Saturday Night Contest - Something Unexpected

[j.bayme]

Over the past several weeks, many of our Saturday Night Contests have been more on the lighter side. We try to keep a healthy balance with our Saturday Night Contests-- having a smooth mix of funny ones, serious ones, hard ones, easy ones.

So for this week, we wanted to switch things up and focus on the real reason why all of us are here: we perform. The topic of this week's SNC is just that. As anyone that performs regularly and truly engages with their spectators may know-- performing is an active process. It involves both stimulus and reaction, and sometimes things go aerie.

For this week's SNC, our challenge to you is simple. Tell us about a recent performance of yours, and tell us one thing about it that didn't exactly go as planned. More importantly-- how did you react to it, and what did you learn from it? Sometimes a mistake or deviation off plan during a performance can make the impact 10x better.

Tell us about a recent performance of yours. Who were you performing for? What happened? Did anything go wrong? If so, how did you react-- and what did you learn?

Best true submission as determined by our crew receives a signed deck of Bicycle Centurions (http://www.theory11.com/playingcards/centurions.php) by the theory11 team. Submissions must be in by 11:00pm EST. Winners posted on or before midnight.

Let's hear it...

[DannyT]

Sounds great, I'll get to typing!!!

[sky_lark]

Awesome! I can't wait to hear all the submissions!

[DavidMisner]

I like this challenge. It doesn't require a camera or the destruction of cards.

Alright, here's my story.

About 2 weeks ago, I was downtown doing some magic, and a group of girls about my age asked me to show them something. ;)


I had a fresh loop around my wrist, so I decided to put it into action. I started to perform Nathan Kranzo's Haunted Deck routine from the Loops DVD set. Everything went as planned up until I had to actually cause the deck to move.

The loop was set, and I had everything positioned, so I started to cause the deck to split. After it was about halfway through it's motions, for some reason the loop popped off the deck and went back into my wrist. One of the girls noticed this, and commented that there was something on my wrist.

Another girl must have thought it was a hair, so she decided to pull it off my wrist. Maybe she just wanted to touch me, but I'll never know for sure. What I do know was that the loop broke as she was pulling on it, and now I had a half split deck and no way to finish the effect.

Because of the nature of the effect, the deck really had only split about half an inch from the rest of the pack, and I really didn't want to pull out the card as a lame reveal.

I was about to admit defeat and manually remove the card, when I had an awesome idea. Why not finish the movement myself? As corny as this sounds, I picked up the deck in dealer's grip, and using my left middle and ring fingers, I pulled the top half the rest of the way.

I thought for sure it would look horrible, but to my surprise, the deck slipped around a bit as I was moving it and looked even better than the loop reveal! After the top half had pretty much gone as far as it could, I had one of the girls remove the card it cut to, revealing her chosen card.

The reactions I got from that were by far the best I have ever received. Because my stress and efforts were genuine, the effect's strength was heightened. The girls were freaking out. After the performance, one of the girls told me her brother was a magician, and that she had heard of loops, but she had no idea how I did my effect.

Overall, I lost a loop, but gained the confidence to not worry about messing up on the trick. This experience really helped me expand my creativity, and now I have a killer haunted pack in the works.

Think, all this because a girl wanted to touch my arm...

David

[tsarothpaco]

I may not be really good at magic but that does not affect my performances;
A recent one I had was at the 8th grade Youth Center about two weeks ago. I planned to do a random pick-a-card trick but my spectator made a mistake which allowed me to do an even better trick. I fanned the deck and they picked a card and I knew exactly what it was. The fan was even spread and even for another magician they would say this couldn't be a force. So then they put it anywhere in the deck and I used the break and did a series of false shuffles and cuts. Now here I mess up...I lose the card on accident. My face didn't cringe or anything so they thought nothing went wrong. Regardless I knew their card but regardless to that I riffled and picked up about to do a cut and that card was at the bottom of the cut. I then shuffled to the top and had a seemingly hour long discussion in my mind of what to present the revelation as and I got it in two seconds. I did a top change then showed the top card not to be theres. Next I did a double shapeshifter (it switches back to the origninal card) and it flashed their card and they gasped ( I said watch as this card will try to see what your card is). Then seeing as their mind was boggling I was able to palm the card, allow them to look for theres and revealed it.

This was just one part of my performance but played as strongly as a whole one to my friends (they were the spectators). I freaked out when I realized I lost the card but kept cool and luckily it went the way I thought it couldn't be. This has taught me to always be ready for change, your performance isn't whats guaranteed to happen. I learned I had to be like the comedians on Who's Line is it Anyway and just make up stuff in 10 seconds and go with it.

~PaCo

[AjDeF3]

Me did the magics of illusions. Me mehssed up a lot. Peehpul dihndt cach me. they gave I handshake. Me got really hahpey. I Lyked how dey make me feel good wen I do mahgic. I wike magic awot. Do you wyke magic gys and cootie ihnfestied girls?

[Steve Simmons]

Aw man...I got a big bag to pull from for this one! :p

Fortunately, I already have one in mind. I'll start typing soon...

(I like this contest...haha..awesome!)

[illusioner13]

Yesterday I was floating a french fry and the eating it out of thin air at McDonalds . this caught a groups attention. They came over to me and asked to see a trick. I asked if i could use there car and they said yes. I started the routine of Chaos and when I started to ''pull'' the card through the window it ripped. They heard this happen and looked over to see I had half of there card that i pulled through the window. I thought quickly and took hold of the cards one guy was holding and secretly hid the other half underneath. I told a spectator to check the bottom of the pile for the other half. when they found it there reaction was huge. Now whenever i preform this trick I rip it on purpose the reactions are extravagant. I have now found out it can be good to screw up.I should do it mare often! JK

Hope u Enjoy

[dejavu05]

Ha Ha. That is funny that this is the contest because something just happened today. So yesterday my friend came over and we had a sleepover. He asked me to show him a trick and I showed him dejavu and then we did some other stuff. I think he liked dejavu, he said he had no clue how I did it. Then today in the morning he told me to do a magic trick. So I did a trick called Word in a Million where the spectator can pick a word from a book and I can tell what it is. I am not going to go into detail about the trick. But anyway he picked a word and I actually didn't know what it was, I think it was like the only time that I have messed the trick up (or something went wrong in the trick). So I was telling him that he could have picked any word on any page, and then I did something to try to figure out what his word was (the secret of the trick). All of a sudden I didn't know what the word was. I couldn't tell what it was and immediately in my head I was just like "Ohhhhh man". I realized that I didn't have a backup plan for if I messed up the trick. I didn't know what to say or do. I kind of just had an idea and threw it out there and was wrong (it was pretty much a guess). But anyway, I did not handle the situation like I should have. Sure some people may be reading this and say "you have to have a backup plan!!! what were you thinking", and that is exactly why I am posting this because that is what I learned. I have been thinking that I need a backup plan because magic tricks are going to go wrong. I learned a lot out of this. But here is the finale, he asked me to do it again. I couldn't believe I did. I performed it one more time only to fail again. These were pretty much the only two times I have messed up that trick. I got the word wrong again and I couldn't believe it!!! I learned a lot from this also. I learned that if you make a mistake, don't try to do it again and hope it works. Rather, take the time to fix it and make sure that you have it down and have a backup plan if something goes wrong. I hope people that are reading this are also learning something from my mistakes. Best of luck to everyone in their performances!!!

[VagueTheory]

Well, I recently ordered some sponge balls. When I got the hang of most of the sleights that I learned, I decided to bring them to school to show my friends and classmates.

My performance was for a group of kids. I didn't know them that well, but they were still in my class. I started off with the usual, they hold a sponge, I hold a sponge, and it magically appears into their hand. Everything was going well until my last phase, where I try to make three sponges appear in their hand while they were holding two. I false transferred, and loaded the third sponge into the spectator's hand. I guess I must've flashed a little because he said, "I saw that." So I asked, "Saw what?" He replied, "You put three sponges into my hand." I got a little tense, but then I said, "Yeah, you're right! Look! (I opened up my hand and pointed to it.) "It jumped from my hand into yours!" The rest of the people gave some great reactions, like the usual, "What the ****?" and "How in the world...?"

I made a small mistake, but I think that the experience helped me realize not to get so nervous when I do flash or do something wrong. Instead of just standing there looking foolish, I can play it off like, "Oh..you caught me." or "You got some good eyes, but did anyone else see it?" I just came up with the excuse off the top of my head. I guess you just can't go wrong while performing.

Thanks for reading!

;D

[Amirshaw]

well i was performing the famous trick THIS N THAT to my friends, i accidently pulled out the other card way ahead of when it was suppose to be produced, my friend then started crying, i said why are you crying he said, that was just so amazing, i ended the trick right there, and now i now know that you dont need to go through the whole proccess of THIS N THAT, you can simply produce the othe card whenever you wnata nd still get the same reaction... =]

[Ben Long]

A while back I posted a thread about what I thought was (and still think is) a great presentation for Triumph. In effect, when performing for a large group, I get a confederate to tell somebody else to just flip over a packet while I'm shuffling. Then I "shuffle" and realize what has happened and I build it up to this spectator who has "ruined" the trick. I reveal that the deck is not in order (you all know how it goes), and it theoretically will get a huge reaction in that I have actually thwarted a heckler. So that's the general idea.

Now, some people, when I posted this, warned me that it could be potentially risky. I acknowledged it, but basically went about doing it anyway. I had already done it once with a magician buddy of mine and it had gone great.

So I maybe did it this way one or two more times over the course of a few weeks at some parties, etc.

So a little while later, my friend and I are at this shindig and somebody requests some magic, So I decide to do a short routine or two. First I do (I think) Interlaced Vanish, and then I move onto Triumph. My friend's there and he actually flips the packet while I'm distracted.

Now, I'm not quite sure what happened inside my head, but instead of just doing a Zarrow shuffle like I usually do, I do a full table riffle and actually do mix up the cards face up to face down. I'll usually do a few regular shuffles before the face-up to face-down one, so I guess my mind was still at that phase. There are about six people watching and they all see this. I still haven't quite gotten it until I break the pack to do another shuffle.

So I curse and they see that I've seen my mistake. I hate myself very very much at that point.

Now, luckily for me, the selection is still on top, face-down. I spread the cards to show everyone how screwed I am.

I would, at this point, like to extend my sincerest thanks to Paul Harris for publishing Strange Exchange in AoA, thus forcing me to learn the one-handed top palm.

I palm the card and reach into my friend's jacket and pull the selection out and then just look at him. Then I say, in an annoyed tone "stop stealing cards."

He's of course helping me out by acting incredibly surprised. The other five people seem to be having a pretty good time too.

What saved me here? Technique, a little bit. But mostly acting mixed with some real bona-fide anger. Everyone thinks I'm pissed about the deck being mixed up, but I just show that I'm pissed about the card being transported into somebody's jacket. Showmanship can really salvage a sinking boat. You've got to practice improv and and thinking on the fly. The sleights will follow.

That's my story. I'm an idiot, I know, but it worked out in the end.

[PhilTheMagician]

Ok...I was at a bar and was doing some tricks for friends. I was practising some flourishes in between tricks, and I dropped a whole bunch of cards on the floor, and onto my friend's purse. I bent over to pick up the cards, and that's when I noticed the ironically AMAZING thing that had happened. I usually keep a duplicate card in my deck for verious effects, and that day was no exception. I couldn't believe it when I noticed the duplicate card actually fell IN her purse. I left it there and continued on to gather the other fallen cards. I then joined the table again, and was thinking how I could make the best of this insanely perfect situation. I decided to try a very clean card to purse effect. I simply forced the duplicate card on her, and then did some colour change + double lift thing which made her card dissappear from the deck. I then spread out the cards and acted quite surprised. I let it play out for a few seconds and then I asked her if she had any pockets or a purse. She said yeah, and I asked her to check her pockets....nothing....I then asked her to check her purse.....she looked inside and screamed some profanities. It was the best trick of the evening, and it was PURELY unintentional.

Lesson to be learned: take your time when setting up a trick, even if it was an accident. If I had stood up and immediately done the trick, she might have found it fishy...but she didn't even remember that I was bent down on the floor a few minutes back.

Doubt I'll win, but I thought I'd share it anyway :)

[Antney1234]

cool contest!

[Gomeriffic]

So, I was at school doin some magic. I had a card selected. I controlled the card to the top from the middle. Then a quick shuffle so the card was second from top. I was gonna do a Top Shot with a Duck change after. When I did the Top Shot, the top card was shot into my hand, while the second card got stuck under someone's binder. Then when I did the duck change, the people told me that wasn't their card. I just noticed the card under the binder. Then I said that was because the card wasn't in the deck. The spectators went through the deck, only to not find their card. Then I revealed the card under the binder. Best part, it was the spectator's binder! This heightened the effect, while I will never be able to duplicate it. :(

[Tyler Johnson]

I go to a pretty large church and after performing for my youth group, word got around that I was a magician. After church one day, everyone was standing around in the sanctuary and this older lady came up to me and started talking to me. I had the gimmick for a trick I created ready in my pocket, because I was going to perform it for a friend after church. The old lady started talking to me about my magic and asked if I could do any for her. The only trick I had on me was my own, so I stuck my hand in my pocket and slipped it on as I told her, "Sure, I'll perform something for you, let me grab my ring out of my pocket." So I pulled my hand out holding my ring, I handed it to her and she inspected it, then gave it back. I then told her to watch closely, blew on it, and it disappeared visually right in front of her face. She was so shocked that immediately after it happened, she grabbed me and started patting me down! It was very weird, being a 17 year-old guy, to have an old lady feel you up! Anyway, I learned about controlling the space between your audience and you. I finally realized that when she felt me up. Before I realized this fact, I performed and had some kids grab the card that was supposed to be theirs, but really wasn't, and that messed up the whole trick. So now, I stand just out of reach length from all my spectators. Unless I'm using them for something of course. But, thanks to the old lady, it got into my head and made me realize that. Cause I never want to be felt up by an old lady ever again! Or anyone for that instance! (lol)

Tyler Johnson

P.S. Good lucky everyoney! :p

[AjDeF3]

@Antney Erm.... Are you serous? That doesn't sound like a legit story to me...b

[jdstyle]

I have a really good one thats been haunting me for decades lol.

About 4 years ago , i was 14, I was with my cousin on a plane to Miami to go visit a college he had applied to. So were on the plane ; I'm doing some cuts and stuff when suddenly cabin crew comes towards me and asks me to do a few tricks for them. A 200 passenger plane and only 6 crew people which were around me. I start of with a two card monte , then an ambitious routine and so one, about 45 min of tricks and the pilot announces we are getting close to land in the airport.
I thought thats it no more tricks but no they ask for more. Being still small and naive i say ok. The plane lands and me without my seat belt i completely fall down . Everyone is laughing and apologizing for not having told me to put on my seatbelt. I get up and notice something. I was previously doing a think of a card effect but haden't finished to previous reasons :p. I forgot to mention when i fell i let go of the cards and they flew everywhere. strangely enough one card landed in a mans champagne glass. The lady then goes " THATS MY CARD ; ITS THE CARD I WAS THINKING ABOUT." I haden't even made her choose a card or anything . It was really creepy.

Thats not the end: Normally when a pilot lands a plane safely everyone starts applauding . Well in this flight they did. I was still confused with the trick and the coincidence and all i thought they were clapping for me. My cousin then goes " Dude its not for you"; I was about to cry because the people sitting next to me were laughing there a**'s off.

[conjure_pitch]

As soon as I saw this thread I knew what I would post.

It was at a corporate X-mas party/dinner for a local bank. I walked up to my first table, all went well and I went through my routine. I went to the second table and did another routine I had come up with, ending with a strong ambitious routine with a boomerang finale. The wierdest thing I could ever fathom happened at that point.

I finished the routine flawlessly until the boomerang, The cielings were high so I thought I could try something crazy. I approached the boomerang as follows:

Cut deck in half, spread left hand packet in a fan and wave it across the front of the deck and card flys out from behind.

I decided with high ceilings I could shoot a high one so I fired the card hard. I mean real hard. The card was face down in the deck on top, so I unfortunately could not see what it was. Somewhere during the control I lost track of it because the card that flew out was nowhere close to the selection. As luck would have it I accidently popped the next card off as well but it hit the fan I had in my left hand (the fan I wave over the deck) and fell immediately downwards.

The specs eyes watched intently as one card soared through the air. The card that fell went completely unnoticed and happened to be the selection. The gods were clearly shining on me that day because the selection slid right down into the 1/4 inch wide opening at the top of one ladys purse.

I caught the boomerang card and finished my patter (one card jumps out of the center and that card is.....insert selection) ending it with a questioning glance and saying, wait a minute I swear you chose the 7H not the 4C (boomerang) which is impossible because I don't even have that card in this deck, as I hand the deck to be searched.

A real tough heckler watched my hands to make sure I didnt pocket it. I kept my hands on my head and she reacted quite surprisingly. "What the ****!!!! where did it go"

I looked her right in the eyes, cleared my throat and said I never even had it with me. Remember, I left it in your purse. With that I turned, and left to a LOUD reaction compiled of cursing, applause and one girl called her father and literally begged him to hire me for thier house party which, after the show, she proceeded to do.


It was by far the luckiest thing ever. I could not believe nobody noticed me drop the card. That experience gave me several things: An automatic booking, one of my best reactions ever, a great lesson in my magical life and a new incredible closer for my ACR.



Thanks.
Trent.

[bentley]

I was performing "Do As I Do" from Royal Road to Card Magic. I was looking at my card and he was looking at his. I totally forgot that there were people behind me watching me and the card I chose (which for the illusion is a big no no) and he was picking his card. We put them back and switch decks and we look for our cards in the deck (which for the illusion is that they are the same card.) Well we actually picked the same card without knowing it and people behind me started to scream that was the card (insert my name here) chose. HOW DID YOU DO THAT.

I learned that you need to watch your angles and keep your mind and eyes everywhere so that something like that wont happen because I may not pick the same card they do like that again (except for the ending of it of course). Not really funny but is a lesson learned.

[Dr.Nick]

I was performing for a large group of people and these two girls wouldn't stop talking so I leaned over and quietly said in their ear "Hey quiet, or i'll stab you two" and I didn't hear them talk ever again.













Just Kidding

[Tenchu]

First of all, sorry for my poor english, plus it's kinda late - where I live it's 02:24 right now.

So, last week I was invited to a friend's party at his house. Couple of my good friends showed up but I did not knew most of the people out there.

So we were chilling, talking and since my friends know I do tricks my good friend Monica asked me do I know some new tricks. Accualy I did, I had some cool tricks I was working on recently, but I didn't practised them much. I had quite a long break with cards so I wasn't 100% confident, but when I started with a classic ACR... I realised I was doing some crazy stuff for a good hour! Everything I did was superb! No mess ups at all! Smoothly and slick like never before. All I heard was "nooo way", "woooow" and "that's sick!".

But...

I completely forgot that later that night there was supposed to be a poker game!
It was all good but when the game time came and after everything what I showed to them one guy said "Hell no! After that spooky stuff there's no way you gonna play!". There was no poker for me that night...

Peace and good luck everyone!

[b.boulton]

Alrighty Then...

Ever day after school I have wrestling practice. School ends at 2 and practice starts at 2:45. (We have to wait for the coach to get there, and we need to get changed and warmed up.) Well last Friday I decided that it would be time to break out the deck of cards again.

I roamed the halls looking for some people to get...I mean perform for. I found the girl's soccer team, they were doing some off-season cardio workouts...or at least getting ready to. I knew a couple of the girls so I went over and struck up a conversation.

I proceeded with a normal ACR, followed by a new ender that I have been working on. They all loved it. I was getting other people who were walking the halls to stop and look on. I had a group of about 20 people.

I was just finishing up and getting ready to go (It was about 2:40 and I still needed to change!) and they kept saying don't go show us some more!

Who can say no?

So I showed them a trick called "I have a Dream" Then went on to do just a simple force then prediction. I held out the deck and said "Tap a Card" to the first girl in front. She tapped it and I looked up.

It was my ex. "awkward silence kicks in"

I said "uhhhh...ummmm"

Then my senses kicked back in and I said "O ok take a look at it...show who-ever you want"

She did...I finished out the trick and things went crazy.

I then got to practice 10 minutes late and had to do 10 suicides.

It was all worth it because we might be hooking up again...and we are definitely hanging out tomorrow. She left me a Myspace message saying that she wanted to hang out on Tuesday.

She texted me the next day saying...and i quote... "....you gotta teach me some tricks ;)" O yeah.

Well thats the story.
The end.


-Brad

[Tenchu]

Girls and cards = awesome stuff! ;)

[AjDeF3]

I was performing for a large group of people and these two girls wouldn't stop talking so I leaned over and quietly said in their ear "Hey quiet, or i'll stab you two" and I didn't hear them talk ever again.













Just Kidding

This one will win. It is by far the best.

[Michael Nasello]

A couple of months ago I was performing for my family. A I did a trick where the delt the four aces. But to perform the trick the deck has to be set up. So i handed the deck to my uncle to deal and he shuffled the deck. So i decided quickly to continue the trick and at the end of it tell everyone it was a joke I just wasted five minutes of your time. So my uncle delt and I turned over the top four card and amazingly it was the for aces. (My theroy for this was that the aces never broke apart a miraculously the travel back to the top.) So that day was my first crash course in crowd control and I went home to re-work my repertoirie and make sure im in control not them.

[Dr.Nick]

This one will win. It is by far the best.
It's from The Office

[kod482]

This is a short one, but it's short because I acted quickly on it.:D This was also the only time I messed up while performing for people i didn't know.

So I was on this cruise party and it was a nice night out. Most people had a little to drink and it was starting to get dark so i thought maybe I should try some magic here. Now at that point, I have NEVER performed for strangers before, I usually did tricks for friends at school. I pulled out a deck of cards and immediately this woman said "oh are you going to do a trick"? so I did. So I got started with the ACR and about somewhere near the end I couldn't get a good grip of my DL and I actually flipped over 3 cards. At that point I knew that wasn't her card but I acted as if I didn't know why it went wrong. Then I flipped the cards face down and gave it a little rub and just flipped the top card, again acting surprised as if I didn't know what went wrong. But then I said "wait, wait give me one more try okay?" and she said alright. What she didn't know was that when I was talking to her, I got into the perfect setup to do a shapeshifter change. I did the change and she flipped out. Three other people were just as amazed. I let her talk about it for a few minutes and then the conversation got carried into something about David Blaine, but i did not mind at all because after almost messing up while performing for strangers for the first time, I was glad I made it out alright.

[gap123]

i am a highschool student, so naturally, my magic performances occur at school. i had one of those penguin magic clear super thin loops on my hand and i was performing the trick where the card rises out of the box. I was performing to a crowd of like 6 people in class, 3 girls and 3 boys. I told them to pick a card, and they did, i showed it to them then hooked the loop aroudn the card and put it back in the deck. i continued with my patter, but then one of the guys i knew well was like "ahh your tricks are all BS, so he slapped the entire deck out of my hand. naturally by doing this he broke the loop and i dropped all the ccards, but somehow the card that was picked remained floating in air because the broken loop somhow attached to my sweater, i dont know how but i was wearing a wool sweater. anyway, i then looked at the card and realized it was the card that they had picked so i said "and THAT is your card". Even though it only remained floating for about a second longer, it was long enough for everyone to see that it was the card. Two of the girls started going "F*** F*** F***" and HOLY S***. really loudly and repeatedly. Now this happened in literature class, with my a crabby teacher who was strict on rules. Naturally she heard to girls cursing loudly and i was sent to the office along with 5 of the six people i was performing to. I nearly got a mark on my permanent record for class disruption, but i was glad my vice principal was a good sport and let me off with just a warning, but it was a warning that my parents had to sign, so i got my cards and magix stuff taken away for a month ( i have asian and strict parents). Anyway thats the most messed up experience ive had, but im only a few months into magic so im kinnda looking forward to more in the future =)


hope you enjoyed my expeience =)


-gap123

[CardGuy90]

A performance i had would not be a close up performance, it would be one i had on stage.
I usually always do close up magic but since it was my schools talent show. I decided to do something more stage appropriate. I had this routine set up where i would perform Dream of Aces and have it shown via a projector, then perform a variation of Wayne's Indecent without needing a spectator and having it shown on the projector also. And then to finish the show i had a prop set up where i would do a simple version of a metamorphosis.

During the rehearsals, everything was great and i was completely ready for the show. I often didnt think about what could go wrong because of the fact that i was ready in every aspect... so i thought.

The day of the performance came and one thing went wrong after another. To start, my prop for my metamorphosis was damaged (HOW I HAVE NO IDEA!) and i was forced to make a new prop for it ON THE SPOT (i literally had 3 hours to do this and i was limited, but lucky for me i found some wood in my school and a few other things and made HORRIBLE prop but it was good enough to be used in the show). After that, i didnt realize but one of the props people had accidentally moved my newly horrible metamorphosis gimmick and because they moved it, something i built was moved and depending on where you were in the audience, you could kinda see what was going on. Of course i didnt realize this until after i performed it.

Now the performance came, i was ready and i started to perform.... But little do you know that someone back stage, forgot to switch the right battery into the camara and the camara continued to go off. However i continued to perform while they fixed it because i was being timed and could not stop and wait. So the audience knew that i did my best and clapped when i was done with Dream of Aces... even though some parts were not shown due to the camara.

The judged felt bad and gave me an extra 2 mins... however now the camara was dead because it was the wrong battery, so i stalled and said a few jokes while my friend tried to fix it but he was unable to do so. I didnt know what to do because now if i did my variation of indecent, not everyone could see. WHY I DID THIS I DONT KNOW BUT.... i risked everything and decided to do a REALLY simple and really risky “Think of a number” trick to someone in the audience so that everyone who couldnt see from far, could still hear and know what was going on.... and it worked. I was shocked but i think it was because i gave it my all so there was no way this spectator was going to pick a number i didnt want them to pick!

So that went great, i decided to just go right into my metamorphosis and finish the deal... i went in and did it, my fellow magician who was helping me however messed up the timing. And if any of you know metamorphosis timing is everything. So there is a part in the act where he is standing with the cloth up for A LONG TIME! when that part should have been quick, it just looked bad. And in the end the audience (some of them) saw how it was done because of the props peoples mistake.

I was extremely mad that night, however weeks later, i am extremely happy it happened to me. It showed me something very important. Even if you do everything right, things still go wrong and we should be prepared for them no matter what. When you think your ready, think again because i bet there is something you could have overlooked.
Yesterday i went to my schools auditions for this years talent show and this year im going to make sure that im 110% ready and that i go out there, amaze them, and leave them wanting more.

This is a link to a video some student took and posted on youtube, its only the metamorphosis, but at least you can see part of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8Y3ndXj5ck

Thanks for reading.

[BRodgers]

Ok, this is my first Saturday Night Contest entry, so here goes...

I'll start by explaining the who, what and where details.

Who: I was performing for small groups of children.
Where: A local popular restaurant.
What: A standard sponge ball routine. (Kids love those things.)

It was a busy night at the restaurant, and I was going from table to table performing mt standard sets. There were lots of kids there that night, a bit more then normal. Naturally, I had my sponge ball set out and going strong for most of the night.

At one particular table with 3 kids, I went into my routine as usual. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Everyone at the table seemed very entertained, with the kids acting a bit strange.....more on that later.

It being a very busy and somewhat hectic night, I quickly moved to the next table. You guessed it, more kids. So like before I pulled out the sponge balls, and proceeded into my routine. It was at about the moment I was supposed to cause one ball to vanish and appear in my pocket, that I realized I was missing a ball. I could not complete the effect as it was supposed to go. I was stuck.

That is the mistake, the deviation my performance took during my plan.

How did I react? Well, heres where the twist comes in.

Remember the previous table, with the kids acting a bit strange? Here is where they come in. From what I know, they were paying close attention to everything I was doing at my new table, so when I was supposed to produce the ball, and didn't, one of the kids yelled out, "Here it is!", and held the ball in the air. The kids at the table I was at went nuts, it was priceless. I went over and got the ball, and finished the routine. Nothing else I did at that table could top that.

There were a few other tables that saw what happened, and reacted the same way.

Thats it, thats my personal example of what not to do, and what COULD happen if you get lucky.

What did I learn? I learned to pay attention to my props, even more so in a busy environment, and even more so with young children. I got lucky, but I shouldn't ever rely on it happening.

[magicpowder]

well this is my story:

Lately iv been preforming at my high school and there weren't really any problems with my performance i usually got the reactions like "wat the ^%5345!!!" and "U demon!" lol this usually made me laugh and made my confidence go over board to the point that i was full of myself so what happened was i went up to a football player with a group of ppl around us and i did some sponge ball routines i did really good till my last trick :(:( this is the bad part i told him to hold one sponge ball in his hand and call out a number 1 - 20 he said "15" then i told him to throw the sponge ball really hard at the floor and wat happened was that there was alot of sponge balls on the floor everyone starting counting them at first everyone thought the was 15 balls, so did I, when i counted them out loud i only counted 14 not 15 i asked him if that was ok that i got close enough and if he would except it he said "yes" i felt shameful even tho everyone liked it and was asking me to do it for them it made me feel stupid bc i dont think anyone here wants to preform a trick u have confidence in and mess up and act all nervous


welll i hope u like my story and best the luck to everyone


ps. heres the link to my vid
http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=2797117

[JPD]

Okay, so I'm in the mall, looking for someone to show a trick to. I see this guy standing out side of a store, shaking a sign for the store. I have a poker chip in my hand and I ask him, "Do you know what this is?" He answers, " A poker chip?" I say, "Yeah, did you know that this can fall up?" He says, "Wait, are you going to do a magic trick on me?" I said, "Yeah." Now here is what went wrong. I didn't catch the chip. In my head I was like, "S@#$T!" Thank god I didn't get more nervous. I said, "Wait." I did it again one more time and I caught it.(it= muscle pass). After that, he was amazed and asked me where I learned it. I said hogwarts. After that performance, I learned that I should practice som more on catching and hopefully, I will catch the chip every time I pop. Thanks for reading! If you read it.:rolleyes::D

[captainslaughter]

Preformance: Well this happen friday. I was at school and I had some invisible thread and some wax (wich I carry around all the time). I was in math class and I put someIinvisible thread on my pencil. Well like always im not paying attention in class so im doing little levitation with the pencil witch nobody saw I was just thinking of some ideas.

Then my pencil droped on the floor well the thread was still on the pencil I did what most people would do if something was attached to a string is to pull it up. Well that everyone saw it now it was loud in the class room so i do the levitation it goes up into my hand.You can hear the class get real quite. Not noticing the class got quite I raised my hand to ask a question to the teacher and this is what i said" so if you ad x+5............" the teacher was looking like WTF just happend and the class was looking at me in a weird face. Even a sudent said HOLY CRAP like really loud. Knowing that they saw that i did like a whole magic show for the class.
And Another kid asked my and wispered it to me "How in the hell did you do that" I said "dude one way MAGIC He said"OH Im going to try it so hes trying it for hours droping it on the for and trying to get it back up. Later he walk up and say" How did you get so damn magicial"


Reaction: REALLY REALLY FUNNY AND GOOD AT THE SAME TIME THEY REALLY LOVED IT



-Jay.C

[AjDeF3]

well this is my story:

Lately iv been preforming at my high school and there weren't really any problems with my performance i usually got the reactions like "wat the ^%5345!!!" and "U demon!" lol this usually made me laugh and made my confidence go over board to the point that i was full of myself so what happened was i went up to a football player with a group of ppl around us and i did some sponge ball routines i did really good till my last trick :(:( this is the bad part i told him to hold one sponge ball in his hand and call out a number 1 - 20 he said "15" then i told him to throw the sponge ball really hard at the floor and wat happened was that there was alot of sponge balls on the floor everyone starting counting them at first everyone thought the was 15 balls, so did I, when i counted them out loud i only counted 14 not 15 i asked him if that was ok that i got close enough and if he would except it he said "yes" i felt shameful even tho everyone liked it and was asking me to do it for them it made me feel stupid bc i dont think anyone here wants to preform a trick u have confidence in and mess up and act all nervous


welll i hope u like my story and best the luck to everyone


ps. heres the link to my vid
http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=2797117


After hearing all this made up crap of cards flying in wine glasses, in side little slits in purses, and other made up crap like that, I loved this one...

It was just what happened, with proof to go with it.

Hope you win,

-Aj

[4c3.0f.h34rTs]

hey guys, well, about a month ago I was at school in study hall, and a couple of friends of mine asked for me to do a trick cause they had heard I did magic and had seen me messin' with cards all the time. So actually I was kinda off guard in the sense that my brain had a freeze. After about a minute of chatting Murcuring popped into my head...and oldie but a goodie. And it was kinda odd because one kid was behind my shoulder, and the rest were around me.

So I started the trick, and got all the way to all four cards were turned over (for those of you who are not familiar it's a card turn-over with a killer ending), when the kid behind me said "FREEZE!, i swear you got 6 cards there!." so i was like sweating, and asked him why he thought so etc.....anything to stall. As I was doing this I almost too obviously stole away the starting cards (not the aces), but apparently nobody noticed. I then assumed the same poz. that my hands were generally in...and slowly turned everything over and boy were people surprised... I think he was kinda embarrassed too lol but it was all cool. :)

[Guardian452]

so, i was difuesing a bomb once on top of a building doing charliers in my other hand.....

but to the real story.....


over the summer was when i REALLY found a passion for magic, my dad AT THE TIME ran an "isold it on ebay" store, and a few blocks down was a magic shop. Grand Magic.

i start going in EVERYDAY over summer, i would just sit there and STARE at everything, the guy let me go behind the counter and show people stuff, demo effects....etc.

then a ting called Crusin grand comes to town, everyone who owns old hot rods comes out and parks there cars and A LOT of people walk down the street and watch, WELL, the magic shop would do street performances outside the shop during these events, and the guy asked me to go out and perform.

MY FIRST TIME street performing, not exactly busking, but close.

i sit my hat, hole down onto the table.
i stop people by shouting at the top of my lungs "MAGIC SHOW, ITS FUN, ITS FREE, ITS MAGIC, GET OVER HERE!!!!"

people start wandering over and stopping in front of my table, im waiting for the crowd to build when some guy asks me "hey kid, are ya going to get started or do a fricken show for us or what?"
OUT OF NOWHERE, IT JUST HITS ME i say to him "no sir, i just wanted everyone together, im just holding these cards cause this is all i have...yes sir, im doing a show."

i start my show, i have someone pick a card, replace it back into the deck. i truly lose it into the deck. i have someone else pick a card...ITS THE SAME CARD. she SCREAMS (both selections were from a ribbon spead) and holds the card high into the air for everyone to see and they start clapping and just "wows" "howd he do thats" were the type of things people were saying.

there was a small kid standing next to me, i look down at him once the clapping stops, i say to him in a voice so everyone can hear "thats why you got to college." everyone starts laughing.

that moment is what defined me as a magician. made me want to continue growing and growing. yes, the story is not that amazing, but it was my first time on the streets, first time gathering a crowd, first time making them laugh.

i learned that if you can take something and make them laugh, itll go off perfectly

[magicpowder]

After hearing all this made up crap of cards flying in wine glasses, in side little slits in purses, and other made up crap like that, I loved this one...

It was just what happened, with proof to go with it.

Hope you win,

-Aj

thanx alot i hope i win too :D thanx for the support !

[thexcheat]

I don't have any amazing recoveries, or awful failures. But i'll tell you about this one time.

OK, so i was performing a do as i do kinda thing(not at all like do as i do though lol) for my friend. And in the middle of the performance you have to do a pretty bold slight. So i start, and everything is going great. I've done this many times and I'm confident it will work. But when i get to the slight, i see that the guy is burning my hands (not literally), so that if i did anything he would see it.
I think a bit, and then tell him that i need a certain item to complete this effect (which i don't). So i go get it and when he is picking it up i quickly do the dirty work. Everything turned out fine, but I think a little more on every possible situation that can happen.
Not the most exciting story lol, but hope you liked it.

[jrobarts05]

i went to work about a week ago to check my schedule and see if any of my friends were working. i get there and one of my co-workers was waiting for a ride with another one keeping me company. Now these two are as mismatched as they come, one is a 5 foot nothing girl who likes to talk a lot and the other is a 6 foot 4 inch, 280 pound 16 year old who is like gentle ben, GIANT AND SCARY looking but a real softy pushover. Anyway i sat down and started talking to them and i guess i didn't notice that i took my cards out (they seem to just spring into my hands) but i took them out and started just messing around, cuts and springing them. well my co-workers asked to see a trick. i started with a simple ACR and then did fallen by Daniel Garcia, my first time performing this for spectators by the way. i followed withThe Queen's off the trilogy. just anything that really popped into my mind. everything was going great better than i expected, the two of them were great spec's, So great actually i decided to try another trick for the first time... so i busted out Control by Mr. Hoochy Woochy himself. i asked the girl the usual questions and set it up perfectly, she began to take my pulse. as i performed i put everything into it, everything Wayne had taught, all my practice and just sold it. as her counting slowed i can hear something else, it was my friend, THE Gentle Giant gasping and his teeth chattering.. as she stopped i hear him let out a little squeak. well he pushed back from the table nearly knocking it over and stood up and just started walking away... litterally freaking out.. it was so hard not to start laughing but i wanted to keep the integrity of the illusion. so i slowly came back out of the "trance" all the while this girl is just staring at me and counting while my giant friend is basically running out of the restaraunt. so i get up slowly and start walking after him. i NEVER EVER expected that kind of reaction, least of all from him. it was amazing and i almost lost if and couldn't finish, but i ended with Control and it was a great performance but i wont forget that reaction and how hard it is to keep performing sometimes.. even now a week later he keeps his distance from me and gives me funny looks as if he expects me to pull my heart out and put it on the table in front of him. lol
and i just wanted to thank Wayne and Daniel for this great effect, it has just made my experience in magic all the more interesting. this is why i got into magic in the first place

[DannyT]

Okay, here's my true submission for the SNC.
Just so you know my sister's name is Heather and she's 20. I feel that's important.

I was at one of my sister's friend's parties. I kind of felt like a tag-along because everybody there was older than me and it was kinda intimidating. I didn't talk much because I didn't know most of them. The whole night I was sitting down in a chair, watching people talk and laugh. My sister saw me and felt bad for me because it didn't look like I was having any fun. Truth is that I didn't really mind sitting down by myself doing nothing. I was just texting my friends and seeing what they were up to.

So my sister tells a group of her friends that I do magic. The next thing I know, she's calling me over to the group to do something. I had a regular deck on me and the Invisible deck. I started with the Biddle trick. I figured I had that one down-pat and didn't want to try anything I wasn't very familiar with. Once I shown them that their one card disappeared, they freaked out loud!, attracting more people to come over and watch.

My next trick was the 2 Card Monte, again I didn't want to try to pull any fast one on them, and I knew that that trick would hit them hard. I turned over the 1st card, the Ace of Diamonds. I turned it back over and gave it to one girl to hold face down. I told her to keep her hands locked together tight so I can't take that card back if I wanted to. I then turned over the King of Diamonds. Turning it back over and holding it above my spectator's hand, I asked what card she was holding, she replied the Ace of Diamonds. I took my card, put it under her hands and flipped it over to reveal that I now had the Ace of Diamonds. I told her to open her hands to see what card she had. To everyone's amazement, it was my King of Diamonds.

While everyone was laughing and talking to each other about my last trick, I switched decks, and was ready to perform with my Invisible Deck. I said, "Okay, I'll try one more trick with you guys. This time, my sister wanted to be involved. I said to think of any card, a card that wouldn't be too obvious for me to guess. She told me that she got it and I went into my routine. I repeated, that this was just a random card that popped into your mind, right? She said yeah. I handed the deck to one of her friends asking them to hold it up in plain view. I asked, "For the 1st time, what was the name of your card that you were thinking of." She said the 5 of Hearts. I asked, "Are you guys ready for this?" I asked for the cards back from the girl, opened the deck and spread through them looking for the face down card. Once I got to it, I went passed it to show that throughout the whole deck, only one card was turned upside down. The only problem was that 2 CARDS WERE TURNED UPSIDE DOWN! I felt like I messed up so unbelievably bad in front of all these people. Everyone looked confused. I didn't know how to go about the trick, it definitely caught everyone's eye, I couldn't hide it. "I said sorry guys, I kind of messed up", as I showed the 5 of Hearts, but didn't show the other card, and squaring up the deck. My sister said, "WAIT! I actually thought of another card before the 5 of Hearts, I switched it because I thought the Ace of Diamonds was too easy. Is that why there were 2 cards flipped over?, Is that the Ace of Diamonds?"

In my mind I was thinking, "no I actually messed up", but then I thought, "OMG!, I can make this work, and with this card too, perfect!" I spread through the deck once again, this time looking for the face-down Ace of Diamonds. Once I came to it, I flipped it over, and . . . . . . . . . . . Everybody screaming, cursing, laughing, "How the **** did he do that!"
My sister looked at me like I was a freak or something. lol, I love my sister.
Best Night Of My Life!, Wouldn't trade that night for anything.

I went from being that kid in the corner, to the life of the party.
I've learned that if you have an opportunity, you have to take it!

-DannyT

[babyjkjoe]

Imagine performing for your harshest critics, that group of people that know the double lift and know when you flash or mess up. These are the type of people you always sweat around when performing; these are the type of people that you have to figure out different, unique ways to trick them.
I had just finished playing poker with about 6 of these friends, I bought back in three times (amount of money will be disclosed) and I busted out in 3rd place, out of the money. It was just supposed to be a fun game though. My adrenaline was still rushing when the whole game was over, and they wanted to see some tricks. My adrenaline fueled my nervousness. I had never been so nervous. I took out a deck of bicycles from my pocket and they immediately accused me of having a trick deck. It wasn't, and they examined (they forcefully took the deck from me). I decided I would do the biddle trick, since they had never seen it before and it didn't involved a double lift. I was doing a classic force on the 4 of hearts, but obviously my friend is not the one to fall for a classic force so he used his finger to go all the way to the bottom, so I had to slip the four of hearts under the pack and put it at the very bottom. My heart began to slow down, since I got past that part. So they put it in the deck and I double undercutted it to the top. I did a patter about how I could feel the difference in temperature of their card and cut the cards and asked them to put their hand out. I said I could feel around for their card and cut to around their card in the middle of the deck. I told them I wasn't that good of a magician, so I believed their card to be about five cards at the top. I flipped five over and began to do the biddle slight, telling them to not give me any clue where their card is because I am a good poker player (that got a good laugh).
At this point, I thought everything would be fine. But these guys always seem to play with the cards when I give them. So I really had to focus my attention away from the deck and make them focus on my hands. I rolled my sleeves up, showed my hands empty. This really taught me how to manage my audience, it was a huge confidence booster, when I saw all their eyes away from the deck. I false counted 5 cards in my hand, and began to say that I could see from the dimple in their smile that I saw a indentation of a four, but I wasn't sure. I "palmed" the card and made it invisible and threw it into the deck.
I showed the four cards and how their card was missing. I clearly showed them and I told them to look through the deck. My heart was normal now, I was proud that I finished the trick. I must have bent their four of hearts extra special this time because when my friend decided to cut the deck instead of spreading, he cut right to the four of hearts, and my heart went CRAZY. They all jumped in excitement and amazement.

I really learned how to manage my audience. I also learned that often the tricks that I have done for years can be invented in new ways if I try and mess with them. They can become 10x better. And I learned that the heart beat is necessary and really gives me a thrill.
I learned that my own magic fools me.

They don't want to play poker with me, ever again.

[RebelAce69]

Now, performing for my friends is a routine thing for me. We can communicate well together and are comfortable around eachother. So, this is story is entirely the opposite of that fact.

A group of 120 Japanese students came by my high school for a tour and the experience of a "Canadian high school". I was volunteered by one of my teachers and decided what the heck it will be an amazing experience. Now, I previously mentioned my friends know I perform magic and one of them BEGGED me to bring a deck of cards to show to the Japanese people.

My partner's name was Kazuyori and was 17 years old in grade 11. Or whatever level that is in Japan. Anyways, after the tour was break for the group of Japanese students and all of the other students in the school. So, I decided to pull out my deck of cards and tried my best to ask them if they wanted to see some magic. Since they really didn't understand I showed them a quick phase of my ACR, basically getting it to the top a couple of times and they immediately understood what I meant.

I proceeded to try to talk to them, while setting up the deck for David Stone's Invisble Palm routine Reset. I showed them the four kings, taught them the suits of the cards and how to say the word King. All in good fun, and then went into the routine. Just as it started a student at my school decided to shout "OH SWEET CARD TRICKS." Now, my little group of 5 japanese students and 5 friends quickly erupted into about 30-40 students. Woo, the pressure was on.

Basically I ignored all of the other people around me since my angle were perfect for the routine, no one was behind me and all were to my right side. I went through the whole "invisible palming" until the 4 cards were on the table. Some older students were yelling and saying "WHOA OH MY GOD" etc. Then I showed the 4 kings had turned into the 4 aces and people went NUTS. I had never gotten that type of reaction before. Very nice.

Now, since there was so many people I wanted to do an effect where I could not possibly mess-up. The four aces were on the table, and somehow there was a 5 on top of the deck. I quickly set-up for the Invisible Reverse. I did this while talking to my spectators who asked "PUT A CARD INTO MY WALLET." I have a rather sharp tongue if you will, so I fired a few things back like, "Well, let me see your wallet, and the 5 bucks inside and I'll see what I can do."

I used that as my mis-direction. I used a few false flashy shuffles, to retain the decks order and proceeded into the Invisible Reverse. No one saw it coming, especially after everyone had thought I screwed up, oh boy was it nice. The 3 bigger guys in the front called me a Witch, and came up and gave me hi 5's patted me on the back and made off.

Now, throughout all of this I was still able to transcend the routine onto the Japanese spectators. They knew barely any english yet, they understand the concept of magic and what I was doing. This, while using barely any patter, essentially saying "Card, you pick a card." "Remember" "This your card, card is yours?"

What would've I changed about this? Nothing. One of the best experiences I've ever had doing magic. I made a name for myself with not only my peers but, others from across the planet who don't even speak the same language as I do. So, if you ever get the chance, I recommend opening your mind to new and challenging ways to perform your magic. I did, and will never regret it.

-RA69

[Blink]

Awesome competition guys, best of luck to all.

I performed recently at the Adelaide Fringe (Which btw is the 2nd Biggest Fringe Festival in the World) we performed alot of Street/Card/Coin Magic and a few Stunts.

For the entire show everything seemed to go pretty well, and throughout the night people had offered to buy us a drink. So later on in the night I would have had a few drinks, but not enough to really have effected me too much.

I went into one of my favourite moves 'Bruised' and forced the card exactly like normal, once the spectator started punching me a large crowd started to gather. I mean, its a little strange.

After building up the crowd, and getting into my routine of talking about my 'von Willebrand disease' which, I do not infact have. (The disease causes easy bruising) and I talked about how I can control where my blood flows (Which is something great to use to run into Control)

Upon the reveal I took off my jacket, with the remaining of the deck still in my left hand, the card he picked in his pocket.

I told him to hand me his card, as I placed it upon my arm ready to reveal the bruise. I turned the card over 'The Queen of Spades.' My heart plummeted, the bruise was the Queen of Hearts.

I decided to still reveal the bruise, most actually didnt notice the error but some did.

I noticed the Queen of Hearts was actually on the bottom of the deck, so I did a double lift with the Queen of Spades at the front.

"You often have the Queen of Spades cover for the Queen of Hearts. See she is very shy and dislikes large crowds like this one"

With a quick snap change, the Spades changed into the Queens.

The crowd were completely amazed.

Make sure not to mix alcohol with magic. Though it turned out extremely well this time, it very easily could have turned out terrible.

[allinking17]

Unlike many of the other stories here, I did not really mess up on this trick (which i will admit i have done in the past) , but i learned an immense amount from this instance.

A little background on the situation... Im a guy that likes to have a laugh and smile, and i am known around my classmates for some of my magic. Everyday in my 4th period class i perform magic for a group of girls. These girls are very talkative and basically beg me to perform a new trick daily.

Well, one specific week i had performing and experimenting with a new handling of las vegas leaper ( A cards across routine by Paul Harris) so i decided to give that trick a go on these girls as i knew how much they would love it. During the patter of the trick when i handed the packet of 10 cards to one of the girls i could not remember the exact patter of what i normally use.
Which is something along the lines of "Take this packet and place it out of reach, or in your pocket"

What actually came out of my mouth was along the lines of" Put these cards somewhere where i cant get to them"

Now this does not seem like a big difference at all, but let me tell you, i was more suprised than anyone in the room when she stuffed them in her bra..... Now my normal teenage response to that is...uhhmmm...ok, anyways....

After i regained my composure i began the trick in which 3 cards from my 10 card packet dissappear one by one so i am left with 7 cards in the end, and my spectator counts out thirteen from their packet.

After i counted my cards (7 now, to their shock) it was her turn. So i said now count your cards into my hand. Her hand then reached into her bra and began counting and ended up with 13 cards. I recieved the best reaction of any trick i had done in the year i had been performing. She instantly tried to reconfigure how in the world i got those cards into her bra, and started blushing immensly. Everyday after that when she saw me performing tricks she beggged me to show them "the bra trick" and i also recieved many requests from the people she told.

Hmmm now for the lesson. Well, its pretty simple. Through this performance i learned that sometimes the technique and magic isnt all what performaning is about. It is about character. I concluded that if i can go into any performance and just have fun, nobody will care about how technical i am, or even if i didnt perform the best tricks, they will remember me for my personality, and that is much more important

[Infinity]

I try to perform out of school as much as I can, but every Friday I perform for students in my lunch. Only a few tricks usually, no full routines or anything. Well, this Friday, yesterday, I was feeling kind of sick and not up to my usual condition, but everyone had been talking about what they thought I was going to do this week and they kept asking me to show them some magic. I was not going to at first, I was going to keep my cool and just tell them that I wasn’t feeling well and that I’d show them something on Monday. But they kept begging and begging.

Well, as you can most likely guess, I lost it and decided to do one trick. I stood up out of my seat and stumbled a little from slight dizziness. I knew deep down that I should wait and it would be unprofessional to do one now cause my patter would be off and my sleights sloppy. I pulled out my deck of cards and prepared to perform Kaos by Daniel Garcia that I had been practicing intensely the whole week. My patter was terrible and my handling way too rough. Well, the performance (if it even deserves the title) went on and I was about ready to go to the other side. I tried to build up at least some suspense before I went to the other side.

Well, without exposing, the sleight of hand failed and the card slipped and fell to the floor while the spectator was spreading the deck. The reactions ranged from disappointment to pity to sheer heckler laughing. But inside there was only one emotion that dwelled; shame. I felt as though I had let everyone down, not just my spectators, but magicians everywhere, past, present and future. For that moment, I was the lowest of the low, I didn’t deserve the deck that was handed back to me, it wasn’t fair to all those who spent hours practicing and knowing when and where to perform. So I performed a quick Here then There to try and pick up the pieces of the heart of my reputation. They said they are still looking forward to next week.

I believe that what most magicians’ love is to please their audience. That’s why most of us got into magic in the first place. To astonish and amaze ordinary, everyday people. I have learned much in a short period of time from this experience. I send this message out to all magicians and performers around the world.

*Don’t break under the pressure. However much you are being annoyed and pushed to perform.
*If you are not at your best, DO NOT PERFORM. Even though you want that satisfaction of a reaction. It is not fair to you, the spectators, and other magicians.
*Have a sleight down to perfection? Practice more. Think your good to go? Practice a little longer. As said by many before, “Amateurs practice till they get it right, professionals practice till they CAN’T GET IT WRONG.

***Perform when YOU’RE ready. Not when THEY’RE ready***

Hope you enjoyed my experience and can learn from it. Good luck to everyone!

E*W

[th3 r4zOr]

Hey everyone,
My performace of W/H's stigmata that backfired on the spec.

Ok, this is a moment that didn't really go wrong, but the spec intended to mess it up big time for me and i found it quite funny when it backfired on him, so here we go:D

I was at school, and i had just finished Physical Education, it was lunchtime, so i just got out the doors, and i said "hang on sir", "do you want to see a really neat trick?" He replied, "go on then", so i proceeded to remove my deck of cards from my bag.

I then removed the cards from their brand new packet, and before i knew it there was a huge crowd around me, seen as i was performing on the main part of my school.

I then began to start my routine of Stigmata by Wayne Houchin. So i riffled down and said "stop when you want", he choose his card, and held it close to him like it was gold, "i then said im gonna turn around, i want you to show everyone the card and shuffle it back into the deck."

I heard him shout "ok", and i turned back around everyone paying close attention, and for some reason smiling very weirdly at me, i just ignored it and carried on.

He handed me back the deck and i carried on, "are you right or left handed?" and he replied, "right handed". So i placed the deck into his left hand and said "grip my arm with your right hand", so he did.

I then proceeded to say "squeeze" and i asked him to remove his hand, and everyone gazed down onto my hand as the blood he had made rise to the top by squeezing magically formed into the name of his chosen card.

All of a sudden there was no reaction, i was thinking to myself whats happening here. And just as i thought those very words, he pulled one card out from his pocket and looked at me in confusion as if he didn't know what to do.(Obviously he had attempted to ruin my entire effect by not shuffling the card into the deck and hiding it, thinking i would perform a trick where i locate his card.)

Everyone begin to burst out laughing at him and pointing making his look like a complete fool, then everyone started to clap and cheer, you should have seen the look on his face it was priceless he look like he was genuinely lost.

So my lesson learned performing this was never give the spec the deck and turn away, you cant trust anyone, well you can let go when performing stigmata, because it really does make them look like a fool if they try to mess yur routine up.

If you suspect the spectaor of pulling a joke on you, just take the deck back and say infact i need you to find your card again. If he/she cant because he/she has hidden it then you have just revealed his little idea of a joke. If he/she finds it you know you can trust them, then move on to perm your planned out effects.

So that's it my performance of stigmata that made the teacher a laughing stock. :p

Thanks for reading everyone.
r4zOr...

[art-is-a-blast]

Something has happened to my previous post, so I'm posting this second one.

My story is something that happens to quite alot of us magicians, and I decided to put my own story of it. My recent performance was in my school, and I was cleaning up after I finished performing them. While I was cleaning up, people started to tell me my performance was great but they were able to see exactly what I was doing, and it really shocked me because it made me realize that this happened becase I was focusing more on copying other magician's style to make my self look cooler than improving the quality of my performance. It makes me think that, all these years, magic gave me this huge fraustration, because I couldn't buy all those new products on the market even though I really wanted them, and over the years, that fraustration got bigger and bigger until I snapped and started to copy other performer's style to feel better about myself. In the end I really learned a great lesson, and decided to really work on my original high quality performance and style.

[C=B]

First, I guess you should know that I have stopped being very active in performing, magic is a passion and love of mine and I need to devote more time to learning it.


But, recently I was performing Reset (P.H.) at my local drum shop. My hands were shaking because I had never performed this effect out anywhere... well something in the counting went wrong and as I show that the jacks have turned back into aces there was a lone jack amongst the aces... My head nearly exploded... I couldn't believe I had just messed this up this badly... But I thought for a second and then had my out. I said that all of the jacks had turned into aces but one and then showed that one ace had stayed behind on the packet of jacks sitting several feet away, thus proving the transpo had taken place. The reaction was HUGE... not only had the impossible happened, there was hardcore PROOF it had happened that no one could dispute...

Thats my story.

[kakashisensei3]

I was at school preforming a basic pass but with 5 cards. They selected them i put them in the middle of the pack and was doing a pass, but when the other packet was being dropped a card got caught and made a bend. I made a shi* a** lame saying and said i will use this card to find your cards in the pack. I threw the card and said maybe not. Then i flipped the cards off the top and they were it. MY friend said i F'D up he saw what happened. So i just practised alot and was not nerverous. Then i did it in front of 27 people.



THERES MY STORY! HOPE I WIN> GOOD LUCK!

[eli505]

Performance story

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi guys ,
This happened to me a while ago and i posted it on the E forums without the accident.
For christmas from my grandma this year i got an hd video camera.Me and my friend decided to go out and do some street magic with it .There werent many people out on the streets so we decided to go to this old bookstore.When we went into the store I decided I wanted to do stigmata the version when the persons initial shows up on there arm. I decided I wanted to try a new patter that was simalar as to what wayne did on the special features when he told that guy he was shooting a documentry.I told the lady I was doing a project in school and i had to do a poll on how many people believed in the paranormal.After I asked her some questions for my "poll"I told her that my grandma was a little messed up and that she could do this weird thing with a buisness card.I asked her if she wanted to see what she did she replied yes.So i did stigmata and after she took her hand off my arm and she saw the M on my arm. I told her the name was michel not michelle this suprisingly made the situation even scarier because i sad michelle and mitch who was her brothers name. she went into tears saying that was her mother and she had died of cancer just a month a go and that michel was her brother.I told her the name was michel not michelle this suprisingly made the situation even scarier because i sad michelle and mitch who was her brothers name. It was probly the best reactions ive ever got it was a nice experience for me.Sadly i didnt get it on camera because my camera man was focusing on me the whole time not her.

[Steve Simmons]

Ok....so when I first read through tonights contest, this screw up was the first to come to mind.

When I first started out performing every week at RR, I was there on Tuesdays. About a month or so later, they switched me to Saturdays. This night was the first Saturday I ever performed there, and I was getting used to new staff and such ( the good servers work on the weekends, new manager there, etc). Anyways, most of the staff was still getting used to the novelty of having a magician there, and was watching me perform at the tables and asking me to show them something quite often.

This particular table was coming towards the end of the night, and I had the feeling that no one could touch me, on top of the world kinda thing going on...sleights perfect, big laughs from the audience, tips rollin' in, etc. Anyways, went up to one of the corner tables that seats about 10 people, and started off my intro. Got the okay, and went into my opener. After that, a few of the servers came over to watch and crowed around me. The first phase on my ACR went good, reactions were on par. But the second time, I went to do a cover pass, and half the deck that I pivot between my pinky and ring finger just slipped and feel right onto the floor....and went EVERYWHERE. From there, I completely lost their signed card and didn't have a clue where it was. So, then I made the brilliant mistake of setting the other half of the deck on top of the sharpie whilst I look down and contemplate the situation. BAD MOVE. I did that, then the cards were on a slant and started sliding off the table AGAIN!

At that point, I was just completely embarrassed...later a few people told me my face was like beet red LOL! Then I just pulled out my invisible deck (what I was going to do either way), and went into a story how before the performance, I set aside a prediction. Went ahead and did the reveal. Pretty good reactions and they went into applause (not sure if they felt sorry for me LOL!)

Now here's where it gets to the point of being a tad bit unbelievable, but I assure you this story is completely unexaggerated. When I went to the put the ID back, I was too busy looking at all the cards on the floor and trying not to slip and fall on my ass in the process, that the whole deck wasn't in the box. I went to put it in, and a good portion of THAT deck feel onto the floor too!!! Then I just made a joke about it and started picking up the cards, with the help of a couple servers. But I'll tell ya, that's a night I'll NEVER forget. I've dropped a few decks before, but that's the definition of the saying, when it rains it pours!

And besides, the whole situation put me in my place...I ate a nice big slice of humble pie afterwards too....haha!!! Just goes to show, even when things are going as good as can be, you're never too far from making a mistake. ;)

Good luck to everyone!!!
Steve

[d_dooms]

I was hired in another city so I travelled to Cali, Colombia (south America) to perform at a 39th birthday party.
In my country, people are used to think that magicians are for children parties, so… for a 39 birthday.. the guests were not very excited about a magician, I started with a Ambitious CR and I started to gain control over my spectators, I started on small groups, like 4 or 5 people, and they started to call the other guests because “They have to see this” street magic is something that here… they’re not used to, is not so common, so… it started great, later on, I did a triumph, Indecent and Witness, stigmata and original effects. Then a heckler showed up… “I saw something…”, “do it again…” “And if you do it with another deck…”, etc…

Then… I said Ok, bring me a deck, and I picked my loop and set it in place, he passed me the deck (...he had to shuffle it before, you know that bright eyes on the spectators when you ask them: “…you want to shuffle the deck?” so he did) he picked a card, showed it to everyone, and when I put the loop in place he wanted to return the card himself (I was doing the haunted deck) I was like screaming inside afraid that he would break the loop, but it didn’t brake, I put the deck on the floor, and started to do the routine… when the deck started to split, I felt that horrible little brake-sound and feel… so, what can I do…. I did a little theatre, and he came and pulls the card… but… IT WASN’T THE SELECTED CARD…. The cards were a little sticky so the deck didn’t split where it has to split so everybody was like… what??? But many people was somehow worried about me, because I was so tired splitting the deck with my internal energy (:p) then I picked the deck and ask him, what was his card, he told me and I find his card and palmed it, and said…. Your card is not in the deck… he checked it out… and his eyes popped out!!! “IS NOT HERE!” I took the mistaken card… and said to him… you didn’t look the card I gave to you carefully, I said to him, if you looked with a kids eyes, not an engineers eyes (he was an engineer) you could see what I wanted to show you… believe” when I was finishing the last word I made a Shape shifter and transform the wrong card into his card…. This guy totally freaked out… and that was my final effect… he then started to ask me about the energy and plasma and stuff like that… and that how I use it… and that he read that once… and told me that was an honour to meet me and that he first did think that I was a fake. It was an awesome experience!!!

What did I learn… stay cool, even the worst heckler can be the best friend and channel to do a great effect, there are two kinds of people you have to be able to amaze… their reactions will guide the other spectators reactions: the leader (In this case the one who the party was made for), and the worst heckler, if you can control these two people, you have control of the situation.

Ahhh I almost forget!!! STRETCH YOUR LOOPS BEFORE AN ACT!!!

XD

Daniel Cuartas

[Matt_36433]

Hey guys!

Thought I wanted to share this fairly detailed & long story and afterthoughts on a recent experience of mine. First off, I wanted to bring up this point. My story is not about me "saving somebody". It's not about me making somebody cry. It's not about me causing children at SickKids hospital to rethink their outlook on life. My story takes everything we've learned back to the very basic foundations of the art of magic.

Let me ask you, have guys ever worked on a trick so hard that getting it down perfectly is all that matters to you in life? You practice it over and over and over again that you can’t wait to get those jaw-dropping, screaming reactions that you know you deserve? Well, that was what happened to me. I was practicing a trick known as “New Era Moving Pips”, you may have heard of it. Oh man, the hours it took for me to build the gimmick, write up a script, and practice it in the mirror… I worked my butt off for just that trick alone.

Then finally, I decided to perform it. I performed it for the first person I knew would want to see my latest “trick”: my dad. During the performance, I kept thinking to myself, “I worked hard for this; this is it, I need that ‘jaw-drop’ that I deserve.” So, I went up to him, “Hey, Pa, you want to see my new trick?” Although quite loaded with work at the time, he actually stopped, leaned back on his chair, and brightly said, “Sure, son”. Thus, I started the trick. Everything was going great and he was well entertained, until the point where the gimmick came into play. Unfortunately, something went wrong with it. I was staring at the gimmick for maybe a whole minute as if I had just watched someone sit up out of a coffin. Obviously, I can’t really describe what was wrong with it, *exposure*, but all that matters was that it was not working.

I honestly felt so embarrassed and so disappointed in myself. I worked so hard for this trick and even though it was just for my dad, I was still pissed off. The trick was ruined. So I look at him and I go, “Oh… uh… sorry… I screwed up… really, really sorry for bothering you... I can see that you were busy”. I was surprised, however, to see him look at me and then he smiled at me... “Try again.” I was just so taken aback. It was like, suddenly, I realized what magic was all about. I finally understood that magic was really not about getting screams, jaw-drops, or tears from emotional spectators. No, it was something much more simple than that.

I had a sort of epiphany. At that point, I started to remember the times in the past when my dad said that same thing to me - when he smiled at me so serenely. I remember him smiling at me when I first started riding a bike, or when I was on stage in a singing competition, or when I was giving a speech at the Royal Canadian Legion in front of a hundred people, or my first stage magic performance in front of the whole school. I especially remember him smiling at me when we were simply having a cup of coffee and some toast in the morning together.

You know, I always used to ask myself: “Why am I doing magic? What’s the point of all this?” Now, I know. I think that what we all do, why we work so hard on our magic, we do for this one simple thing that means the most to me. I’m pretty sure that my entire magic career started off with one of the greatest dads anyone could ask for. It started off with a smile from my dad.

Thanks for reading.

Matt

[EugeneSoh]

Well, it all started when i was performing an ACR "Pick and card and sign it trick" i lost their card...>< then i was like crap >< so i guessed a card from the middle of the deck saying "i believe this is your card, but dont look yet! and then i *Snapped!* and then i turned the pack over to attempt to show their card disappeared. it was really gone! the card i chose (for him to hold) was the one he signed! so i learned magic IS real if you just believe and......."Snap Ya Fingers Do The Step You Can Do It All By Yourself" =)

[magicbysage]

This will be my first pariticipation in the SNC's.

So there I was, minding my own business and filming a magic montage with my buddy, having a good old time. We were in a desolate field in my friend's community, and while I was doing some XCM, four girls my age came around.

I guess they were attracted the bulky camera my amigo was lugging around, but I prefer to think they were coming for me. Anyway, they all came up, acting like a couple of schoolgirls, and they naturally wanted to see some magic.

Unfortunately, I didn't know what I was getting myself into. These were some rough spectators, and I don't think I was mentally prepared for that. If someone isn't ready for the worst to happen, then, it inevitably will, which is what happened in my case.

I performed some sleights and a few changes, then went into my Ambitious Card Routine. I found an old electricity transformer and spread my cards on it, in order to let the girls pick a card. And, unexpectedly, they all dove for the cards, each girl picking a separate card. We narrowed it down to one and I continued.

I gave one of the chicas the deck for another trick, and I was carrying around my brand new, one-week-old custom deck. I was proud of it and giving it to that girl was a mistake. On the way to giving it back to me, she dropped it. Right in the dirt. Needless to say, I was upset that a new, basically unused deck was ruined. My heart sank and my organs tensed up, but I thought to myself, "I have two choices - I can blow up, or I can keep my cool and continue so I don't make a fool of myself."

I chose the latter and in the end, it all worked out very nicely. I was intensely proud that I stayed calm and was able to continue my routine. I guess what I learned through this whole ordeal was to remember, that whatever happens, KEEP YOUR COOL. Don't let something that won't matter in the long run bother you, and you'll be on your way to some happier, more fulfilling performances.

[snibbor]

It was a dark and stormy night... whoops, wrong story.

I'm going to start from the beginning.

It all started on January 29th, when my school announced the upcoming talent show in one month. Immediately, I had the perfect idea of what to do. I would team up with my fellow magician and preform a levitation where you float your assistant, and the the form of bisection where you bisect an assistant / spectator.
The next day, I asked if he wanted to do the talent show together. He agrees. later in history class I give him the run down of what I had planned. A couple days later, I go to the main office, asking how I can go about signing up for the talent show. Guess what? The lady says I missed the auditions! I couldn't believe it. For the next two weeks, I was furstrated about not being able to preform. But all hope was not lost yet, for my sister came to me, saying that she arranged with a teacher so I could be in the show! I was so happy! I told my partner, and we were golden. Unfortunately, I was swamped with homework and 3 tests the next week. That Friday, I called my partner and asked when we should meet up to get ready. He says Sunday. So, on Saturday, I call and ask what time i should come over. He says he'll call me right back. So I wait. Then he calls me back. AND GUESS WHAT? He says he needs to see his sister in Boston on the day of the talent show! So with one week left until the show, no materials, AND a change of plans, I was panicking. So on the only day I'm free, Wednesday, I go out and buy materials for the show. I stay up until 11 building my props, practicing until 12. Then on thursday, do you know what happens? My partner says his plans might change and he might be able to do the show with me after all! This means a change of plans AGAIN. I told him he was just too unreliable, and I had already changed my plans permanantly, meaning he couldn't do it. I practice all day when I get home from school on Thursday.
The day of the talent show, Friday the 29th, arrives. I get to school, and practice until the show starts. Then, finally, my turn arrives. I had a big script planned out for the performance, but I totally forgot. So, I relied on my impromtu comedy skills to help me. I went out on stage and started out with "Hello everybody, my name is Stephen, and I have stage fright." The audience burst into laughter. So, I began asking people if they had seen David Copperfield chop himself in half. After that I picked up my cloth and said "this, folks, is my magical cloth. Magical things happen behind it." Again, everyone laughed. I picked it up and performed bisection. I couldn't have performed it better. After an innevitable and audacious applause, I took my leave.
After the show, I got at least 50 comments like "You have to tell me how you did that!!" "That was amazing!" Etc.. One guy called me David Copperfield! A group of girls was on me all night like "Tell me how you did that! Pleeeeease!!" It was awesome.

Lesson learned: You truly cannot account for everything. Ever. Also, a good joke will always help!

[Virus]

( i have asian and strict parents). Anyway thats the most messed up experience ive had, but im only a few months into magic so im kinnda looking forward to more in the future =)


hope you enjoyed my expeience =)


-gap123

Ahh I feel for you man, me too D:

[@ndE]

OK this isn't recent but it pretty weird.

I was at school and doing a couple of my average tricks with my Black Tiger =P. Such as Ambitious Card and some Jay Sankey effect. I forgot what it was called. So a group three comes over and looks at me with curiosity. I finish my trick and one of the guys comes over and asks if he can see the deck. I thought, "hehe some guy wants to pull a 21 card trick on me xD" so he grabs the deck and does a bunch of flourishes. This is when I wasn't into flourishing and all that but all I remember the most is he kept doing Mary Jane. I was like "whoa!" I extend my hand and ask for a handshake and a name. He goes yeah my name is Pierre Tran(yes THE Pierre Tran [=)
Hehe so after the crowd went away we started talking and got to know each other better. He showed me alot of tips and tricks. Even got me into flourishing.
Without Mr. Tran [= I wouldn't be as far as I was today.
Now it's not everyday you meet and an awesome flourisher.

[joycey1989]

About A month ago i was on the tube by myself , so I figure ill break out my deck of cards and amuse myself for the rest of my journey. A few minutes in, this group of Girls come on the train and ask, the perfectly reasonable question of why i have cards with me? so i explained i do magic and asked would they like to see some?

so i do i few tricks, i had a loop with me so i did the haunted deck a few card transpositions, that sort of thing, and they seem pretty into it. By now most of the carriage is watching, and i decide to try and preform one of my favorite tricks Derrren Brown's invisible deck so i choose one of the girls whom has been particularly responsive, and go through the stages of giving her the invisible deck asking her to deal it into the appropriate piles, but because this has the attention of the whole carriage she was getting pretty self conscious of repeating this motion of dealing out cards that weren't there, so her motions were not very big and instead of listening to my instructions she is laughing and looking around the carriage and i kind of have to half guess my prediction. of course the card i had place out as my prediction the 6 of diamonds was the wrong card. now this is quite a long trick, a lot of build up to this revelation which doubled the anticlimax of my incorrect prediction. so for the sake of knowing where i went wrong i ask her what her card was, she replied the 4 of spades, now i remember earlier in the day i was doing a card to wallet effect where that card that appears in the wallet was the 4 of spades which i hadent taken out of my wallet. so i maintained there attention and said that is so strange because before i got on the train today i took one card from this deck and put it in my wallet i slowly took the wallet of and let her open the zip compartment to find her thought of card. best reaction i have ever got!!

so now although opportunistic before i preform this effect i put one card usually the 6 of diamonds which i find it to be a relatively common selection either under my little notepad which i leave in clear view on the table or in my wallet and every, one in 10 times or close to it someone will have selected the card hidden away and them times the effect becomes 100x better and the times they don't select the 6 of diamonds the card remains hidden and the effect plays out as normal.

thank for reading
Daniel Joyce

[conjure_pitch]

After hearing all this made up crap of cards flying in wine glasses, in side little slits in purses, and other made up crap like that, I loved this one...

It was just what happened, with proof to go with it.

Hope you win,

-Aj

I don't think it was reasonable to assume that my story was made up with no supporting evidence whatsoever. I agree the story was a good approach to the contest but I don't think the other comment was necessary.

Trent.

[princehidalgo]

Great contest.

When I discovered the invisble deck. I thought to myself "This will be the trick I will perform everyday for the rest of my life". And I did, that is until this happened. I was doing the basic "Think of a card, any card then spread to reveal their card" then this girl whips out a deck of her own, the whole deck was bent up in the middle. These cards couldve have been a day under 5 years old. They were kept together via a hairbow. More importantly, these cards were blue, not the same as my red backed invisible deck. So a switch is out of the question. I had just read about being able to Psychologicaly force a card, I had never done it with any card, I had no methods other than the basic idea of it all. So I faked a smile, and took the cards. I did the Braue reversal and took a peek at what card I managed to turn over. 8 of clubs. Dang. The least thought of suit, i cant gesture with eight fingers and look natural, how can I force this card. I cut to get it in the middle. I gave her the deck. And said "Great, now im debating whether or not to do this, I might be to late to get inside the mind and magic window" (some junk i made up on the spot) i then said "Close your eyes, this is where it will get crazy...Think of a card" Now name it out loud..

now it may have been all the 8's i didnt notice till later i had said, great, debate, late....or the unitentional reference to the crazy 8 card game..it might be total luck..but she said 8....of spades.....DANG im close but it might still be impressive since i got the number i said to myself.

She fanned the cards as a looked her inthe eyes to see the reaction..her jaw dropped and she ran outside followed by her friends....

She left her cards and her purse and everything...i thought wow mustve been gullible till i looked over and saw that i hadnt turned over the 8 of clubs, I actually turned OVER THE 8 OF SPADES. It took everything in me to hold it in and play it cool...
By this time shes called her other friends screaming "He did it with my deck!!"...

I learned right then and there possibly the most important lesson in magic- ALWAYS have a backup plan....no matter how good the gimmick or trick is..or how many times youve done it..always have a back up plan and practice it just as much as the trick it backs up.
thanks for reading
-Prince Hidalgo

[btaylor]

My story starts a while back. I was performing at a lobsterfest one night at an Irish pub. I was walking around starting to scope the place and was thinking this will be a walk in the park. I totally forgot where I was, and totally forgot how good the Irish are at drinking. I went to one table, had the spectator pick a card. He was totally gone at this point. I asked him to put the card back and was about to control it when he wanted to shuffle the cards. I controlled the card to the bottom before he grabbed them. I couldn't say no to him or else I would look stupid. I ended up bottom palming the card to my pocket and asked him to shuffle. I got this totally awesome idea. I walked away from him and said I had to speak with the person running the night and that it was an emergency. I went back to the table and continued. His card vanished from the deck. He was pretty blown away but wanted me to strip and prove I didn't have it. I turned out my pockets and he was satisfied. I did admit that I didn't know the identity.

I didn't mention where the card was. When I had left i gave it to the operator of the event and had him place the card face down in the lobsters claw, and made 100% sure he got it. When he got his lobster with the card in the claw he lost it. He was yelling so loud it was unreal. People were giving him dirty looks but his table understood why he was so crazy.

That night was so unreal. That was my favouorite performance by far.

Enjoy guys.

Good luck everyone.

[juanslobo]

Hi
Last year i was in a presentation on a theater (doing Some Card magic)there were about 100 people and i was on the last part of the routine , it was a joke card trick with the jokers, i was supose to thow the deck to the other hand and catch the chosen card..i caught the card but i coudn´t get the deck , it fall and spread all over the floor...then i show the card to the people ,and they said ,no thats not the card....:confused:..i got frozen for a couple of seconds and i said ,ok i tried to ,but i couldn´t ,(so pick up the cards) so which was your card?i doesnt matter any more!!, they said the card , and i said ohh no i even wasn´t close !!!ok but i´ll try to do something nice for you, (there was a man besides me from the public, he had the wrong card in his hand )and i took the card look at it (i made card switch and gave it to him)and said ,Mr please put your hand over the card so i cant get it , and tell me a number betwen 1 -5 , he said 3!!i made a shuffle and count to tree,1...2....3....and i took the card and show it(the car that he soposed to have in his hand)and said , if i have his one here , so what do you have in your hand???and the turn it and said this is my card!!!and show it to the other people!!and they applause!!!...that was a stressing moment but i learn that , they(public) always should think that every "mistake"is part of your act!!a magician never fails!!

[kevin]

This is a good SNC.

First of all, performance to me is a very personal thing. I feel that having all the new gimicks and stuff is cool, but it is unnecessary. if one can establish a good relationship with the spectators, then real magic is afoot.

I recently found myself lounging with people who i am fond of, along with people who i didn't know, and as i had just performed a show for the school, me and magic were put in the same sentence. "Do something Kevin!" was yelled for about 30 seconds until i oblidged. Someone went to find cards (I carry nothing because i dont like to be seen as one who is always looking for someone to impress. If i carry anything i want it to be invisible: loops, magnet, etc.) cards were found, and I asked someone to pick a card. people were joking, someone yelled, "Name it!"

So i said to stop joking around and then I kind of trailed off because everybody was looking at me in shock. there was some nervous giggling in the back, until everybody started yelling at me and tackleing me into the couch.

I was utterly bewildered at such a reaction. The trick hadnt even started! What happened? I wondered.

after I desentangled myself from the jungle of arms and legs, I saw the card thrown vicariously on the floor. The joker. I smiled.

Perfect.

I learned that the encorporation of chance and even pure luck in my routines can make absolute miracles. The employment of risk is a great factor in performance. Such are the moments we magicians live for. They had picked the card before even giving me the deck, so they each experienced a moment of real magic.

kevin

[magicpowder]

3 more mins.!!! who ever wins congrats o yea hurry up and submit now!

[Amirshaw]

ahh! 1 mintue left i cant wait! i hope i win lol (whihc i highly doubt)

[sky_lark]

The story I'm telling occurred right around the the holidays. Now, there was a performance SNC around that time, so this entry will be in a little more detail.

Enjoy!

3 Card Monte Mess-Up

So I'm performing for a wife and a husband. The wife was injured; I believe her leg was hurt in a car crash.

I decide to do the trick "3 Card Monte". I start off fine: The set-up is apparently clean. I start with the secret moves and patter, and immediately the husband starts correcting me by telling me where the cards actually are. Obviously, I know where the cards are, but it's ruining the point of the trick.

I'm cringing inside, but I continue on. Still the husband talks on "no, that card is in the middle". I chuckle, hoping he would stop.

Luckily, the husband never actually got up and forcefully showed where the cards were. It was just a little bit of bad luck. I ended the trick asking the audience what the card, (I don't remember what it was, so we'll say "the ace") was. For the first time, the husband didn't know. I asked the wife and she correctly told me what card it was.

"****", I thought. The card she was saying WAS the secret card, but it had never been shown throughout the show... how could she have known?

I finally convinced her she was wrong, and she told me she had somehow managed to see "the ace" during set-up. So I hadn't done an okay set-up... crap.

Embarrassed, but ready to move on, I revealed the card. As I expected, the reaction wasn't huge; they had already figured out the trick. This was one of my top tricks.

Lesson: I was over-confident that day, thinking I had completely mastered that trick. Well, one thing I learned--I did not, for sure, master 3 card monte!

End of story

Hope you all enjoyed it!

// sky_lark OUT.

PS. Oh yeah, just in time!

[Tenchu]

There are some good stories...


Good luck everyone!

[magicpowder]

OVER!! good luck everyone who do u guys think will win?

[jesse.ecm]

i was doing some basic but awsome card tricks. after a few deacent reactions and a few laughs i had an idea. instead of saving my appearing cane for a manipulation routine, i decided that in my next trick as the laughs settled i would launch off my cane just for kicks.
after the trick while everyone was reacting i reached into my pocket and the lock on the cane unlocked on my jacket pocket and just as i pulled it out of my pocket the cane shot out at the people i was doing the trick for . everyone thought it was part of the trick and got a huge laugh i played it off as if it was supposed to happen. you can imagine how funny this was. im just glad i didnt put someones eye out

[Amirshaw]

wow, ide get soo tired readingh all of these entried good luck t11 staff! =]

[sky_lark]

I'd be impressed if theory11 managed to read all of these, decide a winner, and post it by 11:30 PM EST. :p

[Amirshaw]

i wouldnt be too suprised, t11 can pull off some prety fast resonses, ive sen it before

[Aris.SA]

I dont like this SNC XD

[magicpowder]

lol why?
(short)

[DannyT]

Good luck to everyone!

[Trick-E]

Theory 11,

I would like to share something really unexpected happen in one of my performace.

Last November in my Economic/Government class, I had a big guy in my class that doesn't believes in magic and use to catch me everytime when I do double lifts.

He came up to me and said,"Do you have any more new obvious magic tricks?"

I was thinking this could be the end of my reputation and so I replied,"Yes, well kinda and this trick will not be obvious." Then he smiles and nodded his head a few times.

I was perfoming one of Oz Pearlman classic card magic and I don't remember which one. Catching their selected card between the deck riffle with two jokers.

Just half of the class gathered around me wants to see me perform it to the non-believer of magic. I pulled out two black kings in the beginning of the trick. I ask him to say STOP as I riffle down the deck. He said STOP to where he wanted at. I did Dan's and Dave's double lifts from the middle of the deck and showed it to him on top of the deck. I was surprise that he didn't spot the double lifts, then put the fake selection back into the middle of the deck and leaving the real selection on top.

This is the part where it goes wrong.

I picked up the two black kings and show both sides to show there's absolutely nothing. I put those two on top the selection in the pinky break and all I have to do the sandwich reveal. I have the two kings with the hidden selection in my right hand and the deck in my left, I began to riffle the deck with my left and then pretend to catch his card somewhere between the riffle. Something has unexpected happen, I accidently add three more cards into the sandwich and that wasn't supposed to happen during this trick.

I looked at the sandwich reveal point blank and I remembered thinking like,"I'm totally screwed and this trick is a failure."

Then he asked me,"Did you mess up the trick?"

I replied,"No, let go to the next step shall we."

I continued to moved on to the next step. I pulled four cards being sandwiched among to two kings and I took a peek at the cards. I knew his card is still going to be there. I have 25% of the chance of having him picked his own card and the outcome is really low.

I said,"hmmm....I got four cards here and one of them is yours. Pick one."

He pulled out his finger and move it along the four cards. My heart is beating so fast and my hands becomes so sweaty. Then he said,"This one!"

My mind,"Yes, you did it and you made it a success!"

I was so surprise that he didn't pick the wrong card. I told him to take look at it.

He yelled,"Son of beandip mother-Fritos!"

Everybody in the class laughs and I laughed too.

I learned that making a small mistakes in your performance can happen sometimes and even professional magicians makes mistakes too. If would made the mistake, then I wouldn't blame Oz Pearlman for the mistake.

[DavidMisner]

Theory 11,

I would like to share something really unexpected happen in one of my performace.

Last November in my Economic/Government class, I had a big guy in my class that doesn't believes in magic and use to catch me everytime when I do double lifts.

He came up to me and said,"Do you have any more new obvious magic tirkcs?"

I was thinking this could be the end of my reputation and so I replied,"Yes, well kinda and this trick will not be obvious." Then he smiles and nodded his head a few times.

I was perfoming one of Oz Pearlman classic card magic and I don't remember which one. Catching their selected card between the deck riffle with two jokers.

Just half of the class gathered around me wants to see me perform it to the non-believer of magic. I pulled out two black kings in the beginning of the trick. I ask him to say STOP as I riffle down the deck. He said STOP to where he wanted at. I did Dan's and Dave's double lifts from the middle of the deck and showed it to him on top of the deck. I was surprise that he didn't spot the double lifts, then put the fake selection back into the middle of the deck and leaving the real selection on top.

This is the part where it goes wrong.

I picked up the two black kings and show both sides to show there's absolutely nothing. I put those two on top the selection in the pinky break and all I have to do the sandwich reveal. I have the two kings with the hidden selection in my right hand and the deck in my left, I began to riffle the deck with my left and then pretend to catch his card somewhere between the riffle. Something has unexpected happen, I accidently add three more cards into the sandwich and that wasn't supposed to happen during this trick.

I looked at the sandwich reveal point blank and I remembered thinking like,"I'm totally screwed and this trick is a failure."

Then he asked me,"Did you mess up the trick?"

I replied,"No, let go to the next step shall we."

I continued to moved on to the next step. I pulled four cards being sandwiched among to two kings and I took a peek at the cards. I knew his card is still going to be there. I have 25% of the chance of having him picked his own card and the outcome is really low.

I said,"hmmm....I got four cards here and one of them is yours. Pick one."

He pulled out his finger and move it along the four cards. My heart is beating so fast and my hands becomes so sweaty. Then he said,"This one!"

My mind,"Yes, you did it and you made it a success!"

I was so surprise that he didn't pick the wrong card. I told him to take look at it.

He yelled,"Son of beandip mother-Fritos!"

Everybody in the class laughs and I laughed too.

I learned that making a small mistakes in your performance can happen sometimes and even professional magicians makes mistakes too. If would made the mistake, then I wouldn't blame Oz Pearlman for the mistake.

Sorry man, but the contest closed about 40 minutes ago.

David

[magicpowder]

they'll probably still count ur post but im not sure an yea u were 40 min late

[Trick-E]

Sorry man, but the contest closed about 40 minutes ago.

David
Already?!

:(Man, my wrist hurts. I'm so tired.

[Trick-E]

I thought all submissions is due at 11:00pm.

[DannyT]

Yeah, we should actually find out who the winner is in about 15 minutes or more.
Good luck!

It's 11:46 right now, but I'm sure yo