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The Magic Memories (119)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: Letters From Juan (Vernon’s three secrets); Chalk Talk; Hintertuxer Zaubertage

These are The Magic Memories 119, gone online Sunday, April 9th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

Letters From Juan

A few weeks ago the first installment of Letters From Juan by the one and only, the inimitable, Juan Tamariz arrived, and a few hours before I started to write these lines, the ad for the second volume reached me via the Penguin Magic Newsletter.

I’m sure most of you who are reading these The Magic Memories know about it, so I won’t need to say much, besides, going to the Penguin website will tell you all you need to place your order and form your own opinion.

I was surprised to read two negative comments on the Penguin website, and it is the price we are paying for a free and democratic civilization where everyone can express his/her opinion on everything, and the Internet has potentiated this to the n-th degree, where people who have nothing to say actually do. On the other hand, it might be a good thing, as those who let themselves be influenced by such opinions, will not get the books, and those wonderful secrets (now no longer secret) will only reach those who deserve it.

As for comments on products, my opinion is that all buyers (and only those!) should have a right to express their opinion, unless it contains obvious incorrect information and/or insulting formulations, of course. But at the same time I opine that their full name should show up, and not just an alias. Whether you are in favor or against something, and you try to influence other people’s opinion by publishing yours, is OK, but you should at least stand by it with your name… as I do now with my opinion (no more, no less).

Anyway, the reason I’m mentioning Juan’s Letters is that the first volume already brought back great memories, as I’ve had the privilege of seeing almost all of the items explained on the occasion of my many visits to Juan’s home in the past forty years plus, either in Madrid or in the South of Spain. And I can’t wait to see what the next volumes will bring…

Here, I would like to address something Juan writes in his first “Foreword”, concerning the sharing of secrets, namely when he went to the Magic Castle for the first time and there met Dai Vernon, who later would call Juan “the best in the world”.

They obviously had several sessions, some with others, some in private. On one such “private” occasion Vernon took Tamariz to the library, at that time located on the Castle’s upper floor, and said, “I’m going to show you three things that you must keep to yourself.” And when Tamariz protested, explaining that he is used to share his secrets with his closest friends, Vernon was very firm, “No, no! Just for yourself!” He then proceeded to show Tamariz three quite wonderful moves, which at that time were still closely guarded secrets.

Well, meanwhile Dai Vernon is unfortunately no longer among us, and as Juan writes, “…I feel liberated from the secrets, which I eventually shared with my friends.”

Juan tells this story to express his attitude towards magic secrets in general, and those revealed in these volumes in particular, a philosophy that has been responsibly for putting Spain on the map of the world of magic, and which in my opinion is the main reason why today’s generation of Spanish close-up and card magic is at the very top. It also led to the foundation of the EMM, the Escuela Magica de Madrid, about which I have written in earlier posts (you’ll find the the PDF of the Manifest of the EMM in an earlier The Magic Memories, or in Ask Roberto).

(Yes, I remember that library on the upper floor, where I also met Vernon and had a long session with Bruce Cervon, where he showed me some “closely guarded secrets”, two of which went into Card College (with his permission)… but that’s another story for some other time…)

Juan further comments in reference to those “three secrets Vernon told me”:

Nowadays they are public domain because they have already been described by Stephen Minch in the magnificent Vernon Chronicles books.

Unfortunately, he gives no more detail, and “The Chronicles” spanning over four volumes, make it three needles in a huge haystack…

Would you like to know?

After Vernon left us, and after Tamariz has now unveiled the story himself, I, too, very much like Juan, feel “liberated” from my oath to secrecy: Yes, because I was one of the fortunate close friends to whom Juan told them.

So, without further ado and flourish, here are the “secrets” and their exact lieu of publication for you to explore over the Easter Holidays:

  1. “A New Peek Control”, in Minch, Stephen, The Lost Inner Secrets, Vol. 1, p. 86
  2. “The Transfer Force”, in Minch, Stephen, The Lost Inner Secrets, Vol. 1, p. 93
  3. “The Gordon Bruce False Shuffle”, in Duffie, Peter, 5 Times Five of Scotland, p. 16

I know this will make the day of some of you… You’re welcome 🙂

Unknown and better-known discussing secrets in books…

Chalk Talks

According to Wikipedia:

“A chalk talk is an illustrated performance in which the speaker draws pictures to emphasize lecture points and create a memorable and entertaining experience for listeners.

I know this will interest only a few among you, but if it does and helps only one, the purpose is fulfilled.

Briefly: I have a collection of twenty publications on the topic, one hardbound, the rest softbound, all in immaculate condition. You can have them for $ 150 including shipping worldwide. Check Internet, and you’ll see that they are worth a multiple (just the Tarbell book goes for up to $ 80), and as far as I know, these are complete collections of the respective authors, which is an additional feature. See the photo below.

Collection of 20 publications on “Chalk Talk”

If you’re interested send me an email HERE, and I’ll send you a PayPal-link: First come, first served (I ship from Germany).

Hintertuxer Zaubertage

From WED, July 12th to SUN July 16th I’ll be lecturing and performing together with Thomas Fraps and Christian Knudsen at the Hintertuxer Zaubertage. If you can handle German and want to spend four days in a superb location in the Austrian Alps, with lots of magic, excellent food and as much drinks as you can handle, this is the place.

Unlike a large convention in Las Vegas, where everyone rushes off to some restaurant or show after the last event of the day, once you are stuck at the Adler Inn in Hintertux you won’t want to get away: On one side is an insurmountable glacier that allows for alpine skiing even in summer, on the other side a looong way back to the next spot of civilization. In others words: Once you’re there, you’re there. And that’s, of course, the whole point.

I’ll tell you more after the event. All  info in the PDF HERE. (All of this at a fraction of the money you’d have to spend if you went to the VI-Retreat in Alaska…).

The Magic Memories 120 Pauses

Next week-end The Magic Memories will go on another hiatus, as I will still be at the international convention in San Marino. See you all back on SUN, 23rd April, with The Magic Memories 121.

Wish you all a very successful week – and Happy Easter to those who celebrate that (all religious holidays should be celebrated, by all, not so much for the religion, but because a celebration is something against war and hatred, and for peace and love, and that’s what it is all about)!

Roberto Giobbi

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The Magic Memories (118)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: Remembering… the guillotine (an anecdote with  lots of interruptions); a marketing idea (photo-postcard); News from Helder Guimaraes; practical advice for downloads.

These are The Magic Memories 118, gone online Sunday, April 2nd, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

Remembering… the Guillotine

As I’m wading through the estate which a deceased friend left me, trying to sort out what can still be used, and donated to our club, I keep running into memories, not only of the life of my friend, but also of the many tricks and props I’ve come across in the past fifty (!) years of my involvement with magic. I had almost forgotten my fascination with all those things I consider trivial today… but they were part of my magical apprenticeship and education, if you will, and as such more important than I thought.

Finger Guillotine by Tenyo

One of the props that made me smile and reminded me of an amusing happening was the guillotine depicted above. This is a model created and sold by Tenyo years ago. Although it functions admirably well, with little risk of really cutting off one’s finger (see below!), it is not a good one, and a good example why psychology comes before design, mechanical working, handling and presentation. I’ll explain:

The Tenyo guillotine misses the essential second hole below the large hole. In the presentation you first show that the guillotine works and its blade is “sharp”. For this you introduce an object that represents a finger into the “Work Hole” (a small carrot), as well as a “checking-prop” into the “Check Hole” (e.g., a cigarette). The blade is then pushed down with force, cutting both through the carrot and the cigarette, proving in an “Action of Explicit Conviction” (Sharing Secrets, p. 16) that the guillotine works as it is supposed to. And of course this is where the situation comedy starts… (no explanation needed).

When the climax occurs, and the guillotine magically “penetrates” the spectator’s finger, leaving it unharmed (symbolism of invulnerability – s. Sharing Secrets, p. 110 “Symbolism”), the blade must cut the cigarette in the “Check Hole”, this being an “Action of Implicit Conviction” that proves the blade is sharp after all and works. Without this, the piece remains a demonstration of a mechanical curiosity.

Bottom line: A trick that doesn’t consider the psychological construction of a trick, and only its technical and dramatic construction, may be surprising, even entertaining, but will never be magical in the sense of evoking the emotion of wonder.

Anyway, back to the anecdote I was going to tell you: I was booked by a private bank in Liechtenstein (info about this micro-state HERE), maybe it is the bank you have your money in 🙂 The event was the Xmas Party for the employees of this small private bank, as far as I can remember less than twenty people, all seated around one large table, and taking place in the country’s best restaurant inside a castle.

Upon my arrival the organizer informed me that they would have a six course dinner, and that they would like me to do a short interval with magical entertainment between each course, total 5 mini-shows. Good for me, my specialty!

Of course I was prepared, because before any show, I call the responsible person for the event, and I run through the evening with them in our mind… but that’s another conversation we’ll have to leave for some other time (still, I mention it because occasionally I have professional friends who complain about the conditions of their performance, whereupon I always wonder how this can be, as it is a professional imperative to foresee such things – and it is really very easy provided you talk to your client before the event, regardless of how many agencies are in-between…).

OK, back to the story. First course has been enjoyed, I wait for the table to be cleared, drinks being served, and get the maître d’ to withdraw his staff for the duration of my short performance (again, I have seen colleagues who start before, and then wonder why they’re not receiving full attention…). After having been announced by the CEO (no less!), who first explained how successful their bank business has been during the year, and that they had to do quite a bit of “magic” to achieve this, and this is why they have hired a professional magician tonight, to see if he can, “…teach us a few tricks. Please welcome Mr. Roberto Giobbi!”

I come on, thank and greet, perform some kind of visual opener (can’t remember what, as this is over twenty years ago…), and then, for my first audience participation piece, address a gentleman sitting near me. Immediately a big uproar, loud laughs, applause, cheers… I mean, I had no idea what was going on.

I had not said anything funny, I had not done anything (neither funny nor else). However, with the stoicism of the consummate professional I carried on as if nothing had happened, but made a mental note to ask the organizer in the break what had happened there, as I was sure it was some kind of inside-joke that I simply didn’t get.

Briefly, I finished the trick to kind applause, and let the restaurant staff discharge their duties… they served the second course.

And so it went until the end, to the satisfaction of the customer and his invited guests. After this show they booked me back two years later, being of course the most sincere way of saying, “We liked what you did.”

Oh, yes, lest I forget… the punchline: In a break I asked the organizer about that incredible reaction when I picked an assistant. She laughed and almost fell over, but finally told me that last year they had also booked a magician, a young one and apparently not so experienced, she pointed out.

One of his tricks was the “Guillotine Trick”, as she called it, where a spectator has to put his arm into the guillotine. Well, to cut this short – forgive the pun – the poor chap must have forgotten to activate the mechanism before letting the spectator put his arm into the “Work Hole”. When – after apparently endless jokes – he eventually slammed down the blade, the spectator was seriously injured and had to see a doctor after the show. Apparently he had the arm in a sling for a while, and of course his colleagues at work kept picking on hin and making jokes about it. So, when I chose exactly that one spectator, it all came back again!

Yes, very funny, I agree!

And, of course, I’m full-circle back at the guillotine I started with, proving that although I keep side-tracking all of the time, I never forget the point I want to make 🙂

A Marketing Idea

Recently my young friend Kevin Stieger sent me a physical postcard through the mail, reminding me of a lovely dinner we had in a one-star Michelin restaurant in nearby Alsatia, France: Living in Basel where Switzerland, Germany and France meet, I have access to the gastronomy of three regions!

The front of the card depicts the five courses we had in a restaurant- all except the dessert with lobster from Brittany (homard bleu de Bretagne, arguably the best) – and on the back it has a personalized stamp (Jimmy, the cat, taking a rest after practicing the Takagi Rope Routine I have been doing now for over 30 Years to open my professional performance), and there is plenty of space for a personal message (the photo only shows the upper right corner of the back of the card with the stamp).

Five photos on a postcard
Personalized Stamp (Jimmy on card table)

How about taking five or so photos from you performing for a client, maybe at the table or else, arranging them as per above, and then sending it to your client after the show, or on his or her birthday as a memento/reminder?

In Switzerland the post office offers to print and send one such postcard per day for free. You can simply upload your photos into their predefined form, and they do the rest. If you want to send more than one, you’ll have to pay a fee.

Isn’t that a lovely idea, and so simple? I remember that when our son Miro went to a trip to Australia, he had the post office send us a photo-postcard almost every day with a photo documenting his travel. This probably works only to an address in Switzerland, but very probably every country has a similar service for its own country.

To see how this works in Switzerland (text in English), CLICK HERE.

If you like, using that service, you should be able to send me a postcard of you doing something, since my address is in Switzerland (send to: Roberto Giobbi, Schlossbergstr. 5, 4132 Muttenz, Switzerland).

Secret Language and Inside Story by Helder Guimaraes

You’re probably aware of this, but just to make sure: My good friend Helder Guimareaes has a very well made new project up called “Inside Story”. It deals with how to come up with your own presentations, and he illustrates this in much detail with some of his own creations, which are all quite wonderful, as you’ve come to expect from this over-talented young man.

As you know from my own writings and several blogs I’ve devoted to the subject, how to come up with one’s own presentations is a topic I’m very fond of, and I not only have a lecture on this, but also a full-day workshop. (No, there is neither a set of lecture notes nor a video documenting that…).

To learn more about Helder’s project, CLICK HERE.

If you bought a download…

Occasionally I receive an email from customers who can no longer find the download-link to a video they bought. I apologize, but this is due to a technicality that is of no interest to anyone, so I’ll save you the explanation.

However, as I clearly write in the description of each download on my webshop, IF YOU BUY A DOWNLOAD, please, do not just stream-view it, do download it on your computer, and if you think you are going to watch it again (I hope you do, as almost all my videos are made just for that!), then you should make a backup on an external hard disk, or on a USB-stick, and to a cloud service. I use Dropbox.

This is recommendable not just for my videos, of course, but for all you want to keep. You never know how long a particular site remains online.

I’m flattered that many out there seem to think that I’m at the head of a huge operation, possibly because my Card College books are so famous and widely translated, and that I’m a wealthy man with lots of employees. Actually, it’s only me, a small (but oh my…) one-man and one-woman (Barbara) micro-business. So, if I die, or a cyber-attack sets lose, or, or , or… your download-links will be gone, too, very fast, I assume…

THEREFORE: Do not rely on your links staying in your account, download the videos and SAVE them on your own devices.

End of lecture 🙂

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

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The Magic Memories (117)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: Magic in Rome March 2023 (and lots of sub-subjects…)

These are The Magic Memories 117, gone online Sunday, March 26th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

Magic in Rome

Rome, the “Eternal City”, is one of the mythical cities on this planet. I had the good fortune of having been there several times in the past, almost always performing and teaching magic in some way. Before going into the details of my most recent visit, I have to tell you two little anecdotes related to Rome.

My First Time in Rome (ca. 1980)

My very first visit to Rome with my wife-to-be Barbara, was purely as a tourist when we both were in our early twenties, and I was still a student of linguistics and literature. Two curious things happened that I remember to this very day.

One evening we were strolling through the historical center of Rome, and came to Piazza Navona, the famous square (which in reality is neither square nor round, but oval, as it was formerly used for horse races). At the time there were lots of artists offering to paint your portrait sitting in various spots on the plaza. One of them was an older man offering to read your future, can’t remember what “technique” (palmistry, tarot cards etc.).

Anyway, believe it or not, in a mix of curiosity, ignorance, naïveté, after-dinner-mood (wine?), or what-have-you, I decided to pay whatever it cost (certainly not much, since still students we didn’t have much money) and get his “advice” on my future.

From what he said I only remember this: “You have a great career as a writer in front of you, it will take a little time, and if you were gay the success would come earlier.” That’s what I remember – funny, eh?

Of course I didn’t believe what he said, but still, it somehow happened.

Which reminds me of Nils Bohr who used to keep a horseshoe on the door of his house, which is believed to be an object that guards the house against the evil spirits. A friend, upon seeing the horseshoe on the door of Bohr’s house, asked Bohr as to whether he subscribed to the relevant superstitions. Bohr replied that he didn’t believe in them but he was told that the horseshoe works whether or not one believes in their power.

RG on Piazza Navona 2023 (photo Norbert Fazio)

The other event I remember from that time is that for dinner we went into a Trattoria located on a small street behind the famous Spanish Steps. Barbara and I had a very simple but succulent dinner with Roman specialties. It turned out that this place was a favorite of local artists and intellectuals. As we were the only tourists, we somehow got into a conversation with a few journalists at the next table, and inevitably the conversation turned to what we were doing, which then led to telling them about my passion for magic, especially card magic (I was still an amateur then).

They were immediately full of enthusiasm and asked me to do something for them. As incredible as it sounds, having been quite hot during the day, I did not have anything with me, let alone a deck of cards.

Not to be deterred from this, one of the journalists got up and offered to buy a deck from a shop nearby. However, it was already about 10 pm or so, and most shops were closed. In spite of this, the journalist rushed out, and we waited at least half an hour before he came back with a used deck he had found somewhere. This in itself I will never forget!

And then I started an hour-long session, doing magic with the borrowed deck. Can’t remember what I did, of course, probably all the “classics” I knew, and I also did “Cannibal Cards” (see Card College Volume 3, and for an updated version Card College 3&4 – Personal Instruction).

But the punchline to the story is yet to come! One of the journalists liked us so much, that he offered us to use his flat in Rome while he was abroad on a professional assignment for his newspaper. So, the next day we checked out of the B&B we had, to the dismay of the Italian landlady to whom we offered to pay an extra night, and spend the rest of the week in the beautifully chaotic flat of a Roman journalist, located in downtown Rome.

That’s something you can’t buy with money, only with magic 🙂

How “Il giardino dei giochi segreti” happened

And another one related to Rome:

Most among my readership will be aware of the documentary Il giardino dei giochi segreti, sub-titled in English as The Secret World of Magic (if you don’t know what I’m talking about, you can see it HERE).

It is the year 2003: Matteo Bellinelli, who then was a director with Swiss-Italian Television, had just finished a documentary on a heavy subject, and was looking for a new topic on a “lighter” vein. As he was walking through Rome he came to Eclectica, a lovely magic shop in the historical center of Rome.

He entered, started to chat with the owner and manifested his interest in the subject, saying he might want to do a documentary on magic and an interesting magician. Whereupon the owner pointed out my Card College books in Italian, saying that I live in Switzerland. Well, Matteo bought the books, came back to Switzerland, called me over the phone, and then one thing led to the other, and in 2004 the 50-minute documentary was produced and aired. Talk about the butterfly effect.

Masterclass on Deck Switches

The main reason for my trip to Rome was a full-day Masterclass on the subject of deck switches. From 10 am to 7 pm, with a few coffee breaks (Italian coffee, of course, which doesn’t compare to anything else in the world, least of all to Starbucks…), and a three-course lunch with local wine… anything below this is considered a sin in Italy, and so close to the Vatican you have to respect religion, and Gastronomy in Italy is a Religion!

Flyer & photos by Fazio & Turchi

A full-day session, such as a Masterclass provides, is by far my favorite teaching format: I only get interested people, because they have to invest money (very little, compared to other disciplines, and somehow you can get that back) and time (much more precious, as you never get that back).

The eleven students and I performed, practiced, discussed techniques, tricks, presentations and theories, all turning around the deck switch and what you can do with it. But obviously a lot of the material taught and many of the ideas were polyvalent, applicably to all of magic, and therefore went far beyond the mere topic of “deck switches”.

Everyone was more than happy, including myself, and I’m the most difficult to satisfy. But there is no doubt that besides private coaching this is the format one learns most. I wish I could do such an event once or twice a month…

For all who couldn’t attend, the next best thing is my book The Art of Switching Decks, that also includes the video lecture I gave at the Genii Convention in Orlando in 2012. The book has seen an unusual success and is now in its fourth printing (instead of the DVD you now receive a download link for the video, making it practical for modern requirements).

Impressions of the day (photos Andrea Turchi)

Lecture for IBM Ring

On Monday night I gave a lecture for members only of the IBM Ring 204 in Rome.

The lecture’s title was “Excursus magicus” (in Latin to honor Rome, of course…), sub-title, “A roundtrip in the world of magic”. I assembled three topics for which I have three other lectures: One, how to find your own presentation for magic tricks; two, how to study a technique taking Controls as an example; three, criteria and staging of professional magic. I had planned two hours, I did three and a half. Everyone stayed awake and survived 🙂

In my personal opinion lectures should not be misused to sell things (although I perfectly understand the necessity of doing so for my colleagues who do lecture tours and accept to do so at dishonorable fees), but to share knowledge and insights gained by someone who has studied the matter, very much like professors impart lectures and workshops at universities. As a result of this, a lecture needs a specific focus that should be communicated so as to have only interested people in the audience. I have a lecture on “How to Give a Magic Lecture” (what else did you expect?), and the more I think about it, the more I’m led to believe that it could interest more than just a few. We’ll have to leave it for another time, though…

To my great surprise, and as an unforgettable moment of the evening, Silvan attended, yes, the one and only… When entered the room to greet me, he whispered into my ear, “I came only to see you…” And in the break I overheard him saying to President Andrea Turchi, “Giobbi é un grande.” Made my day.

Silvan with best seat for Giobbi lecture

It should not be necessary for me to do so, but if there are newcomers to the magic world who are reading these memories, I should add that Silvan is arguably Italy’s most famous conjuror, I mean of all times, including Giuseppe Pinetti and Bartolomeo Bosco.

In Italy, if you do magic well, people will say to you, “Sei proprio un Silvan – you are really a Silvan.” The name “Silvan” has entered the urban vocabulary, and that’s a feat to behold. This man justifies a big book, and as a matter of fact he has written several, all for the public, most out of print, unfortunately, including an autobiography that is still available (Silvan – La magia della vita. La mia storia.If you read Italian or want to practice it, you can get it HERE.

 

from left to right: Unknown, Silvan (Rome 2023)

In the photo-montage below you can see the two organizers Prof. Dr. Andrea Turchi (bottom left) and Norbert Fazio (center right) who were responsible for bringing me to Rome for these two wonderful events.

Impressions of the Lecture for IBM Ring 204

Luca d’Agostini on Marked Cards

A participant to both the masterclass and the lecture was Luca d’Agostini, a man of many talents. Among other things he’s quite an expert with playing cards and also a collector. See more HERE.

He gave me his latest offering, a set of lecture notes, which is about to be turned into a book, on the subject of marked cards, “readers” to be more precise. Readers, as opposed to other marking systems, are marked with letters and numbers, e.g., 7D (Seven of Diamonds), so that upon seeing the mark, you instantly know the card’s identity without having to learn an obscure symbolic system.

The notes have only some 30 pages, but are packed with historical, technical and other information, plus feature some really good tricks using readers. The notes come with several transfer sheets that will allow you to make up your own reader deck, an excellent idea.

We hope that Luca will make this publication available in English soon for all of us to enjoy and learn from it.

Luca d’Agostini’s publication on readers

Alea Jacta Est

Since we’re talking marked cards and Rome, an obvious association are dice, as well as one of the most popular Latin sayings, “alea jacta est – the die has been cast”. Which brings me to my friend Gianfranco Preverino from Varese, Italy.

Gianfranco is not only an accomplished magician, but also quite an expert in gambling matters. He’s currently writing a large book about dice and magic which will hopefully be available also in English soon.

I met Gianfranco for the first time when he came to an event sponsored by the “Silvan Magic Academy” and where I taught for three consecutive days, a total of 16 different lectures, workshops, sessions – never have done anything similar before or after, and it deserves an entire blog (might do sometime in the future…).

Anyway, I fine friendship developed since, and Gianfranco, who had then started magic quite recently, made an exponential career and is today a household name of Italian magic. In May he will be performing for the second time in the Close-up Gallery of the Magic Castle, and if you have a chance you should try to see and meet him.

You can see him do some interesting dice moves HERE – enjoy!

Gianfranco and Roberto: First meeting, Tuscany 1999.

Roman Curiosities

As much as I would like to, neither space nor time allow me to tell you about my touristic and gastronomical adventures around the magic events. With one exception: There is a tourist attraction that is off the beaten path and reminds me of a trick I used to do years ago.

On one of the seven hills of Rome, the Aventine Hill, resides the Villa del Priorato di Malta, and looking through its key-hole from outside you can see the dome of St. Peters’ Basilica, through three states, namely, Malta, Italy and the Vatican. Find all info HERE.

view through a key-hole

Many years ago I used a Two of Hearts with a blank back, into which I had cut a key-hole that fits nicely between the two pips of the 2H.

Using the Carlyle Business Card Move you can show it on both sides blank. Force the 2H from the deck in use, and have all see the card, except one person whom you ask to stand beside you.

Now show the “Key-hole Card” with its blank side to the audience and ask what they see through the key-hole. They will say nothing, or simply what they see (you, someone else, etc.). Now you could tell the story of the key-hole on the Roman hill, and maintain that similarly some people have the ability to see further than others. Hold the gimmicked card in front of the spectator standing beside you, with the 2H facing him, and ask what he sees through the key-hole. If he’s at all a good sport, he’ll name “The Two of Hearts”!

You could later switch the card for a double-blank card with a key-hole, or the commercially oriented among my readership might even want to make it up as a business card…

I’m also reminded of the following stunt I’ve read about, but have only done once, if memory serves me well: Force three known cards on three spectators (I would force the 4C, 2H and 7D, the first three of Mnemonica, because I can’t remember three cards… but I can remember 52, which some might find is a paradox… but it isn’t, it’s just practical).

Ask the spectators to put their respective cards face up on a chair and to sit on it. Then ask them to open their mouth. Yes, you can see it come, can’t you? You look into each person’s mouth and announce the name of the cards!

Freud would have called this “free association”.

To be done after midnight, and in male company only.

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

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The Magic Memories (116)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics is: Visiting Paris March 2023.

These are The Magic Memories 116, gone online Sunday, March 19th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

Visiting Paris

For earlier information on Paris, check The Magic Memories 94 of  OCT 16th 2022.

Following are a few impressions from my most recent visit two weeks ago, which was a short-term decision: My friend Robert Jägerhorn from Finland called and stayed with us for a few days.

Robert is a magic pro, and you might have seen him at a magic convention years ago with his act performing as an airline pilot. However, like many successful professionals, you don’t see him a lot at magic functions… You can learn more about him HERE.

Since Robert had booked his flight back to Finland from Paris, I decided to join him for a few days in my favorite city, Paris, which is a mere 3-hour fast-train-ride from Basel: Leave Basel at 08:34, have lunch in Paris! An artists’s life…

Session With Bebel

We arrived on time on March 1st, at Gare de Lyon, and left our luggage at the hotel. I always take a hotel near the train station, so at arrival and return I can just walk over without having to take the Metro (the subway in Paris) or a taxi, as traffic problems are omnipresent in Paris, let alone when they go on strike, a favorite occupation in France… (they had announced a General Strike on Tuesday, fortunately I left on Sunday).

With beautiful weather we took an almost one-hour walk to Bebel’s favorite restaurant in the 18th arrondissement – Paris is organized in 20 districts, called “arrondissements”. The 18th, “the Montmartre quarter”, is famous for its Basilica of the Sacred Heart (Sacré-Coeur). It is quite touristy, but the Parisians have made a real effort in the past years to upgrade it for the locals, and it is now quite attractive.

When we arrived at the restaurant – “Café Bruant” in rue des Abbesses 59, an unassuming little bistro – I told the waitress we were friends of Bebel waiting for him, and immediately were assigned a larger table for five in a cosy corner, rather than a tiny table of two for tourists 🙂

And there I had a “tartare coupé au couteau”, invariably my first dish when I arrive in Paris; “coupé au couteau” means the meat is cut with a knife rather than letting it through a grinder, a world of difference, like a card trick done by a beginner and an expert.

 

RG, Robert Jägerhorn, Bebel – Paris MAR 2023

When Bebel arrived, we immediately started a session that for me lasted until late afternoon, when I had to leave to see my publisher Georges Proust at the “Musé de la magie et curiosité” (see below).

If you are reading this blog, you’ll probably be familiar with Bebel’s work.

He’s a real model for many of us, not just for his talent in magic, which is over-abundant, but also for his modesty, humbleness and kindness.

When I first met him on my first visit to Paris, over thirty years ago, he was a poor and sick kid. But through sheer perseverance and love for magic, he made it, a French version of the American Dream you  might say, now being world-famous among magicians, and being able to lead a life with great dignity.

Although he got work on TV and also had his theatre shows, he still goes back to his roots, and on any night with good weather, you can find him performing sitting at a table, under a lamp post near the Metro Mabillon on the sidewalk, next to Boulevard Saint-Germain, from about 9 pm to late into the night.

If you want to see a video of Bebel in his element, early in his career, CLICK HERE.

Bebel and his magic deserve a book, but suffice it here to say that his magic is original, inspired and immaculately performed, without braggadocio, just kind and humble – and his audiences, magicians and laymen alike, love him for that.

If you study his work you’ll find it very visual, organized in short sequences, often redundant in the sense that the same effect is reapeated with variations. I’m not much of a musician, but I can see analogies in the composition of certain musical pieces. (My musician friend Roland Heuer could express this in learned terms.)

This is due to the fact that performing in the street entails an audience which comes and goes, and at any moment should be able to grasp the plot of a trick and its effect. Bebel’s style of performance and the construction of his pieces are designed to satisfy the requirements of this situation at a high artistic level.

All who perform in similar situations, or who do bar or table magic, would greatly benefit from studying his work.

Bebel is working on a book, and we discussed the ins and outs of it, too. He was especially interested to hear how I organize my material and information using Evernote, and I gave him a quick lecture on it – I made a note to come back and offer my know-how and experience for a larger group who seems to be interested in the matter.

The rest of the session was spent with Bebel showing us his latest findings, which are all truly remarkable, and we did a few things for him, too.

To see Bebel perform more, simply go to YouTube and enter “bebel magie”, and you’ll be able to spend the rest of the day (or night) watching him 🙂

Musé de la magie et curiosité

The “Marais”, in the 3rd arrondissement, also called the “Jewish Quarter”, is one of the most attractive for tourists. There you find George Proust’s museum of magic in the rue St. Paul 11, and Dominique Duvivier’s “Double Fond” cafe and magic cabaret (see below).

While Robert and Bebel continued playing the cards, I made my way to George Proust’s museum, a great walk through the boulevards and small streets of Paris, still full of small privately owned shops, although many have been replaced by run-of-the-mill and absolutely uninteresting shops that offer fashion, shoes and other unnecessary things, shops that you find in any big city…

Proust is another who deserves a HUGE book, being one of the important collectors, owner of the “Academie de magie”, a big and innovative magic shop, a publisher of some of the most important books in French, and, and , and…

Together with the late Christian Fechner, he was also responsible for the exhibits on Robert-Houdin in the Robert-Houdin Museum in Blois, always worth a visit (ca. 90 minutes by train from Paris).

Proust is also the publisher of hundreds of books in French, and even two of my books in French (I collected my yearly royalties, which paid for a meal in Paris… no comment).

His latest publication is a 500-plus-pages book, magnificently illustrated with many colored photos on the history of French magic dealers called MARCHANDS DE RÊVES, written by Proust and Philippe Saint-Laurent. This is only volume 1, and several more are in the works.

If you come to Paris, this place is a must-see.

For more information on the opening hours of the museum, the many publications etc. CLICK HERE.

Show at the Double Fond

I had been at Duvivier’s Double Fond before, many years ago, shortly after its opening. I still remember it because I was the only spectator!

Still, they put on the full 75-minute show, and being the only spectator I had to pick cards, shuffle, and eventually work almost as much as the performer, who on that particular night was “Le Nain”.

As you will see, if you go to their webpage, they have several performers, and different shows going on, and it’s not easy to find out who does what and when, and if you do, it might change… so the best thing is to call or write in and ask if you want to see a particular performer or show.

If you are lucky you get to see Gaetan Bloom, David Stone, or the Master himself, the Great Duvivier, possibly together with his daughter Alexandra, who keeps reminding everyone that she fooled P & T, as have hundreds of others.

As for Duvivier, he’s quite a controversial person, and among the Parisian magicians it is not easy to find one who likes him. Nonetheless, it has to be said, that he’s quite a character, does what he does in a unique way, and is certainly what you’d call a “mover and shaker”: He owns Mayette magie, one of France’s first magic shops, has been the editor and publisher of its magic magazine LE MAGICIEN from N°127 to 158, together with Gaetan Bloom and Jean-Jacques Sanvert (the webshop says you can still buy them for € 360,19), owns and runs the Double Fond, and recently has put up a video channel on Internet, as well as a magic school that receives a grant from the state- as the French say: “Il faut le faire – you’ve got to do it.”

Since Robert had never been at the Double Fond, and we only had one evening off, we simply got there before 9 pm, had an acceptable quick dinner at the bistro next door, and easily got in without reservation.

To our surprise the evening’s performer was our friend Boris Wild, who did a double-take when he saw me in the audience – surprise, surprise 🙂

Boris had done this hundreds of times before, so walked through the performance with the consummate ease of a professional, and the 27 spectators in the audience went along splendidly. As part of the show he did his “Kiss Act”, as well as his “Butterfly Act”, both of which you can see if you enter “boris wild kiss act” in YouTube.

It amused me that Boris was using a headset-microphone to speak to the 27 people of whom the one farthest away was less than three meters, but it seems to be one of the theatre’s “policies”. Another such strange “policy” is to have a monitor behind and above the head of the performer, which shows the latter, only smaller than you can see him anyway live.

This said, if you are in Paris, I recommend visiting the Double Fond and see the show, BUT make sure to check their homepage to see if the show is on, and who is performing – if you want to play it safe, call (all info online).

RG, Boris Wild, Robert Jägerhorn – Paris 3-2023

Playing Card Museum

Whatever you do in Paris, make sure to visit the French Playing Card Museum in Issy-les-Moulineaux. Simply take the Metro line 12 to the end station “Marie d’Issy”; try to arrive around noon, so you can have  lunch at “Les Colonnes”, a French type Brasserie serving excellent traditional dishes. Robert and I had “Ragout de Joue de boeuf”, similar to “Boeuf Bourguignon”, but with beef cheek, and “Quenelles de chocolat noir aves crème anglaise de pistache”, the latter being worthy of a Michelin-star restaurant. A “café serré” (Espresso) and a “petit Calva” (Calvados, Tamariz’s favorite when he lived in Paris), and we were ready for the museum visit.

I said this before, and will repeat it here: This museum will be interesting to any intelligent person, i.e., a magician’s wife, partner etc. (you’ve got to be very smart to live with a magician…). The place is absolutely enthralling, from the architecture, from the exhibits, and from the didactical manner the exhibits are presented – this is the ultimate challenge for any museum. You’ll need ca. 90 minutes to visit the museum, for me the ideal time, plus 10 minutes for the shop… (never forget the museum shop, as there is ALWAYS something of interest).

BTW: The poster you see in the photo below was designed for the inauguration of the museum by world-famous actor, clown-magician-director Pierre Etaix, a phenomenal talent. Check him out HERE. Speaking of cards: Etaix designed and produced a very attractive deck of cards, not so easy to get – glad I have one 🙂 His biographical work C’EST CA PIERRE ETAIX will be interesting even for those who do not read French, as it is full of photographs and reproductions of his work.

In 2004, when we taped part of the documentary “Il Giardino dei giochi segreti” he came to see my show at the “Musée de la curiosité”, and we had a short conversation afterwards, where he graciously gave me a few ideas for my performance.

At that time I was not aware of what an important person he was, and I wish I had spent more time with him, a truly great artist.

Robert & Roberto entering the museum

The museum has a small museum shop that used to have a larger offering, but is now quite reduced – what a pity! – nonetheless, I made a find in form of a book about the history of the Joker. Some of the essays contained are truly interesting for us magicians, as they give a deeper insight into the history and symbolism of the Joker. However, it is in French…eh, oui!

Serna, Pierre (ed.) – Le Joker (2021)

Session With Bernard Bilis

A visit to Paris wouldn’t be complete without seeing my good friend Bernard Bilis, who always surprises me with his enthusiasm, his novel findings and his out-worldly skill.

His book is still in the works, as I have already mentioned, and nobody knows better than me what it means to go through all the work before a book hits the market. Bilis’ magic is quite astonishing, original, complex, and full of technical finesse. However, it is not for the faint-hearted…

Bilis & Gobbi between Cards and Cigars

I sessioned with Bernard after Robert had left for the airport to take his flight back to Finland, but before we fortunately had a copious lunch at one of the Parisian classics, “Le pied de cochon”, literally the pig’s foot, near Les Halles, and after the oysters, which are de rigueur if you eat in Paris, I had a pig’s foot stuffed with foie gras, black truffles and some other mysterious ingredients… I maintain that gastronomy is the perfect analogy for magic… I keep promising to write about it… I will… sometime 🙂

Among the many things, Bernard showed me a wonderful move that has great potential, as it can solve many technical problems of card magic, and when it will be published, it should take the magic world by storm – until then, shhh, it’s a secret 🙂

Yves Carbonnier

Another unavoidable appointment when in Paris is having dinner at Yves’, a friend of many years, sharing magic, bread, wine and cigars. I spent the last evening at his home with his charming wife Véronique, we had a fine dinner (Yves is a great chef!), and talked lots of magic.

If you read French, or want to learn it, Yves’ book called Grand livre de cartomagie published a few years ago by Marchand de Trucs and obtainable HERE, will enthrall you.

“I told you a million times that you must not exaggerate!”

There would be a few more things to tell, but I have taxed your patience already to the limit, so will stop here.

In the next The Magic Memories 117, I will tell you about my adventures in Rome, the “Eternal City”, the magic I saw there, the unique meeting with the legendary Silvan, and of course give some hints at how to get around Rome as the Romans do 🙂

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

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The Magic Memories (115)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: I’m in Rome, Italy…

These are The Magic Memories 115, gone online Sunday, March 12th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

When in Rome Do as the Romans Do

As announced earlier, this week’s The Magic Memories will pause, for I’m in Rome right now, with a Masterclass about deck switches on SUN, 12th and a lecture on MON, 13th, both for the IBM Ring 204 “Il Circolo degli Illusionisti”, ably organized by my good friend Norbert Fazio, the club’s president.

Below is a great souvenir photo, taken in front of the world-famous “Fontana di Trevi”, the one of which it is said that if you throw a coin into, you will return to Rome.

I did in 2006, which made me return in 2015, and now again in 2023, proving, of course, that the “magic” works!

Nobody will be able to prove the contrary, because you cannot prove a negative, and that’s how superstition and other beliefs are formed and maintained – but that’s another conversation :-).

Rome 2006 (Wolf Neubauer, Juan Tamariz, Franco Silvi, RG)

Will report next week about my adventures in Paris and Rome 🙂

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

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The Magic Memories (114)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: Break for Paris. Masterclass and Lecture in Rome (announcement)

These are The Magic Memories 114, gone online Sunday, March 5th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

Hello, everyone!

I’m on my way back from Paris and getting ready for my trip to Rome.

Will tell you more about my two trips and the magic in The Magic Memories 116.

Masterclass and Lecture in Rome

In Rome, on Sunday, 12th March I’ll be holding a full-day masterclass on deck switches, and Monday, 13th March a lecture for the IBM Ring 204 of Rome – if you are in Rome or want to travel to Rome (why not!?), for more information and to register CLICK HERE.

As announced earlier, because of my stay in Rome, The Magic Memories 115 will go on a hiatus, and I’ll be back for The Magic Memories 116, on Sunday, March 16th, as always at 0:007 h sharp.

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

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The Magic Memories (113)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: The German Cardworkshop 2023

These are The Magic Memories 113, gone online Sunday, February 26th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

German Cardworkshop 2023

I’m back from the German Cardworkshop (CWS) that took place in the beautiful city of Nuremberg, Bavaria, from SUN, FEB 19th to TUE, FEB 21st.

Origin and Organisation

You’ll notice that these are unusual dates, as the CWS is not held on a week-end, as one might expect, but on week-days. The reason is interesting and has to do with the shift in the kind of people who attend.

When the CWS was first held in November 1975, practically all the attendants were amateur magicians. In the photo below taken ten years later, in 1985, and one of the first I was part of, not one single member was working magic professionally.

…an early Cardworkshop, 1985

Even Wolff, Baron von Keyserlingk (seventh from the left in the back row), who later became a successful professional, at that time was still earning his living as an attorney. And I went professional a few years later, in 1988. For years Wolff and I were the only ones.

I call this the “First Period of the CWS”.

You’ll also notice two more things: First, that almost everyone wears a tie, a hint at the formal aspect of the event. Second, the elegant ladies in the front row 🙂

The gathering was also understood as a social event, were several brought their wife, and the wives among themselves formed a community that had as much fun as the men had with discussing “card tricks”. (Interesting to note that to this day, 2023, there has not been one single woman in the CWS, not because it is an all-men gathering by constitution, but because never ever has a woman asked to be part of it – if she had the competence required, she would be welcome.)

Below you can see a group photo of today’s CWS-attendants (FEB 2023).

CWS group 2023 (photo: Denis Behr)

Interesting to note that now, from the 15 participants, well over half are full-time professionals, and the others very busy amateurs. You’ll also notice the lack of ties, and the missing ladies! This is, btw, the main reason why the meeting shifted to week-days, and during the German Carneval, as nobody gets work in that time…

I call this the “Second Period of the CWS”.

The only ones who are still there are Reinhard Müller (3rd from the left, front row), and myself. Magic Christian (2nd from the left, front row), although an early member of the CWS, did not attend often, as he was very busy professionally, but now, semi-retired, attends often.

In the first few years, the CWS gathered twice a year, but then found its current format, meeting once a year, limited to about 20 attendants, and over a period of three days.

Attendants

What does it take to attend a CWS?

The CWS is essentially a meritocracy, were people are selected and invited according to merit, skill, knowledge and “social compatibility”.

So, the premier ingredient, if you want to get invited to a CWS, as it is by invitation only, is your over-all competence in the specialty of card magic, be it as an inventor, author, performer, historian, or a combination of all. People can apply by writing to the secretary, and the group then decides if the person gets invited for a first time, and can then stay or not.

Apart from a secretary (Jörg Alexander, 4th from the left, back row), there is no officer, there are no politics, there is no attendance fee (except the cost for drinks & food), and everyone pays his own expenses to travel and stay at a nearby hotel.

Similar to the Card Conference in Escorial (see The Magic Memories 97 of NOV 6th 2022), which served as a model to the CWS, no-one gets paid, but everyone pays his expenses to attend – quite astonishing!

Content and Schedule

Again, similar to Escorial, topics are decided at the end of each CWS for the next year.

In 2023 the topics were:

  • Universal & General Card
  • Kaplan, George, The Fine Art of Magic (book)
  • Various

The topics for 2024 will be:

  • Frank Garcia (card material in his publications)
  • Card tricks that prepare or retain a set-up
  • Multiple Card Revelation
  • Card Magic of Japan

As you can see, the idea is to have a good mix between tricks, techniques, principles, theory, history.

Program 2023

The first session started around 5 pm on Sunday, and is called “The Personal Minutes”, an idea I had launched years ago, and which should give each one ca. 5 minutes to talk about anything “personal” that would be of interest to the group. This could  be some personal achievements during the past year, a favorite book, a practical idea, invention or what have you, or simply the performance of a trick, technique etc.

In my part I gave a few insights into two of the bigger projects I had accomplished during the Pandemic Years, Sharing Secrets and Card College 3&4 – Personal Instruction, as well as briefly talked about a booklet published by Tibor Vargas on card ripping, a relatively exotic subject…

These “Personal Minutes” have proven a great way to break the ice, to start the ball rolling, and to sort of “calibrate” the group.

This is usually followed by a first presentation on one of the subject selected in the previous year; this year it was the first part of “General Card”.

As so often before, Reinhard Müller, a founder member and the “grey eminence” of the CWS, gave a historical introduction into the subject, as he also gave later on the second subject, Kaplan’s book.

Reinhard Müller

“The General Card” is not often performed nowadays, although it was one of the favorite tricks in the repertoire of parlor magicians of the 19th and 20th century: The versions of Hofzinser and Robert-Houdin are legendary.

Certainly, the subject is not very clear to define, as I have already discussed in an essay in my Ask Roberto, there being a confusion of titles and terms along its development since its first appearance in the French literature in the 18th century, and one could even argue that the idea can already be found in Scot’s Discoverie of Witchcraft, or in an Italian tractate of the 17th century that explains the idea of the “Tossed-out Deck”. If you are interested, you can find my essay of the subject from my Ask Roberto, HERE courtesy of lybrary.com and myself 🙂

In the past years the event has taken place in Stephan Kirschbaum’s “Wundermanufaktur”, a bijou of a small theater, that he has now been running successfully for the past ten years (learn more HERE).

Stephan is a great host, as he proved once again on this night, as he had hired a caterer who provided fine cocktails, wine, beer, and food for everyone, and after a most satisfying dinner we continued the talks about the “General Card”.

After that, well, it’s “open magic night”…

The next day we went into the second big subject, with various presenters talking about the various chapters in Kaplan’s book.

To study a book is always a rewarding undertaking, as you can discuss historical aspects, of course lots of tricks, techniques and lots more.

Kaplan’s book, published in 1948, and one of Juan Tamariz’s most recommended books, was an important book in its time, and it is still full of very good material.

The first part, which deals in detail with the short card and its applications, shows how a subject can be taken and studied. This alone is a great lesson, let alone the practical techniques, ruses, and tricks with it.

The second and largest part of the book is filled with tricks that do show the author’s concern for professional details, practical methods and affective presentations.

And the last part, which was not discussed here, as it has nothing to do with cards, deals with how to file material and construct an act – very interesting, I might add…

I will never forget, when as a twenty-year-old, I visited with Juan Tamariz, staying a week at his home at Lope de Rueda 3, and he took me to a show he did in a “pub”, actually a type of Spanish Café Theatre, in a town by the name of Guadalajara (very funny name to pronounce, and of obvious Arab origin, remembering that he Arabs stayed in Spain until the 16th century, the Alhambra in Granada being their last bastion, and that during their 800-year stay have left a lot of their amazing culture). If you ask me what was the most memorable show I’ve ever seen, then it would have to be this one. I can only remember two tricks he did: One was his mental slate routine described in The Magic Way, the other one was “The Lie Detector” from Kaplan’s The Fine Art of Magic.

Never before and never afterwards have I laughed so hard and so much, yet, been totally astonished. Later, I have tried this trick myself, with good success, but of course never as much as Tamariz had on that night.

Within this subject, I did a short presentation on the controversy created by Dai Vernon, who in his “The Vernon Touch” of July 1971 said that Kaplan has lifted most of the material in the book from Sam Horowitz.

Giobbi on the Kaplan-Horowitz controversy

In between the bigger subjects there is always room for other shorter talks on any subject, as long as it relates to magic in general, of course, and if possible to card magic.

This year we had Thomas Fraps with a short presentation on “Movies & Magic”, showing how plots and techniques from movie-making can be transported when conceiving and scripting magic tricks.

And Mirko Ferrantini, who’s an expert in all types of wallets, gave his third (!) presentation on his favorite subject, enlightening us on further applications of wallets in card magic.

Various

Similar to “normal” conventions at least 50% of the fun is during the breaks between the formal presentations, the shorter and longer breaks, the lunches and dinners, which are usually spent together, but small groups are formed here and there, and very personal conversations are conducted.

Stephan Kirschbaum, with Barbara’s “Cups & Balls” Orimoto in the background

The Tuesday Public Close-up Gala

In former times, when the gents wore ties and the ladies attended, and when the CWS was held on week-ends, Saturday evening was the “Gala Evening”, which started with a lovely Champagne cocktail, followed by a formal dinner with a set menu, and finally culminated with practically all the attendants performing in the legendary “Cardworkshop Close-up Gala”, the audience consisting of the ladies (!) and those not performing at the moment. For many, this was the absolute highlight of the gathering.

In the “Second Period” of the CWS, when the ties disappeared and the ladies vanished, it all changed. To the better or to the worse, I can’t say, but I’m certainly happy that I’m now one of the very few who lived in both “Periods”.

Now the CWS ends around noon on Tuesday, some leave, and some spend the afternoon together, private-sessioning, until the evening, when a paying audience of 40 guest enters the “Wundermanufaktur”, first being served cocktails and finger-food (as part of the ticket price!), and then, at around 8 pm, the “Cardworkshop All-Star-Gala” starts.

For the next almost three hours, with a break for more drinks and dessert finger-food, most of the attendants of the CWS perform to an enthusiastic audience, that already buys their tickets after the gala for the next year!

The CWS All-Stars-Gala 2023

All in all it can be said that everyone was more than happy to meet again face-to-face, after the CWS 2021 and 2022 had been cancelled due to the Pandemic, and the “magic vintage” was a good one, not the best, but a good one 🙂

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

PS: Next week I’ll be in Paris, and the week after in Rome, with lecture and masterclass, so The Magic Memories will have to pause twice, but in exchange I might be able to tell you something of interest on my return… sorry not to be able to chat with you for two weeks, but happy that work picks up, at least a little, compared to b.P. (before Pandemic).

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The Magic Memories (112)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: Waiting for Cardworkshop Report

These are The Magic Memories 112, gone online Sunday, February 19th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

I’m at the German Cardworkshop

As you are reading this (provided you do so on Sunday morning, 19th February ’23), I am on my way to the German Cardworkshop in Nuremberg; this is why today’s The Magic Memories go on a one-week hiatus. I’ll be back next week with a hopefully interesting report about the activities.

Meanwhile, here are a few photos from past Cardworkshops.

Below shows one of my earliest attendances, in 1985, when most brought along their wife. Unfortunately several in the photo have passed away.

…an early Cardworkshop, 1985

 

CWS 2011 – Lecture on Deck Switch
CWS 2013 Collage

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

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The Magic Memories (111)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: Repdigit 111; More on the Schnapszahl 111; Match Puzzle; I’m feeling lucky.

These are The Magic Memories 111, gone online Sunday, February 12th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

Repdigit 111

A repdigit is a multi digit number with all digits identical, and today we are at number 111 of The Magic Memories!

I strongly assume that most in our audience have never really bothered about the concept, let alone heard the terminus technicus “repdigit” (“Schnapszahl” in German, a funny term!), which is why it makes for a possibly captivating Prologue (I capitalize “Prologue as well as “Epilogue” because I consider them as much a technical term as Double Lift or Overhand Shuffle, which are also capitalized – see Sharing Secrets, “Prologue and Epilogue”, p. 88/89).

I say “possibly captivating” because it will only be so if properly introduced, argued and finally meaningfully linked to some kind of performance piece.

So, it might not be so smart to start by asking, “Who knows what a repdigit is?”, because you are telling them how ignorant they are, and that’s not what they want to hear, although it is of course true, because we all are ignorant about most things in life, and in that sense, you might say, it would be a philosophical thing to do 🙂

This, by the way, shows how close magic and philosophy are, as magic, like philosophy, shakes one’s apparent certainties. For those of you who have Card College 3&4 – Personal Instruction, the videos, watch “Philosophical Aces” in “Lesson 29: False Display Counts 2”, the second trick at the end of the lesson; it has nothing to do with our repdigit, but with the affinity of magic and philosophy.

Therefore, you need to think about how to introduce the subject in a clever way. A good way nowadays is to simply do a little search on Internet, maybe starting with Wikipedia HERE. As you’ll see this takes you into as many directions as you want to go.

If you like, you can now explore this further.

More on the Schnapszahl 111

What could possibly be so special about the number “111”?

More than meets the eye, and magic is the perfect metaphor that shows us that we look, but we don’t see, and therefore should take a closer look at things.

Here we go: 111…

… can be written with four fours:

complex & simple solution to write 111 with four 4s

… is a “palindromic number”, as it is the same forward and backward, but also a “strobogrammatic number”, because it is the same when read upside-down, and in a mirror, I might add, which opens up some “magical” possibilities )lateral thought: How many “mirror” digits, numbers letters and words in the Latin alphabet are there? Ha…)

… the spelling of 111 in words is “one hundred eleven”, and thus it is an “aban number” as well as an “iban number”.

… is an “evil number”, because the sum of its binary digits (1101111) is even (that’s not a pun, but an actual mathematical curiosity, see HERE)

… is a “semiprime”, which means that it is the product of two primes (3 and 37).

… is an “interprime number” beause it is at equal distance from the previous prime (109) and the next prime (113).

… is a “nude number” because it is divisible by every one of its digits and also a “Zuckerman number” because it is divisible by the product of its digits.
… is a modest number, since divided by 11 gives 1 as remainder.
… is a lucky number.
… is an “insolite number” because it is divisible by the sum (3) and by the product (1) of the squares of its digits.

… is a polite number, since it can be written in three ways as a sum of consecutive naturals, for example, 16+17+18+19+20+21=111.

… is an equidigital number, since it uses as much as digits as its factorization.

… and finally, it is the “magic constant”magic constant of a 6 × 6 magic square (if you wish you can explore this HERE).

BONUS: 111 contains the number 11, which of course is a number you can do a few astonishing things with…

And where did I find all of this? Easy, as I mentioned above, search Internet, e.g., HERE, and you’ll also find the explanation of all those funny terms most of us do not understand:-)

Match Puzzle

Take three matches the same size and place them in a row – you get the number 111, what else did you except?

Now, with them create four equilateral triangles (see solution in The Magic Memories 112), without breaking, splitting or otherwise changing their shape.

As I’ve mentioned in various entries in Secret Agenda, Hidden Agenda, and Secret Twitter, these “match puzzles” are a lovely introduction into a magic piece (a Prologue); simply find a good connection, obviously.

Also, use some of those long matches to light cigars – some of them are quite beautiful and make a nice “trip” for these puzzles.

I’m Feeling Lucky

Inspired by Goggle’s search option “I’m feeling lucky!”, may I suggest that you take three, five, or – why not – ten of your favorite magic books, or any magic books for that matter, from your library, open them at page 111, and then practice the item on that page. That’s actually such a good idea (it occurred to me as I’m writing), that I’ll do it myself right now!

P – A – U – S – E

OK  I’m back, and here are the three books I picked, and the items on this pages:

  • “Speller Transition” (p. 110-11), Super Subtle Card Miracles by Frank Garcia (suggestion: Instead of spelling THIS – IS – MY – CARD, which is a bit lengthy, have him do a Down-under Deal – for this the selection must start out 2nd from top in the five-card packet)
  • “Teleport”, (p. 106 – 111), Worlds Beyond by Paul Curry
  • “Bertram’s Ace Trick”, (p. 111 – 113), Tricks With Cards by Prof. Hoffmann

What has all of this got to do with our repdigit 111?

Well, not much, really, but I hope you’ll find it a fun exercise 🙂

(That was actually so much fun, I might go back to my library and do this with the remaining 3’497 books… on second thought, maybe not…).

PS: Don’t forget to enter “111” in Denis Behr’s Archives… you never know what you get 🙂

PPS: I had 111 ideas to share, but thought four should suffice. Why four? As my over-talented friend Dani DaOrtiz would say, “Why not?”

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi

Posted on 1 Comment

The Magic Memories (110)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: Card magic is the poetry of magic; Note on Behr’s Conjuring Archive; More on Stage fright (Rupert Howard Course PDF); Diamonds of Performance by Christian Bischof

These are The Magic Memories 110, gone online Sunday, February 5th, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020 can be found HERE.

Poetry of Magic

Johann Nepomuk Hofzinser (1806 – 1875) maintained that “card magic is the poetry of magic”.

Frontispiece from Kartenkünste (Fischer, 1910)

As far as I know, he never explicitly explained why he thought this was so, but one day in the summer of 2011, and in a burst of poetry, I wrote about it in my Genii column “The Genii Session”, where I tried to explore the question: If you care (re-)reading it, CLICK HERE.

I’ll reproduce the English translation of Goethe’s timelessly beautiful poem The Sorcerer’s Apprentice below, just like that… maybe that from reading it you can extrapolate why card magic is the poetry of magic… If you have a good theory, let me know and I’ll publish it in an upcoming The Magic Memories.

And it might serve the younger among my readers, who maybe believe that The Sorcerer’s Apprentice is by Walt Disney… but no, it is by Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von… 🙂

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice

By Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1779, translation by Edwin Zeydel, 1955)

That old sorcerer has vanished
And for once has gone away!
Spirits called by him, now banished,
My commands shall soon obey.
Every step and saying
That he used, I know,
And with sprites obeying
My arts I will show.

Flow, flow onward
Stretches many
Spare not any
Water rushing,
Ever streaming fully downward
Toward the pool in current gushing.

Come, old broomstick, you are needed,
Take these rags and wrap them round you!
Long my orders you have heeded,
By my wishes now I’ve bound you.
Have two legs and stand,
And a head for you.
Run, and in your hand
Hold a bucket too.

Flow, flow onward
Stretches many,
Spare not any
Water rushing,
Ever streaming fully downward
Toward the pool in current gushing.

See him, toward the shore he’s racing
There, he’s at the stream already,
Back like lightning he is chasing,
Pouring water fast and steady.
Once again he hastens!
How the water spills,
How the water basins
Brimming full he fills!

Stop now, hear me!
Ample measure
Of your treasure
We have gotten!
Ah, I see it, dear me, dear me.
Master’s word I have forgotten!

Ah, the word with which the master
Makes the broom a broom once more!
Ah, he runs and fetches faster!
Be a broomstick as before!
Ever new the torrents
That by him are fed,
Ah, a hundred currents
Pour upon my head!

No, no longer
Can I please him,
I will seize him!
That is spiteful!
My misgivings grow the stronger.
What a mien, his eyes how frightful!

Brood of hell, you’re not a mortal!
Shall the entire house go under?
Over threshold over portal
Streams of water rush and thunder.
Broom accurst and mean,
Who will have his will,
Stick that you have been,
Once again stand still!

Can I never, Broom, appease you?
I will seize you,
Hold and whack you,
And your ancient wood
I’ll sever,
With a whetted axe I’ll crack you.

He returns, more water dragging!
Now I’ll throw myself upon you!
Soon, 0 goblin, you’ll be sagging.
Crash! The sharp axe has undone you.
What a good blow, truly!
There, he’s split, I see.
Hope now rises newly,
And my breathing’s free.

Woe betide me!
Both halves scurry
In a hurry,
Rise like towers
There beside me.
Help me, help, eternal powers!

Off they run, till wet and wetter
Hall and steps immersed are Iying.
What a flood that naught can fetter!
Lord and master, hear me crying! –
Ah, he comes excited.
Sir, my need is sore.
Spirits that I’ve cited
My commands ignore.

“To the lonely
Corner, broom!
Hear your doom.
As a spirit
When he wills, your master only
Calls you, then ’tis time to hear it.”

On Behr’s Conjuring Archive

I get quite a bit of requests and questions concerning sources and the “is my invention original…” type of question, which I cannot answer all, of course. I then refer most of them to Behr’s Conjuring Archive.

Recently Denis Behr wrote in with advice on how to better search in his Conjuring Archive.

Assume you look for “back-palm”: If you enter the term as-is into the search field you’ll obtain 18 entries (as of FEB 4th, 2023).

Denis suggests that going to the “Categories” item in the top menu bar, and there either enter “back palm” (without hyphen), or even better click through the very well established taxonomy (Cards –> Sleights –> Palming –> Back Palm). The latter will successfully take you to 93 (instead of 18) entries.

Take note, and try it with a few of your own terms to instill the information (see Sharing Secrets, “To Practice and Instill a Theory”, p. 11).

Me, Denis Behr, Pierre Greiner, after dinner at an Alsatian Auberge

More on Stage Fright

I’ve written several times about what we call “stage fright”, which really is a kind of “negative nervousness” – meaning unnecessary and undesirable – before and sometimes during a performance. However, to a certain degree it is necessary and part of the success – what sounds like a contradiction is a complex matter.

Nonetheless, it can be conquered.

In most of my coaching sessions, when someone performs just for me, this is one of the first subjects we discuss, as almost everyone is overly nervous. I then always say, “Don’t worry, this is exactly what I want to see.”

Recently I stumbled over a short text that is part of the little-known Rupert Howard Course in Magic. The first edition is from 1931, no less, at about the same time the Tarbell Course in Magic started. (As always find more info on the Internet, e.g., HERE.)

Admittedly, it is a bit simplistic, and when in the introduction they write “Broadly speaking, stage fright only attacks the beginner”, they couldn’t be more wrong, as this is a problem that bothers even seasoned professionals… and I know several who take medication, or worse drugs and alcohol. All of this is unnecessary if you bother to now about how to master the beast.

However, there is one excellent thought and piece of advice which is worth the whole article.

For a quick read of the Rupert Howard Course text, CLICK HERE.

(BTW: You can find my essay on the subject HERE.)

Diamonds of Performance by Christian Bischof

I’ve known Christian Bischof since he was in his teens, started out with my books, among others, and visited several times, hungry for knowledge, ambitious and talented.

He’s now been a successful and respected professional performer here in Switzerland and Germany for several years, built a house, raised a family (with two kids and a wife!), planted a tree in his garden, and now wrote his first book (actually two).

I remember that René Lavand told me this is what you have to do in order to be a “real man” (many years ago on his visit at my home in Muttenz – see photo below).

René Lavand and me with Rafael (1992)

Last week Christian sent me his “debut work”, and what a debut it is: A magnificent two-volume, hardbound book printed in four colors, actually two books!

They come in a Collector’s Edition and in a Standard Edition, the latter at a very reasonable price.

Briefly: A beautifully produced book, written with passion and expertise. A book that will make you think.

Christian has created a webpage of its own that describes the book and its content better than I could.

You can check details and order your copy HERE.

 

Christian Bischof and me at the Swiss National Convention 2008

 

Wish you all a very successful week!

Roberto Giobbi