Posted by Ian on 2009-05-16
in Pot-pourri
This week’s blog is a number of unrelated items as nothing has taxed my brain sufficiently to merit a complete posting on its own.
Furthermore my computer has decided to pack up on me. It’s a problem with the starting button – in other words if you press it the computer fails to come on. I had rung Dell and they provided a solution which they said would fix it.
However the problem recurred this morning so this time they are going to have to send out a technician to investigate. And, since you ask, I’m typing this on my laptop! But all my other files and work is contained on my pc, so I am, as they say, truly stuffed!
On Monday The Magic Circle held its annual close-up competition with a very high standard of entry. Winner was Pete Wardell whose specialty is the cups and balls: balls appear and disappear from under the cups and, at the end, pieces of fruit are found under each of them. It’s a trick that most magicians are extremely familiar with.
Pete scores not only with his excellent technique but also his well-timed and thoroughly entertaining patter. He cut his teeth doing his act in the tough world of busking – and you can tell with his attacking style underpinned with charm.
The previous day I had gone down to Weston-Super-Mare for the Bristol one day magic convention. This consisted of a close-up show, a couple of lectures and a stage show in the evening. The standard of the close-up magic was again very high – the stage magic not quite so good. This perhaps is unsurprising. There’s very little opportunity for anybody to perform stage magic in the UK these days; particularly those ten minute silent manipulative acts which seem to go down well at magic conventions.
Anybody working on the stage in the UK for real people (as opposed to magicians) almost always perform a, at least twenty minute, speaking act of some sort, usually with a good lashing of comedy.
The venues are mostly hotel or cabaret rooms, very rarely theatres of any sort. So straightway such acts have a major disadvantage at a magic convention - in that they are working in an unfamiliar environment and restricted to an unfamiliar time.
I’m surprised actually that no convention organiser hasn’t taken the radical step of changing the format of the gala show. Rather than trying to find ten acts of ten minutes each, why not book three acts doing twenty five minutes each?
Latest news from The Magic Circle is that Paul Daniels is going to stand for President. Because of the sad death of Ali Bongo the position is now vacant. Why’s he doing this? What are his policies? Will he get in? Watch this space.
Finally I was chatting to a fellow magician at Weston-Super-Mare who said that my name had been put forward to his village committee as a potential act to be booked.
“I presume you voted for me”, I laughingly said, knowing that obviously he would have done. “On no”, he said, “there’s was a couple of singers who are really good – I went for them instead.”
Furthermore my computer has decided to pack up on me. It’s a problem with the starting button – in other words if you press it the computer fails to come on. I had rung Dell and they provided a solution which they said would fix it.
However the problem recurred this morning so this time they are going to have to send out a technician to investigate. And, since you ask, I’m typing this on my laptop! But all my other files and work is contained on my pc, so I am, as they say, truly stuffed!
On Monday The Magic Circle held its annual close-up competition with a very high standard of entry. Winner was Pete Wardell whose specialty is the cups and balls: balls appear and disappear from under the cups and, at the end, pieces of fruit are found under each of them. It’s a trick that most magicians are extremely familiar with.
Pete scores not only with his excellent technique but also his well-timed and thoroughly entertaining patter. He cut his teeth doing his act in the tough world of busking – and you can tell with his attacking style underpinned with charm.
The previous day I had gone down to Weston-Super-Mare for the Bristol one day magic convention. This consisted of a close-up show, a couple of lectures and a stage show in the evening. The standard of the close-up magic was again very high – the stage magic not quite so good. This perhaps is unsurprising. There’s very little opportunity for anybody to perform stage magic in the UK these days; particularly those ten minute silent manipulative acts which seem to go down well at magic conventions.
Anybody working on the stage in the UK for real people (as opposed to magicians) almost always perform a, at least twenty minute, speaking act of some sort, usually with a good lashing of comedy.
The venues are mostly hotel or cabaret rooms, very rarely theatres of any sort. So straightway such acts have a major disadvantage at a magic convention - in that they are working in an unfamiliar environment and restricted to an unfamiliar time.
I’m surprised actually that no convention organiser hasn’t taken the radical step of changing the format of the gala show. Rather than trying to find ten acts of ten minutes each, why not book three acts doing twenty five minutes each?
Latest news from The Magic Circle is that Paul Daniels is going to stand for President. Because of the sad death of Ali Bongo the position is now vacant. Why’s he doing this? What are his policies? Will he get in? Watch this space.
Finally I was chatting to a fellow magician at Weston-Super-Mare who said that my name had been put forward to his village committee as a potential act to be booked.
“I presume you voted for me”, I laughingly said, knowing that obviously he would have done. “On no”, he said, “there’s was a couple of singers who are really good – I went for them instead.”
