Tip Top Tom

The Australian Society of Magicians, of which I am currently Secretary has just had its Centenery convention. 1907 – 2007

The 3 day convention has come and gone and what fun it was! I was thrilled to see Lennart Green perform. Well, perhaps “perform” is not the right word as he’s not a “show-man”, but he is a card expert. His expertise is cleverly hidden by inelegant fumbles, dropping cards, and stuffing them into random places in the deck. then he spreads the deck and TA-DA they are all in NEW DECK order. Absolutely incredible!
Before this convention I was not aquainted with Shawn Farquhar’s work, but he was definitely worth seeing! He’s got so many terriffic ideas for magic routines! And he’s a real performer.He knows exactly what an audience loves. He’s a real cool dude!
And I also got to see one of the World’s best card manipulators Jeff McBride. I really wasn’t into his style before I saw him in person, but he comes across really well. It’s his overall friendliness that makes the impression when he performs, and he wants to use his magic for a specific purpose: to lift the spirits of those he meets. This is such a wonderful change from the attitude that is portrayed in many books and by a number of performers (ie: smarty pants magician knows-it-all). It really didn’t take me long to see that I do have some ideas in common with Jeff McBride.
Shoot Ogawa was kind enough to teach me how to do the linking rings, actually when he does it they are called Ninja Rings. He’s a good lecturer and also knows how to endear himself to the audience with little jokes and a confident but unassuming manner. He’s got great ideas about the difference between tricks and magic.
Gaetan Bloom was really incredible, and had many original ideas and this was one of the lectures I where I was able to get lecture notes before they sold out since I jumped in immediately after he ended the lecture.
Dean Atkinson is a great performer too and had a DVD with his routines! Pretty cool!