One of my pet hate phrases with reporting the performance of young magicians is: “the future of magic is safe in their hands”. Or even worse: “we will be hearing a lot more about this young person in future.”
They annoy me not just because both statements are guaranteed to be the kiss of death for whoever they are referring to; but also because there is a fundamental problem about predicting the future of youngsters. They are just too young to have developed a personality that you can guarantee will work when they are older.
I have seen many a youngster who has cute patter, or a rather juvenile presentation, that matches his age at the time. The problem comes about when he grows up and the script or style he once had no longer fits the individual.
This was brought home to me last Sunday when I was one of the judges of The Magic Circle Young Magician of the Year Competition. I must confess I was a little reluctant to accept, as I do find it very hard to be totally objective and judge everybody absolutely fairly. Also, you come up against the problem of trying to compare a silent act with a patter act: it’s very hard.
The overall standard of the seven acts in the competition was, I thought, excellent. Indeed I was tempted to say... “the future of magic is safe in their hands.” The most awe inspiring part for me was the realisation that at their age I had barely picked up a pack of cards – and here were these youngsters doing tricks that I would be hard pushed to accomplish even now.
The range of skills of the young performers was extensive. There were two male silent acts and one female. Two patter acts with varying degrees of comedy included, one very much a comedy act and one who did a bit of talking and a bit of silent magic. It was the latter that we awarded the first prize to. He was very contemporary in looks, chose very strong magic and had a nice mix of youthful charm and maturity.
Second was the woman magician and third placed was the comedy magician.
The result did cause some controversy. There was quite a consensus that one of the two silent male acts should have been placed – or indeed both of them. I was also taken to task by those who felt the comedy magician should have won. I can see their advocate’s point of view and can certainly sympathise with those who felt we had made the wrong decision.
As I came away I couldn’t help but reflect about one magician in particular: “we will be hearing a lot more about this young person in future.”
But which one it was I’m keeping to myself!
They annoy me not just because both statements are guaranteed to be the kiss of death for whoever they are referring to; but also because there is a fundamental problem about predicting the future of youngsters. They are just too young to have developed a personality that you can guarantee will work when they are older.
I have seen many a youngster who has cute patter, or a rather juvenile presentation, that matches his age at the time. The problem comes about when he grows up and the script or style he once had no longer fits the individual.
This was brought home to me last Sunday when I was one of the judges of The Magic Circle Young Magician of the Year Competition. I must confess I was a little reluctant to accept, as I do find it very hard to be totally objective and judge everybody absolutely fairly. Also, you come up against the problem of trying to compare a silent act with a patter act: it’s very hard.
The overall standard of the seven acts in the competition was, I thought, excellent. Indeed I was tempted to say... “the future of magic is safe in their hands.” The most awe inspiring part for me was the realisation that at their age I had barely picked up a pack of cards – and here were these youngsters doing tricks that I would be hard pushed to accomplish even now.
The range of skills of the young performers was extensive. There were two male silent acts and one female. Two patter acts with varying degrees of comedy included, one very much a comedy act and one who did a bit of talking and a bit of silent magic. It was the latter that we awarded the first prize to. He was very contemporary in looks, chose very strong magic and had a nice mix of youthful charm and maturity.
Second was the woman magician and third placed was the comedy magician.
The result did cause some controversy. There was quite a consensus that one of the two silent male acts should have been placed – or indeed both of them. I was also taken to task by those who felt the comedy magician should have won. I can see their advocate’s point of view and can certainly sympathise with those who felt we had made the wrong decision.
As I came away I couldn’t help but reflect about one magician in particular: “we will be hearing a lot more about this young person in future.”
But which one it was I’m keeping to myself!
