Presidential...
John Mills
I hope you are all well. Our move to the Devonshire House Hotel is now complete and has gone well. Feedback has been highly positive. The room is comfortable, the staff friendly and prices for refreshment very reasonable.
Despite an accident blocking all lanes of the Formby By-pass our northerly members managed to get through and around 20 members attended Shirley Ray’s fascinating balloon lecture in February. Shirley gave us a highly entertaining and inspiring evening and made the construction of some complex creations seem within all our reaches. I can recommend her DVDs and instruction booklets to anyone who wasn’t able to get there. Many thanks to Shirley.
Please have a look at the back page. Our program of events is now filling nicely and you will need to put the dates in your diary.
Our next meeting on Thursday 9th March is a New Tricks Night. It follows straight after Blackpool but you can premier your new stuff at this meeting whereever you got it from.
On Thursday 6th April we have Scott Penrose’s lecture—Making your Magic more Magical. This will be an excellent lecture and we need a good turnout from members and visiting magicians. Spread the word!
We have had requests to organise Magic Workshops and we are aiming for the May meeting. The success of this meeting depends on you letting us know what areas these workshops should cover and members being willing to share expertise. Talk to any of the council to register your interest in this meeting.
Mark Farnworth is the current holder of our Challenge Cup and has set a new challenge for us to compete for in June:
Challenge Cup 2006
A seven to ten minute routine based around but not limited to playing cards. The magician must stand during the performance.
I am sure that this gives us plenty of time to prepare something.
Lastly, can I give you advance notice of our Dinner in September. Our new Council member Gary Butler has been busy on our behalf and has booked Formby Hall for Saturday 16th September. Tickets will be £29.50 for a three course meal and coffee. There will a magical cabaret and an opportunity for close up performers to entertain. We will also have a jazz quartet playing for dinner and later for dancing. Rick Tynan and Paul Sylvester will start to take advance bookings at the April meeting.
All the best and see you at the March Meeting.
John
To CRB or not to CRB?
A question for Children’s Entertainers.
Malcolm Goulding
Recently (this is written in January 2006) there has been a lot of public interest concerning the question of whether people working with children should be allowed to do so if they have a criminal record. This led me to wonder what the position was for Children’s Entertainers. I visited the local police station and found they were not clear on the subject but they gave me a CRB form.
I next contacted the Criminal Records Bureau who told me that Children’s Entertainers were not covered by the legislation and referred me to their website from which I obtained the following information, which clarifies the position for those of us who, as magicians, entertain children or vulnerable people.
“Applicants
The current legislation does not allow the self employed or individual to apply for a CRB check on themselves. In addition, parents who employ a nanny/au pair/baby sitter directly cannot apply for a CRB check; however, if an agency supplies the nanny/au pair/babysitter, the agency is entitled to carry out a CRB check.”
It would appear that we as Children’s Entertainers are not covered by the legislation in this area of law; this was confirmed over the telephone with the CRB. It is also clear that as individuals we cannot apply for a CRB certificate in their own right, but if we work for a school or any organisation, which is registered with the CRB, then they may, to clear themselves, ask us to have a CRB check carried out for which they should pay the application fee.
Once you have been cleared via one organisation then any further checks for other organisations you may work for are done at their discretion, they may accept the check that has been done or request a second check.
Since parents may ask if a Children’s Entertainer has been cleared by the CRB there is a way by which an individual can obtain clearance. This may be done through an Umbrella Organisation (UO) who would process the application on behalf of either a Magic Circle or an individual. Umbrella Organisations are listed on the CRB web site for any given region. They would charge the normal fee plus an administrative fee; typically £34 (this fee is due to go up to forty odd pounds in April 2006) plus say £5 administration costs. Any individual who applied in this way would need to travel to the offices of the UO in order to fill in the appropriate forms. If a Magic Circle was registered with the UO then the forms could be filled in under the auspices of the Magic Circle. It should be noted that even if this is done, any individual organisation which employs you might still require a further check to be carried out, although this will be at their expense.
A further issue, which I have pursued, was “How long are CRB checks valid? Here is the answer from the CRB’s own website.
“CRB check have no period of validity as the information on the disclosure is a snap shot in time at the point that the checks were completed.”
If you require further information then contact either: -
CRB – Criminal Records Bureau
Telephone 0870 90 90 811
or
CRB Web Site – www.crb.gov.uk
Malcolm Goulding
How To Develop A Go Anywhere Routine
Quentin Reynolds
As a new contributor let me introduce myself and tell you a little bit about me. If I'm bold enough to expect you to read my articles, I'd like you to know where I'm coming from.
My interest in magic started at the age of six when I saw Irish magician Albert LeBas perform at a birthday party. The only trick I can recall him doing was Harry Leat's, 'The House That Jack Built', a production prop based on the Japanese Handkerchief box. Aged 10 I saw a classified ad in The Hotspur comic for Eddie Burke's Magictrix House of Magic. The day the lists arrived wasthe day the bug bit really deep and it has been that way ever since.
A couple of years later I met Dick Richards from Cardiff who was the children's entertainer at Butlin's Holiday camp in Ireland. He put me in touch with the Supreme Magic company and Abracadabra magazine.
Edwin from Supreme sent me a couple of big catalogues. Wow! I devoured them all. When I later joined the society of Irish Magicians, I must have thoroughly irritated the auctioneers at the annual auction. For I was able to describe with current prices all the items from Supreme that came up in the lots.
My next major contact was with Eric Sharp from South Wales who taught me the finer art of entertaining children and for the next twenty-five years that was my sole source of income.
In the 1990's I started to develop an adult act and get into
the world of professional speaking.
If I have achieved any recognition in the magic world it is probably through the DVD "Five Minutes With A Pocket Handkerchief", distributed by Meir Yedid. Your only prop is a man's pocket-handkerchief that goes through a series of adventures before evolving into the animated mouse.
The routine is based on bits of business that are already in the magical literature. What I'd like to suggest to you here is that you go and create a similar routine for yourself. Not necessarily with a handkerchief - it could be with anything at all.
Dennis Loomis has a DVD with a routine simply based on tying knots in a rope. Meir Yedid built an act on using his fingers. Pretty much all the material both used was already in print. All they did was routine the individual bits into a coherent and entertaining routine.
So how are you going to create your own routine?
Magic books, DVDs and magazines are full of impromptu bits of business and effects. You must already be familiar with a lot of them, tucked away in the back of your mind. Pick a theme for your routine. Meir was fingers, mine was a handkerchief. Make a note of all the gags, tricks, business that you can think of. Ask magical friends for input.
Do your research. The older books and magazines are a
goldmine of untapped treasures. Books written for beginners are an equally rich source. Don't overlook Martin Gardner's 'Encyclopaedia of Impromptu Magic' and George Blake's 'Forgotten Magic'.
Soon you will have more material than you can use and you have two problems. What to leave out and how to routine it. My best suggestion is put together what you think feels best, try it out on audiences and let their reaction be your guide.
If you are looking for a ready made routine look at the Arms and Hands routine in JG Thompson's 'MY BEST'. Add a few similar ideas from the Gardner book and you will have a top class routine you can perform anywhere.
Here's the real secret of building such a routine. Any of the bits can be amusing and entertaining on their own but it is the compounding effect of relatively minor effects that creates the impression on the audience.
So get out those books, do your research and I look forward to you showing me the routine that this article inspired you to develop.
© Quentin Reynolds. Quentin Reynolds works as both magician and speaker.
You can read about one of his programs at http://www.speakinschools.com
Getting Started as a Ventriloquist.
Derek Lawrence
Editor: Several members have expressed an interest in ventriloquism. Here is the first of a series of articles on the subject taken from “Puppet Magic” a booklet by (the late) Derek Lawrence.
The first essential is to be able to create a voice distinctly different to your own. This is achieved by pitching the vent voice higher or lower than your normal voice, and, where appropriate, by employing a different dialect to your own.
In the beginning then, ascertain how many different pitches you can sustain and how many dialects you can produce. Multiply the number of pitches by the number of dialects, and you have the the grand total of puppets you could use in any one programme.
To produce the ventriloquial voice the mouth must be slightly open in order to emit the sound. There are two ways of doing this:
1. The muscles around the mouth can be locked by tensing them,
2. The mouth is opened with the facial muscles relaxed.
I strongly advise the second method. (Editor: if you are to avoid repetitive strain injury.)
You are about to make a most pleasant discovery. Sit in front of a mirror with your mouth slightly open and your facial muscles completely relaxed. Now say the following letters without moving your lips: A C D E G H I J K L N O Q R S T U X Y Z.
Now wasn’t that easy! None of these twenty letters present problems.
So only six letters are difficult. They are : B F M P V and W.
F and V are the least troublesome.
For V try this. Press the tip of your tongue against the back of your top front teeth. Now force the long E sound (as in tree) through the tip of your tongue and you will make the sound Vee.
Now for F. Make the short E sound (as in met) and finish it off by touching the tip of the tongue on the roof of the mouth just behind the top front teeth.
In making these sounds you are expelling air. They are the explosive sounds made by the lips in normal speech. Not to labour a point— you must be breathing out when you make them!
Editor: Next issue M, P, B and W.
Colour Die Prediction
Arun Bonerjee
SET-UP
Get three dice, each of a different colour, say red, black and white. (I received three beautiful large dice in these colours from my friend and talented magician and magical creator Chris Wardle of Cambridge.)
Also you will need three paper cups. Take a cup and mark its bottom with a pencil dot. Nest the cups so that the marked cup is the innermost of the nested cups.
Take one of your business cards and write on the blank side: SELECTED DIE: RED.
Get three small squares of card and a drug envelope. Write one word on the front of each card: SPELL, THIS, ONE. On the back of the SPELL card write on the other side: NOT. Place the three cards inside the envelope making sure that the SPELL side of the double sided card is facing the non-flap side of the envelope. Tuck the flap inside the envelope.
PRESENTATION
Put the three dice and the nested cups onto the table. Take out your business card and place it, business side up, on the table. Tell the close-up viewers that the card bears on the other side an announcement about a future happening that you will check later.
Remove the envelope from your pocket and place it on the table non-flap side up. State that the envelope contains three computer code cards that you will require in a few minutes.
Take out the marked cup from the nested set and place it on the table. Put the red die in it. Separate the other two cups and drop the other two dice into these cups.
Turn the three cups mouth down onto the table and invite someone sitting opposite to participate in a psychic experiment.
Say that in a moment you will turn your back to the table and whilst your back is turned your volunteer should move the cups around and then finally leave them in row whenever he likes. Make the motion of moving the cups several times. Thus when he has finished no one should have any idea which cup covers which die. Only then should he ask you to face the front again.
When he has completed your instructions turn back noting the position of the marked cup in the row. According to its position carry out one of the following procedures.
A) The marked cup is on your left end of the row. Pick up the envelope with your right hand, non-flap side upward, keeping it horizontal. Remove the three cards with your left hand and place them separately on the table. Show the envelope now empty and place it aside. Rearrange the cards on the table so that the spectator reads them as follows:
PERFORMER
SPELL
THIS ONE
SPECTATOR
Tell him that he will now select a die in a random way. He will loudly spell the code line THIS ONE and you will tap a cup for each letter until he finishes the spelling. The last cup you tap in the process will be his random selection. As he does this tap a cup for each letter starting from left and returning to left when you reach the right end of the row until he finishes spelling. You will end up tapping the marked cup, which you push forward towards the spectator telling him that this is his selection.
Turn over the business card showing that you have predicted RED to be selected. Ask the spectator to remove the cup and reveal the Red Die. Congratulate the spectator for having a strong impulsive mind that made the experiment successful!
B) The marked cup is on your right end of the row. The procedure is the same as above EXCEPT that you tap the cups starting from your right and returning to the right as reach the left end of the row. You will end on the marked cup and can finish the effect as before.
C) The marked cup is in the middle of the row. Pick up the envelope with the address upwards so that when the cards are tabled two will show their blank side and the third will show the word NOT. Turn over the other two cards to show the words THIS ONE. Arrange the cards to show
NOT THIS ONE
to the spectator. Proceed as in A) tapping left to right. However, the spectator spells this sentence whilst you tap the cups once for each letter and you eliminate the cup you finish on. You do this a second time leaving one cup to push forward as the random selection- the marked one. Reveal the climax as described in A).
Arun Bonerjee