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Blackpool - Internationasl Close-up Show 2007
February 2007
Reported by Mandy Davis
DAY 1
This year the organisers of the Blackpool convention concentrated as much on
close up performance as on stage. To this end there were many lectures
overlapping so no one person could attend all events. There were also two days
of close up shows. The performers worked at six tables for three shows spread
over one day and once in the new VIP lounge on the other. They performed
nineteen times! I was in the VIP room for the two days so my report will cover
the acts as they appeared there.
Our first performer was Henry Evans from Argentina and he proved to be a huge
hit. His lovely manner with both the audience and his volunteer endeared him to
all and you just wanted him to do well. He opened with ‘the fastest cards from
box in the world’ and followed this by simply dropping the deck onto the table
where the colour of the backs changed on impact. He demonstrated various ways of
shuffling before asking several members of the audience to shuffle the deck. A
selection was made and this was found in various ways. Henry moved on to use a
borrowed deck to demonstrate an interesting effect where a value was selected
and all four cards were placed in various positions. A number was named and the
cards were then proved to be at intervals of the chosen number throughout the
deck.
Jay Sankey is a Blackpool favourite. He showed the four most vicious cards in
the deck – the four Queens – and performed a version of Cannibal Cards as these
four ate three selections. Three cards were taken from the deck and a spectator
called stop three times as the deck was dribbled matching the selections each
time. This was followed by some silent coin work, appearing, vanishing, Coins
Across, Coins to Pocket and then a double Torn and Restored playing cards. Jay
ended with a routine involving a written prediction.
Losander offered us on a very magical journey beginning with a salt vanish and
reappearance. He also vanished a silk which reappeared inside a large one before
repeating this to find the small silk in a spectator’s wallet. This demonstrated
some very clean uses of a Thumb Tip. He continued with a Thumb Tie before ending
with his marvellous signature Floating Table.
Ian Rowland was very enthusiastic and swept the audience along as he changed the
face of a card to that of a previously selected one. He displayed two
‘infallible’ predictions and showed that the first vaguely matched a spectator’s
chosen card. The same happened with another selection but when the flaps of the
envelopes were lifted the names of the chosen cards were printed inside them.
Finally a lady volunteer chose one of two pictures of birds and then named a
playing card. This was placed on the front of the deck and by rubbing it slowly
with his hand, Ian transformed the card into one which had the chosen bird cut
into it – one of Ian’s special hand-made cards which was given out as a
souvenir.
Marc Oberon performed his award-winning act to the delight of the audience in
the VIP room. Golden balls appeared and disappeared to music, finally becoming
an Oscar statuette. Marc then gave a demonstration of ‘Any Card Called For’
before going back to the music and changing the deck into a golden one. He
continued with coins before his final productions of larger and larger golden
keys.
Jupiter started with music and card scaling before producing coins for matrix
type effects implemented by two giant cards and a Coins Across routine. He then
joined and unjoined some pieces of rope, following this with large cards which
turned over one by one before becoming the four Kings. From under these he
produced many coins onto the table. Two hankies became a giant rabbit printed
silk, then it was back to matrix routining and the production of so many large
coins from under the cards that the table was covered.
Michael Rubenstein displayed an empty purse so produced coins from the air
instead and vanished them one by one to reappear inside the purse. Coins Across
was followed by Coins Through Table and then some copper/silver transpositions
before all vanished to reappear in the purse once more.
The final performer that afternoon was Gregory Wilson who apparently had not
been told about this show and took ages to appear. Consequently the audience was
somewhat depleted, having given up the wait. In spite of this he had lots of
brilliant banter and worked with a borrowed deck of cards in his usual fast and
furious style, spinning selections out of the deck and performing Ambitious Card
routines – all completely unplanned yet still enormously entertaining.
DAY II
The final afternoon once again saw the VIP room filled with an eager audience.
There were 500 people who had paid the extra £10.00 for this special treatment
but, thankfully, they hadn’t all turned up at once!
David Roth, master of coin work, started the show with his superb handling of
three half dollars and a portable ‘hole’. Coins disappeared and reappeared,
always ending back inside the purse frame displayed at the beginning of the
routine. Using a tuning fork there was some fun with sounds dropping into an
empty glass before these were also used to make coins appear and disappear at
will. Coin work with a brass box followed before we were shown a small globe of
the world. This was used to turn several coins into foreign ones, one at a time,
according to the country displayed. Finally they were vanished only to be found
nestling inside the globe.
Aldo Colombini told the audienCe that if they didn’t like him kissing his wife
they should no longer book him! He then performed a routine with two differently
coloured ropes which linked and unlinked in a spectator’s hand. A card was
selected and returned to the deck and the cards were discarded in twos until a
face up card was reached; this was found to be marking the chosen card. The
discarded piles were shown to have an Ace on top of each and all the cards in
each pile matched the colour of its Ace. Finally twelve cards were selected by
twelve spectators and found one by one.
Simon Lovell, fresh from his long-running off-Broadway show, gave us a very
relaxed performance. A spectator chose a card. The four Aces were placed face
down on the table and Simon took a card to ‘tippy tap’ over them in order to
find the suit. Once the selection had been found it was signed and returned to
the deck. Simon found the card whilst holding the deck behind his back and
singing as Pavarotti’s voicemail (as only Simon could!) The selection was torn
into pieces, and after some typical Simon banter, the pieces were found to have
disappeared and reformed as the selection in the centre of the deck.
Shimshi, a house magician from the Mirage hotel, Las Vegas, performed the tricks
he had explained in his midnight lecture on the first night of the convention.
His performance was marred by his insistence at heckling Bobby Bernard much to
the discomfort of the audience who supported Bobby throughout. Shimshi performed
colour-changing - two black tens to red -, a haunted deck effect, causeing a
selected card to jump out onto the table, and a Ten becomes Thirteen, then
Twenty routine; all was ended with some spoon bending.
Randy Wakeman, another legend of close up magic, aided a spectator to cut to the
four Aces before cutting them back into the deck and dividing it into four
packets – only to find the Aces on top again. A mentally selected card was cut
to by the spectator before ten cards were displayed together with one which had
a different back from the others. The cards were mixed and shown face up. The
spectator chose one of them and was shown that this was not the odd backed one –
or rather it was because now all the other cards had changed to match the
original odd one.
Aaron Fisher had Aces which jumped from different parts of the deck to be found
on top. A selected card was found face up, then the whole deck was shown to be
face up too. A second selection was returned face down and once again the deck
corresponded. Another selection was found face up between two selections in a
ribbon spread deck. The four Aces were then found again in various ways before
the whole deck was shown to be in new deck order even though we’d seen that it
had been a shuffled deck previously.
Nathan Kranzo performed Three Fly before offering a deck of cards for a
selection be be scorched and returned. This was found by the spectator stopping
on his face down card as the deck was dribbled from hand to hand. One card was
named the Voodoo card as whatever happened to it, the same would happen to the
selected card which was now inside the card box. When the voodoo one was first
folded and then scorched, the selection was found to be in the same state. A
nice heads and tails gag followed before another card was selected and returned
to the deck. Random numbers were written down and added up, the sum being the
number counted down to in the deck to reveal the selection – and this was
celebrated with a party popper being set off!
Dan Garret ended the close up at this year’s convention with some ring and rope
effects using a borrowed ring. A thought of card was found inside his wallet and
then Dan displayed a routine he’d explained in his lecture. A card was selected
and a corner was removed and kept. The rest was torn into pieces and placed
inside an envelope. By waving a small sword over it, the card was now shown to
be restored and the spectator was expected to perform the trick himself! This
time the pieces were placed in an tiny purse but when it was opened there was a
note asking that the envelope be examined. Inside was the restored card which
was now laminated too.
We had been treated to some of the top close up performers in the world over two
days and it was great to watch these experts at work. Who will be next year’s
performers? Can’t wait!
© Mandy Davis, March 2007