Hi there folks. This is a simple question.

Do you perform magic? In other words, do you let your audience believe that you can do magic or do you tell your audience that you achieve all your magic by sleight of hand?

I make my audience believe I'm doing magic. I'm pretty sure many disagree with me. So, fire away and let me see your point of view. I don't want any arguments though.

Nick.

If I'm performing to other magicians it's pretty obvious they know I'm doing sleights.

As far as performing to laypeople is concerned, I do not 'let' them believe. It's really up to them to believe. From my personal experiences, more gullible people tend to believe it's 'real' and that i'm 'doing magic'. My grandmother for one thought that my wand has special power when I performed to her :lol:

Kids too, feels likewise. They will be curious and insist on holding my wand and try to make something 'happen'. It do cracks me up sometimes but I don't usually let people touch my wand. ;)

Teenagers I can tell you are less gullible and they will probably just be amazed by how fast your hands can go rather then believe you have special powers.

Just my opinion B)

Ben

as i have said earlier, i do neither. i will not allow them to believe in "real magic', but i will try not to allow them to even consider that methods are possible. they just subconciously know that there are methods, but do not bother to think about them.

my goal in magic is just to create a world of fantasy for my audience to enjoy themselves. They know that all these can not happen in real life, but while they are enjoying themselves, they will not bother about the methods, lest it prevents them from having fun.

Oh! I've seen many many many people performing sleights as oppose to magic.
"Hey, check this out, look your card goes in the middle (secret move) and its on top. Thank you"

But, yea, i tend to allow them to think if its real magic or not. I mean, if they do ask you "is it real magic?' It shows that they beileved that there is. And i'll reply 'its all up to you...' I used that cos it suits me.

Ya, Ah I wont mention i can do magic, But i will say i show u something and then i do my stuffs on them. Whether or not they believe its magic, its really up to them. And sure enough those teenagers out there wont believe its magic ans juz mention u are too fast for them.

Well, then you proceed on, and they will be mouth shut, cause if u done a sleight that cannot be achieved normally(laymen view) and when they reach a conclusion of impossible(you can see them trying to achieve it by their actions), then they probe u, then u tell them its up to u to decide. Their mind have no choice but believe it is magic.

But there are always hard nut to crack and they will ask u to show them again. Most of the time when i reject them to repeat the magic, they will say i am scared. But i normally will stop it there or i will show them another trick that will set their mind away from other stuffs.

Agree on letting the spectator decide for themselves. Most of the time however they would have seen many other card tricks and would associate stuff like ACR to sleights and Mentalism to mathematics. It is therefore best to just keep quiet or tell them "Some people can do it, some can't, I'm the former" :)

As for those who keep insisting on a trick being repeated, just say "If I were to do it again, I will have to kill you" :P

hmm.. i think i'm at the sleights side....depends.. normally teenagers will not believe it's magic whereas old people and children will believe you are a real conjuror...so it depends, really....

as for the repeating magic thing, i juz say something lame, like my energy is exhausted, or somethin, there's no need for you to explain much realli..

Most definitely magic. Basically it's how you present the effect that makes it look impossible. Several effects make your specs go nuts, not because of not knowing the method, but because there can't be a method to do that.

As for myself, when a spec asks if I could repeat a trick again, I'd tell them "Like drug dealing, the first one you get was free, but you have to pay for the next one". It gets a laugh :)

I do not perform magic, I will let my audience believe that I had no magic power and I cannot do magic and will tell my audience that I achieve all "magic" by the props, sleight of hand and option illusion, and I am just entertaining them with what I learn. B)

Why?? B)

Because i view "magic" as an "Acts" and not as "occult" get what i means. With that no one will be fear of me, change them into a pig or monkey. :P

Please do not stone me, this what I to said......... :wacko:

i've tried performing the same effect (the invisible pass) in 2 ways, namely the sleighty way and the magical way.

The sleighty patter would be about gamblers having the ability to avoid onlookers stare and camera shots to bring the card from the middle to the top.

The magical patter would be about how when a person square upa deck and concentrates, the card returns to the top after obviously placing it in the middle.

Well, guess what? the magical way definitely receive more dropped jaws than the sleighty. With the sleighty, audience simply say, wow you have really quick hands and that's not we, as magicians, want to hear when performing a miracle.

in short, perform magic, not sleights.

But M.A.D, if you just perform sleights, you should not be called a magician right? You have to act like what you're doing is real magic.

Well, it all depends on how we present ourselves loh. But we all agree on the part where we will let the audience decide themselves whether we are magicians anot.

And also, i like the drug dealer patter. Haha!! Nice one.

drug dealer patter? who did that? Was it at the AMN convention thingy just now?

very true indeed,

"When ever you work, always think you're the best magician in the world... but know that you're not." - Jon Allen

"If you were half as good as you think you are, you'd be twice as good as you really are." - Dai Vernon


but allow me to clarify my stand (which may seem very confusing):

i think its unethical to make any claims or allow the audience to believe in real magic. this, to me, is no different from frauds, psychics and mediums.

but as long as the audience believes that nothing u do is occult, its fine. at the same time, techniques should never be hinted at. its an emotional and intellectual thing.

the audience must feel like its real magic, but know that it isnt.
they must feel like there is no possible techniques, but know there must be.

magic, like other art forms, plays with emotions. for as long as the audience feel like they are in wonderland, but are able to accept reality, its fine.

DISAGREE!

No way man. If you say that we're frauds by posing that our magic is real, so be it. I'd rather be a fraud then go near the ' magic is fake ' stand.

You have to look into 2 directions.
If you're performing to a layman, then you're performing magic.
If you're performing to a a fellow Magician, the you're performing a sleight of hand.
The degree a appreciation from a layman point of view and a Magician point of you, are totally different.
To a layman, when he sees something out of nothing, they call it "It's magic".
To a magician, when he sees his fellow Magician performs a routine, he appreciate the sleights and skills in this expect.

Uhm, I came up with that, never heard it said by anyone else before.

As for gordie, magicians ALWAYS lie. Yes, we try to be as honest as we possibly can, but at times we just can't tell the truth (I don't know if it's considered as lie, but we're concealing the truth nevertheless;)). Lots of patter requires "some lies":

(DL)"Hold on to this 2 of Clubs", Turn it face down give the spec a single card, "Now with that 2 of Clubs...

I don't think by showing them something impossible that is harmless and claim it as magic would be an act of fraud. After all, we ARE magicians, we don't claim to be paranormal when we do mentalism act, we don't claim to use voodoo to make something levitate, but they know we're magicians. And they have agreed to let us take them that we can do the impossible; which under their comprehension, it's something that they like to call magic.

U guys misunderstood Gordie. He is telling to juz say that we are entertainers, we are not people tat goes around and say that we are magicians and they believe that real magic exists.

Cause in this world, because of people believing magic exists, alot of cheats appear to grab money from those innocent people.

We are magicians, we create magic into people, but not saying that we know magic. Cause in the end, there is no magic, but a series of illusions that make people being surprised.

I dun know whether i am right to say that. But wat he means is that, its onli a thin line between the real and the unreal done by us, magicians. Whether we want to misuse the unreal and then forsake the real, its up to us individual. And i believe that i will deliver the unreal to people, but i wont drop them further into the unreal. And making them believe that we got pyshic or some other energy.

of course magician lie, if u think about it, we are just actors. robert houdin? once said "We are actors playing the role of a magician." there is actually no such thing as a magician technically, but it is generally accepted that magicians do not do anything occult. surprisingly, theres still a substantial number of people who believe in such thing. and these are the people who fall prey to mediums, psychics etc. we would be doing them no favour by convincing them that there are such things.

The way I look at the term "magic" is that it can be divided into two categories (which basically is how the specs would perceive your act):

1. Mystic
2. Impossibility

I, for one, would not want to fall into the former category. A magician may fall into "mystic" when the spec are thinking that the effect is only achievable after the magi spends 40 days fasting and staying in a cave. But we are entertainers, we are magicians (you're right that it is generally accepted that contemporary magicians don't deal with the satan), we thrive to achieve the impossiblity by some means that is unknown to the spec.

For example, in Indonesia, there are several magis who try so hard to make their IT stuff looks like as if it was the devil's work. They are basically trying to get attention, and well many people fall for that. Yet, just like us, they don't blantantly claim it to be magic or anything. The difference to us is that our IT is all about fun and the impossiblity. I know I don't want people to think that I'm working with satan for a triumph routine, but I want to make sure that what they're seeing is something magical, it's something impossible to achieve.

I guess what I'm saying is that it's what your initial intention and purpose is to do magic.



Blah.

ps. Sorry if the paragraphs look fragmented, I can barely think now, just got home from a great MMF performance :D and really tired.