A Blog Based On The Life Of Your Not So Average Teenager.

Last ever learn and perform a trick.

1 Comment Posted by Steven Blair Tuesday 4 March 2014 at 22:44

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

Today's trick is from a book that I recommend everyone picks up and it also comes from one of my favourite magicians David Williamson.

Today's trick is from a DVD called "Scratch" by Chad Long.


I performed the very first trick on the DVD which is called "Chicago Scratch".The trick was really easy to learn and enjoyable to watch chad perform. Chad is an excellent teacher. 

I performed this trick as taught on the DVD to a few people first was a random guy I met in a bar, he really liked it, second was to one of my friends and she said "I had no idea that card had been changed" and lastly I showed this to another friend and he did the "raise an eyebrow" reaction. Which basically means that's awesome but I'm not showing you it is. 

I performed this as a opener and a closer and it works perfect as both

Will it stay in my act? Yes but I will do more than the ideas on the DVD. I think scratch is more of a utility device and you should come up with your own ideas using the concept. I have already made something else up that's not taught on the DVD and can't wait to perform it.

Well guys that's it from me for learn and perform a trick. I have learned so much from doing these posts and they have helped me not only make up routines and perform them but also think about my list of tricks I do all the time. I am now on the look out for 10 tricks I can do anytime anywhere with any deck of cards. If you have a trick that you think fits this criteria then get in touch I would love to hear your suggestions.  

Learn and perform a trick day 6

1 Comment Posted by Steven Blair at 00:25

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

First off let me apologise for not doing a post yesterday it was Sunday and I never did much all day so I don't get a chance to perform the trick I learned so I thought I would wait until I had performed it.

Today's trick is from a book that I recommend everyone picks up and it also comes from one of my favourite magicians David Williamson.

Today's trick is from a book called "Williamson's wonders" by David Williamson and it can be found on page 77. The name of today's trick is "51 cards to pocket".


I would like to start off by saying if you have no idea who David Williamson is then don't read on go to YouTube and type his name in and watch him. He is an amazing and very funny performer. I also recommend you check out his awesome DVD set "ridiculous"  it's packed with funny moments and even amazing magic. 

The trick was really easy to learn and it gives you a great gag at the end. I did do the gag and wow it's amazing. 

I performed this trick as taught in the book for a guy called Scott who is a friend of a friend and has never met me before and never saw me do some magic.i got into the routine and it went great he loved it. The biggest reaction came from when I did the gag. Scott and everyone else watching laughed. I think this may be the best gag in magic.

I performed this as a closer and it works perfect there but could be a great opener as well.

Will it stay in my act? No it won't. The trick is very similar to a trick I do in my professional working set from stars of magic and I have worked so much on that routine it would be hard to replace with this. However I will keep the gag in my act and I may just use the gag for every single trick I do. It's that good of a gag.

Well guys that's it from. I will be back tomorrow with the very last day  of learning and performing a skipped over trick. Until then see you tomorrow. 

Learn and perform a trick day 6

1 Comment Posted by Steven Blair Sunday 2 March 2014 at 00:13

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

Today's trick is from a that I bought about three years ago and I haven't really looked at.

Today's trick is from a book called "Above The Fold" by Rich Aviles and it can be found on page 30. The name of today's trick is "middle man".


I want to start off by saying that I bought this book as a recommendation from a friend and I have never read any of it until today. Also I until today I never knew much about rich Aviles.

The trick was really easy to learn. 

I performed this trick as taught in the book for my friends Lisa and Chris who I was hanging out with and they seemed or really enjoy it. They have seen me do millions of magic in fact Lisa is someone I have preformed alongside on a number of occasions (she's a singer and poet) and she has also helped me write some material. Lastly she is my biggest critic and she will tell me if something sucks.

This trick has a nice emotional hook and I think the patter that is provided in the write up is gat for this style of routine.

I performed this as an opener and a closer as I only did this trick for them. I feel this would be a great middle trick as it has a lot of patter and isn't powerful enough for a opener or closer.

Will it stay in my act? I think I will play around with it and it may just stay in may act. Over all it's a great way trick and can't wait to try it out a few more times 

Well guys that's it from. I will be back tomorrow with day 6 of learning and performing a skipped over trick. Until then see you tomorrow. 

Learn an perform a trick day 4

0 Comments Posted by Steven Blair Saturday 1 March 2014 at 01:22

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

Today's trick is from a book that doesn't only have great tricks but also equally as good essays.    

Today's trick is from a book called "One Degree" by John Guastaferro and it can be found on page 6. The name of today's trick is "either or"


I want to start off by saying that I am a huge fan of not only Johns magic but his thinking and theory behind magic. I was lucky enough to meet and hang out with John at a recent magic convention and this was great to pick his brains about magic and theory. 


The trick was really easy to learn and I had it down in less than 5 minuets. 

I performed this trick as taught in the book for a friend who has saw me do a fair amount of magic and this got a poor reaction. The reason was that I know a lot about her and the trick is aimed at learning a bit more about your spectators. However I performed this again for a group of about 6 girls who hadn't seen me do any magic before and it got a really good reaction. 

I should say here that the second time I performed this I used a David Williamson move/idea to do what was needed. However the trick in the book isn't about how you do the effect it's about the main presentation and that's what I think makes this a great trick. You can do the exact same presentation as taught in the book using more than one method. 

The second time I performed this I used it as an opener and I think it worked great here as I got to know my audience a lot more. I think the information I obtained I could have used later on in a mind reading routine. 

Will it stay in my act? Yes, I will keep this in my act but I won't do the handling taught in the book (on occasion I might). I will however do David Williamson handling and use Johns presentation. 

Well guys that's it from. I will be back tomorrow with day 5 of learning and performing a skipped over trick. Until then see you tomorrow. 

Learn and perform a trick day 3

0 Comments Posted by Steven Blair Thursday 27 February 2014 at 21:06

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

Today's trick is from a book that was published in 2004 and contains one of my favourite stage tricks and some great essays. 

Today's trick is from a book called "Random Acts Of Magic" by David Acer  and it the trick can be found on page 88. The name of the trick is "The Flipwiches of eastwick". 

The trick was rather difficult to learn but that was my own fault once I read it properly it was very easy to learn. This trick involves a move called "Flipwiche" and this is very cool I like it a lot but it is rather difficult to do. 

I performed this trick for a friend who hasn't seen me do much magic and she really liked it. I did this as a middle trick and I think this is where I think it works best. Overall great trick.

Will it stay in my act? Yes, I will keep this in my act but I won't do it all the time.

Well guys that's it from. I will be back tomorrow with day 4 of learning and performing a skipped over trick. Until then see you tomorrow. 

learning and performing a trick I have skipped over day 2

0 Comments Posted by Steven Blair Wednesday 26 February 2014 at 20:23

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

As promised yesterday here is day one of learning and performing a trick I have skipped over.

Today's trick is freon a book that was published way back in 1979 by the man who owns my local magic shop, Mr Roy Walton. Today's trick is from a book called "that certain something" and it can be found on page 13. The name of the trick is "smiling mule". 



Let me start off by saying this trick uses a move that a lot of magicians panic about getting caught on not once but twice. With that being said the scond time you do it you have so much misdirection because of a joke that's incorporated in the routine.  

The trick is a good one and it was very easy to learn. I performed this trick for some people in my college class. When I did the first phase with the joke I got the response of " really? Come on do a real trick". This gave sme so much misdirection to do the stuff that needed done. The trick did get a "oh that's cool" response but I think this would get better reactions from a different audience.   

Will this remain in my act? Well yes and no, I would like to play around with it for a few weeks and see how it plays for different audiences and if it gets the reaction I expect then I will keep it in my act.

Well guys that's it from me for today tune in tomorrow for another post.

Thanks 
Steven.

Learn and perform a trick. Day one

0 Comments Posted by Steven Blair Tuesday 25 February 2014 at 21:22

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

As promised yesterday here is day one of learning and performing a trick I have skipped over.

Today's trick is from a book I have had just over a year called "gold dust the very best of Paul Gordon." 

Let me start off by saying I am a huge fan of Paul's work and I think he has some great stuff some of which I even use while out working. That being said a lot of Paul's stuff is very procedural and I am not a fan of magic where you have to either deal or spell to stuff so as a lot of stuff Paul dose uses these concepts it was hard for me to find a trick I liked. I then found a trick called "strollers delight" which can be found on page 245. 

This is a nice trick and was easy to learn.i spent my morning reding, learning and practicing this trick. I was in town and stopped by a coffee shop that I am a regular in and they know I am a magician so I knew they would expect me to do a little something. When I arrived it was very quiet so Dean who was serving asked for a trick as I started Samantha who was also working stopped so I went into strollers delight as my opener. I changed the end phase a little to fit the situation. The trick was well received and Dean freaked out (like he always does) when he saw his card was in between the aces. 

Over all great trick and good reactions. Will I use this again probably sometime but it won't be a regular feature of my act as I do a trick by another magician that is very similar. 

Well guys that's it from me. I will be back tomorrow with another card trick. This time one from a book that every magician should read. 

Thanks 
Steven.  

Welcome back mr Steven Blair

0 Comments Posted by Steven Blair at 01:19

Hello people of the interwebs its Steven back again with yet another blog post. This post is going to be 100% aimed at magicians so apologies in advance to my non magician readers.

So let me first apologise for being away for a long time life has just be crazy of the past few months with college, magic and personal issues. To see what I have been up to since we last spoke check out my social medias. 

Now this blog post is me issuing a challenge to myself. Let me explain, as a magician I have loads and I mean loads of magic books and DVDs that I have briefly skimmed over and I feel that I have probably missed out on some great tricks. So my plan is to learn a new trick each day for a week and perform it for a stranger. After I have done this I will write a post about the trick, how the performance went and if I will keep doing the trick or not. 

          Just some or my magic collection.

I think this will be a great learning curve for me in magic and will hopefully help expand my arsenal of tricks and also encourage me to practice a lot more. 

Well guys that's it for me but I will see you all tomorrow for my first trick of the week.