Is Studying Magic Theory Worth Your Time?

Magic Theory Vs Practice Matrix Magic theory.

Those are words that, as magicians, we’ve ALL heard at some point or another.

‘You should study more magic theory! It completely changed the game for me.’

Or perhaps…

‘Magic theory is pointless! Why waste time studying magic when you could be DOING magic??’

Both are very valid points.

Today I’m going explain why you need to draw a balance between study and practice, by contrasting TWO experiences I had recently.

Theory

I personally had my first real ‘taste’ of the world of magic theory when I dove into Strong Magic, by Darwin Ortiz.

For anyone who doesn’t recognise that name, Darwin Ortiz is one of the ‘greats’ of modern card magic and when I say he wrote the book on magic theory, he really did.

When I first bought Strong Magic I was expecting Ortiz to spill the secrets on some of his coolest routines. I was waiting for finger-busting sleight of hand moves, incredible pointers on card manipulation, and at least the secrets behind some of his ‘workers’.

Did I get a single one of those things?

No.

Instead, I read not about card manipulation but AUDIENCE manipulation; how to get stronger reactions for your magic. It suddenly made perfect sense to me; why should I be focusing so hard on my sleight of hand whilst neglecting the fact that I could barely look my audience in the eye??

I found a ton of useful tips and in-depth lessons within the book, too many to cover in one post so here’s ONE example of a lesson on structuring your magic routines I learnt that turned out to be really helpful..

Less is more.

Let me tell you something. When I was starting out in magic, if somebody didn’t react well to a trick I did, can you guess what I would do?

Yep. I’d throw another trick at them. And another. And so on…

I had this irrational idea that I could force someone to enjoy magic if I just showed them enough. As I’m sure other experienced magicians can confirm, this tactic doesn’t work.

Instead of throwing as many tricks at your audience as you can, focus on developing THREE killer tricks. I have since made it a rule to NEVER perform more than three magic tricks in a row. This is because it gets harder and harder to impress people the longer you perform for them. That’s why I highly recommend the following structure…

– Hook

Your first trick should be something visual and attention-grabbing that won’t take long and preferably doesn’t take any lengthy patter.

Good examples of a hook might be the floating card or a card production routine.

What you really are trying to do is capture your audience’s curiosity so they are ‘primed’ for the next trick.

– Second trick, the ‘weight’ of your routine

Right bang in the middle is where you’ll want to be doing your longer tricks that involve more patter. Right now you’re in the perfect position; you have their attention and will be able to really ‘milk’ this second trick.

For example, this would be a good place for an Ambitious Card Routine.

– Kicker

You want to save your strongest material to the end. Your audience are usually going to remember how you started and how you finished; so make sure you end with a trick that has a great ‘twist’ or ‘kicker’ ending to leave a lasting impression.

For example, when I finish my routines I like to use Cube 3 because NOT ONLY is it a great trick that is highly impressive, I work in a ‘kicker’ ending where the previously selected card in the second trick is actually inside the cube.

Did I see results?

Absolutely. I stopped trying to shove ALL my magic at people in one go, and was able to see much better reactions. There’s a reason the top restaurants serve small portions (it leaves you wanting more rather than feeling sick of it!) and it’s exactly the same in magic.

Now, I like to compare this experience of applying theory to something practical.

Practical

Last summer, I found myself in a position where I was with a bunch of people who didn’t know I did magic, and so I got to test out my tricks in person on LOADS of people.

I’m talking two or three months straight of just performing magic for people. At the time, I wasn’t analysing anything or trying to read up on theory, I was simply seeing what got the best reactions and doing more of that thing.

It really was a very simple process that allowed me to become just a little bit more effective every day. And over time, that led to some AWESOME results.

Now, this was WAY before I started digging into books like Strong Magic so everything I did was purely intuitive and what felt right based on experience. And it worked! My magic got a whole lot better.

So the question is, which taught me more; practical experience or theory?

This is a really tough question to answer.

One the one hand, my eyes were completely opened to a whole new side of magic through my reading. However, the experience gained through performing taught me the same lessons – but subconsciously and more gradually. Reading about the theory was a ‘light switch’ moment whilst practicing manually was more of a gradual sunrise in comparison.

In the end, both reading and performing have the same end goal; improving your quality of magic and the way you interact with your audience. Both will take you to that goal; it’s just a question of which is quicker.

The best solution would be to find a healthy balance of both; read up on your magic theory WHILST applying the lessons you learn in a practical situation. That way you not only gain the muscle memory of what works, but also understand WHY it works.

Thanks for reading! I hope this helped you out with any questions you might have had regarding magic theory and whether it’s worth studying.

About the Author: Benji is a hobbyist magician from the UK who also runs a magic site over at thedailymagician.com

Definition of Magic – What is the Art of Magic?

by Dominic Reyes Leave a Comment

If you are a magician, you should fully understand exactly what you do. What is your definition of magic?

The general public often catagorises magic as techniques used for tricking people. Magicians are lying deceiving their audience. Professor Lawrence Hass suggests something very different:

Magic is an art form that celebrates impossible things, and in doing so, it can motivate an audience to look beyond the limits of their lives, and to imagine new possibilities for transformation. This definition of magic rejects the common misunderstandings about magic and explains why there have been magicians in every recorded human culture.

Lawrence gives us the following definition of magic:

The artful performance of impossible things that generates energy, delight, and wonder.

About Lawrence Hass

Lawrence Hass, Ph.D., is a magician and a philosopher. He is Associate Dean of McBride’s Magic & Mystery School in Las Vegas and is Professor of Humanities at Austin College (Sherman, Texas). He performs regularly in Las Vegas and the world-famous Magic Castle in Hollywood. He is also a celebrated teacher of magic and an award-winning author of essays and books about the art.

Dr. Hass’s work as a philosopher-magician has been featured in the New York Times, USAToday, the Chronicle of Higher Education, and on the Discovery Channel.

Your Definition of Magic

What is YOUR definition of magic? What do you aim to communicate to your audience when you perform? Share your ideas in the comments section below.

Is Magic in Bad Shape or is NOW the Golden Age for Magicians?

by Merchant of Magic Leave a Comment

Is magic ina bad shape? What's the future of magic

Magicians love to complain about the state of magic today, always harking back to the golden age of magic. Everything it seems, is going downhill. The new generation of magicians are ruining magic as an art. But is that really the case? Maybe this is the greatest time in history for magic – a new golden age:

But now everyone is doing magic tricks.

Years ago it was harder to find, and learn a magic tricks secret. Only the committed were encouraged or had the drive to learn the ‘inner secrets’. Now that magic has developed into a more mainstream activity, all those people with drive STILL find magic today. The difference is that they are not slowed down by gatekeepers, or lack of access to knowledge.

It’s true that many more casual magicians can now also dabble in magic, but the effort to master a performance to the level of an expert isn’t there. They drop out of magic quickly. The result:

The same amount of committed, driven people take the time to excel and develop their skills.

Perhaps even more, as commitment has become the barrier rather than accessibility. There is a much larger casual/hobby following, but they drop out of performing over time. They remain fans of magic, and appreciate watching magic. That feeds the audience for those that stay the course.

Does price and availability matter?

The availability and price of magic doesn’t impact the quality of magicians. In just the same way that the quality of professional singers isn’t damaged by the fact that songs are free to sing. It’s talent that’s important, the increased popularity of magic increases the number of talented magicians that can emerge. The poor quality acts also increase but don’t gain an audience.

But terrible magicians on Youtube are putting people off magic.

There have been terrible magicians all through history. There have also been terrible singers, artists, authors and actors. Amateur dramatics is not killing cinema, just like karaoke isn’t hurting the music industry. We are not put off by the terrible audition acts when we watch Britains got Talent or X-Factor. We love the show more because of it. There’s a saying: The sour makes the sweet taste sweet.

Badly presented magic on youtube is low quality and just like anything else, there’s always going to be lots of it. It makes us appreciate the real talent the ‘diamond in the rough’. There’s a huge amount of excellent magic on YouTube in amongst the poor stuff. There’s just as much bad comedy, art, dance too, but the good stuff is filtered through and shared.

Poor quality YouTube videos don’t fool us, we all know their status. Some people learn a little from them whilst others get inspired to explore magic themselves, but most people dismiss or ignore them.

Awful Youtube magic videos need to exist. They have a purpose. It’s the modern version of the uncle who bores you to death with his shambolic magic tricks. You can judge good magic against it.

It wasn’t any better.

We view the past through rose tinted glasses. Were the magicians props and tricks over the last 100 years any better than those today? More expensive and harder to order, yes, but quality? Browse through any magic shop website and pick out all the items you think are terrible and you wouldn’t ever be seen using. What percentage of them have been around for decades?

The stereotypical magician is not new.

Magic had a negative stereotype far before the Internet came along. The magicians that are mocked are dressed and use props from the time before magic became so commercial. We mocked unpracticed magicians then, and we still do now. Nothing has changed. What we are really mocking is lack of practice, presentation and skill. Those shortcomings have been ridiculed all through history.

Tommy Copper used magic for the sake of comedy. He did it with love, but its clear he understood completely how magicians were mocked by the public in the 1970’s and he based his persona on the popular stereotype of the clumsy magician who’s tricks go wrong. People tuned in to be made to laugh as much as to enjoy his magic tricks. His persona allowed the audience to laugh AT him knowing they were also laughing WITH him.

TV Magic has gone downhill.

The 1960’s 1980’s and 1970’s, what some refer to as the golden age were not filled with amazing magic TV shows any more than today. Yes, we can name some great shows, but magic on TV was still rare, compared to any other type of program. There were great magicians on TV then and there are great magicians inspiring and amazing viewers today. TV shows have had to change their format over the years as TV magicians have to deal with a different way that the audience watches their shows. We can now record, rewind and repeat shows as much as we want, this isn’t a reflection on the quality of magic presented, but more an adaption to the way audiences interact with it.

The shows are different, but magic is still loved, hated and ignored as much as ever. Many of the changes we see in the way TV presents magic, are happening across all forms on entertainment. Chat with entertainers in any form and you get the same concerns over the format and presentation. It’s not magic that’s changed, it’s TV and audience tastes in general.

The golden age of magic VS. Selective recall.

Every generation feels that things have gone downhill, and that things were better in the past. This has more to do with growing older than historical fact. People don’t like or trust change and hark back to a “simpler, better time”. Psychologists have demonstrated that human memory is hard wired to remember positive events more than negative. It’s just the same with magic. The magicians in the 19th Century probably longed for a return to the golden age of magic, just as we are drawn to do so today.

Magic Today.

Despite how it may seem, magic has never been more popular at any time in history. There are an incredible number of creative people passionate about magic.

Right now, as you read this, magic shows are being broadcast on TV channels all over the world. Thousands of people are watching magic and searching for it online.

Our ability to learn and develop our skills and to push the boundaries of what is possible for magicians had never been greater.

The huge number of amateur magicians learning and exploring magic isn’t its undoing, it’s a signal that magic is alive and well, staying current and perhaps in a new golden age.