-minded to the possibility that it may be time to put away the strolling liver production . . . it’s just not you . . . you’re more of a kidney guy. So purge it, and either decide to have one less routine in your repertoire, or decide to purchase . . . thus the cycle begins again. The cycle, of course, that will keep your magic repertoire streamlined and much more “you” than “poo.”

Now go study the classics, and go discover your true magical self.

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Have you ever read a novel then later watched the movie? What happens? One thing that’s happened to me is that the actor portraying the character in the movie does not look anything like I imagined the person when reading the book. Have you ever seen a radio talk show host or disk jockey for the first time after listening to him/her for several weeks/months/years? The same thing happens. Why is this? The answer is simple, we as humans have vivid imaginations. When we read, first of all the details are much deeper than they might be in a movie.

How many of you have read any of the following books, before watching the movie:

• Da Vinci Code  (Dan Brown)
• Harry Potter (J.K. Rowling)
  
• Contact (Carl Sagon)
• Timeline (Michael Crichton)

As always, many parts from the book didn’t make it into the movie. Why? Time constraints is, of  course, a big one. However, something that people often don’t think about is that some of the details found in the book are very difficult to translate to film. When writing technical manuals such as a magic book, there are pros and cons to book vs. video.

On the one hand, it’s very valuable to see an effect performed. On the other hand, when you watch it, you often end up duplicating the mannerisms and exact tone, patter, etc. of the performer you are watching. It never quite becomes your own.

Take a look at the two videos below. The first one is my performance of Jacked Up on Jay Sankey’s Underground Jam. The second one is someone else performing Jacked Up. Watch mine first. Then watch the second one. Pay close attention to the patter:

Don’t get me wrong. It’s flattering to see a post of someone doing my material. However, the unfortunate thing is that he is performing it as me, not himself. Back in the good ol’ days when books were all the rage, you would have to come up with your own presentation, and you would have to work much harder to learn the material. I’m all for learning stuff faster and easier, but sometimes things are better left for the written word.

Rather than try to convince you that DVDs are bad (they’re not), I’m going to try to convince you that books are good (they are). Both media have their place. It has been my experience, and probably yours to, that reading is and should be a visual experience. So those who are visual learners, no worries, reading is visual. Before reading the Root and the Branch, I should mention that I’m indebted to Clay Neves for the super clever title of this article.

Root:

Let’s remember our roots. This month’s root: Reading. I just watched the whole 6 DVD set of Malone Meets Marlo By Bill Malone. They were brilliant, and it was great to see someone else doing Marlo’s work. However, the funny (maybe even ironic) thing is that watching these DVDs got me motivated to go back and re-read all of my Marlo stuff. There are some serious Gems in there gang.

Remember, remember that reading stimulates the brain on so many levels. It’s a visual experience. It gets your imagination going. It sparks creativity. One of the questions I get asked a lot is how do I create magic. One of the main answers I give is that I read . . . A LOT. I read magic books, computer books, religious books and novels. The more reading you do, the more open your mind will become and thus the more receptive you are to ideas.

Branch:
Let’s build our branches. Your challenge for the month is simple. Go buy a magic book. If time are tough, dig through your old magic books (or borrow one from a fellow magi). Either way, get your hands on a magic book that you’ve never read before, or that you haven’t read in at least 3 years. Then READ IT! I’ll shut up now, so you can read.

Now go study the classics, and go discover your true magical self.

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We’ve all read magic books and/or watched magic DVDs. We’ve even been impressed enough by some of the material to try to add it to our arsenal. Often, however, magicians rush into performing new material. You definitely need to perform for a real audience as part of fine-tuning your skills. However, you also must carefully practice and study the material before presenting it.

What follows is a modified excerpt from my E-Book, Stone Cold Magic, which happens to be on sale right now. 

Root:
Let’s remember our roots. The root is honor your craft by putting in your time to master the moves and the effect before performing for real audiences. This can be broken down into 8 steps. These steps are referring to reading a book, but you can see how you could easily modify them for a DVD:

1. Muddle through the book
2. Read the book
3. Learn the Mechanics
4. Pick the effects you like
5. Technically master the chosen effects
6. Develop your presentation
7. Create your routine
8. Perform for real audiences

Branch:
Let’s build our branches. Let’s take the theory of reading a book and put it into action. What follows is a detailed break down of each step. You goal for the next 30 days is to pick a book or a DVD that has a handful of tricks that you would possibly consider adding to your “bag o’ tricks.’ Pick just one book/DVD and follow the steps below.

Step One: Muddle through the book.
You’ve already done this.  You read parts and tried some of the moves, and you looked at some of the pictures.  You got out your cards and coins and hankies, and you played around and read part of or all of the book.  That’s step one; just get through it.

Step Two: Read the book.
You may have already done step two, but probably not.  Simply read the book from cover to cover.  Look at the illustrations as you go, but don’t even touch a deck of cards or coins or hankies.  Just read and try to make sense of what you’re reading by looking at the pictures.  Don’t turn the page until you understand everything you’ve read on the page you are reading. Step two is just read it.

Step Three:  Learn the Mechanics.
This is the most time consuming and difficult step of the process.  Read each effect, and walk through the moves and sleights until you understand them completely.  Once you understand how to do the moves and sleights for the effect, continue practicing them until you can do the entire effect from setup to cleanup (start to finish) without referring to the book. Once you can do the effect 5 or 10 times in a row without the use of the book, move on to the next effect.  Step three is to learn the mechanics.

Step Four:   Pick the effects you like.
Once you can do all of the effects mechanically, without referring to the book, then you will choose the effects that you like the most.  This can be based on how challenging the effect will be to master, how powerful you perceive the effect to be, how long it takes to perform, how easily “reset-able” it is, or a variety of other reasons.  Go through the book, and find the ones that match your style and personality.  Step four is to pick your effects.

Step Five:  Technically master the chosen effects.
In step three, you memorized each effect, but you have not mastered each effect. Even if you think you have, you haven’t.  This step is where you will master the selected effects you liked.  Simply practice the mechanics of the effect until you are ready to puke.

You must constantly practice the mechanics of the effect until you can do it without looking (literally without looking).  Have one of your magic friends or family members observe you mechanically perform the effect without looking.  When you show them the effect, tell them that you are just practicing in front of them and not to expect any kind of presentation.

Just keep doing this until everything flows well and feels smooth and perfect.  Then you move on to the next effect that you have chosen and repeat this step again until you have finished with all of your selected effects.  Step five is master the motions.

Step Six:  Develop your presentation.
When I was new to the magic field, I was a master technician.  I could do all of the sleights and moves and I new thousands of effects.  I interviewed Bill Malone for a job at a magic restaurant in Florida and was turned down because I had no personality.  I’ve since learned how to develop a presentation to improve my magic.  In fact I’ve spent so much time on this, that I’ve lost a bit of my technical skill, but trust me the audience remembers the presentation, not the technical skill.

This step is probably the most important, and it’s fairly simple.  The other steps before this are a lot of hard work and practice.  This part however, is simply to figure out what you are going to say and meld it into your already perfected mechanical presentation.

Figure out what you want the story to be and fit it into the effect.  Then practice the heck out of “presenting” while doing the effect.  Then practice the entire effect in front of your guinea pigs that you’ve been using through out the book.  Once you’ve mastered an effect with presentation, then move on to the next effect.  Step six present your presentation.

Step Seven:  Create your routine.
At this point, you should have pretty nearly perfected about 5 or so effects.  What you will find is that almost every effect whether in this book or another can give you a lead into another effect.  Sometimes you have to get creative and come up with a transition, but generally speaking you’ll be able to link at least half (if not, all) of the effects that you’ve chosen from this book.

Link them together, and then work on the one liners that you may need to transition from one to the next.  Once you’ve put them together, practice them to death and test them on your guinea pigs.  In this step, you may find that you’ll want to add other effects that you already know and mix them in with the ones you’ve chosen from this book.  Do whatever you need in order to make the routine flow together.  Step seven is to create your routine.

Step Eight:  Perform for real audiences.
Whether you’re a pro or you just like to goof around with magic, you need to perform your routine on real live audiences.  It could just be non-magic friends at work or school.  It could be at an actual show.  I used to wear a button on my jacket that said, “You wanna see a card trick?”  When I wore this button, people would always ask me to show them a trick.  I’d show them one or two, then ask if they wanted to see more, and if so, I would continue on with my routine.

I’ve actually had the checkout stand girl at the grocery store ask me to show her a trick, so I held up the checkout line and showed her a trick.  Don’t ask for feed back from real audiences, but you’ll get it anyway.  Some of it is not verbal.  Just be very aware of your audience’s reactions and make a mental note.  You may have to go back to the drawing board.  Either way, at this point you are a fully functioning magician.  Step eight is amazing your audience.

That’s it. That’s the root. Now go study the classics, and go discover your true magical self.

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