Author: Roberto Giobbi

Hello everyone!

This is item #11 of the Magic Advent Calendar and it deals with a bit of a specialized subject in form of a PDF (actually two!), which at first sight only a few will find of interest. However, I’m confident that you, my intelligent reader, once you’ve perused the first page, will realize that this is much more than what it seems.

Stephen Minch, arguably magic’s most erudite and talented author and publisher, discusses and gives guidelines on how to write about magic,  a subject of eminent importance. If we ever want magic to be recognized as an artistic and academic discipline – Art & Science, if you will – we need a unified terminology…and taxonomy, I might add. I sometimes get desperate when I read magic books, magazines or lectures notes, not to mention when I attend  live lectures, where many authors seem to make an effort to reinvent magic’s vocabulary. And I still find it hard to believe that Mr. Biddle gets credit for holding a deck at its ends, whereas this must have been done (we assume!) at least since 1370, when the first playing cards were mentioned. In any other recognized discipline once a term has been coined it will be used in all future publications. Even if you only occasionally write or speak about magic, you will want to make sure to use correct and understandable terms.

When I conceived my Card College series, one of my very first worries was to find a logical and intuitive terminology for everything pertaining to cards, and I believe I’m the first to have come up and published such a detailed nomenclature. All of you who are interested can download the PDF with the “Map of the Hands, Deck, Card Case & Card” by CLICKING HERE – I authorize you to use this map, as is, in your own publications, and only ask you to mention the origin (e.g. “From Roberto Giobbi’s Card College“).

To read and download Stephen Minch’s Stylebook, with his kind permission, CLICK HERE.

Enjoy!

Hello everyone!

My little surprise for December 10th is my favorite short film by Georges Méliès (1861 – 1938), for me one of the geniuses in the history of civilization.

I look at this clip as a metaphor for what we are aiming at with our performances as magicians, and with the most simple and commonplace of instruments, a deck of cards. I mean, it’s not a Steinway Concert Grand Piano for more than 170’000 USD, just a very good deck of cards for under 10 USD. But people like Ricky Jay, René Lavand or Juan Tamariz create a similar esthetic experience, not the same, of course, but similar, in a way.  A deck of cards reminds me of Picasso, who could take just a pencil, which most use to write a shopping list, and create great art that nowadays sells for hundreds of millions… Ah, you see, that’s why FISM bestowed upon me the award for “Theory and Philosophy” 🙂

I used to show this clip for many years before my lectures, as a prologue, and I have no doubt that you will like it. For a change this is a short one, just under 3 minutes 🙂

Maybe it will motivate you to do a little research on Méliès – It’s easy, as there is quite a bit of information on the Internet, and of course in wonderfully illustrated books about his life and work, and even movies: remember Hugo, by Martin Scorsese, winner of 5 Oscars, with Ben Kingsley? And not to forget the commercially available DVD collections with many of Méliès’s works, still available for little money.

To watch Cartes by Georges Méliès CLICK HERE.

Enjoy!

Hello everyone!

Today is December 9th, and our subject is the “Cups & Balls”, and more specifically Sam Leo Horowitz’s routine published in the SPHINX, issue of September 1938. Although it’s only two pages, it will take some concentration to get through it. My recommendation is to read through it with the instruments at hand; that’s almost always the best way of understanding a written description anyway.

You will find some excellent ideas in it, especially the opening sequence. If you have my book Confidences, re-read my “Overture for Cups and Balls” (pp. 119). Curious to note, that the initial set-up of Horowitz’s and my routine are exactly the same – how did he know 82 years ahead 🙂

If you want more of Horowitz’s genius, go to Stars of Magic or George Kaplan’s The Fine Art of Magic: you will immediately recognize the originality and expertise of this outstanding artist, who was part of the exclusive New York circle in the 1920s. I do not, though, suggest that you follow Horowitz’s advice of repeating the sequences, as this will make the routine too long. Such lengthy and repetitious presentations are only good if you work in streets or maybe some trade shows, where the audience walks on and off. Similar to “Linking Rings”, “C&B” is one of the very few magic pieces, where as a spectator you can come in at almost any moment of the presentation and still understand and enjoy what is going on. You don’t get that with mental magic 🙂

When it comes to the artistic interpretation of C&B Dai Vernon’s routine remains the template, in my opinion. I have gone in great detail in analyzing his routine in my DVD-project Dai Vernon Seminar, which also includes a film clip of Vernon himself performing his brilliant creation. You can get it from most dealers of directly from me (I’m happy to autograph it if you mention that in the comment field of the order form). One of the two DVDs also contains a 80-page e-book in PDF format, don’t miss that!

Hello everyone!

This is number 8 of the Magic Advent Calendar.

Today’s offering is purely nostalgic and might amuse you :-), although I must say, that at the time, this was quite something, but that’s about forty (!?) years ago.

You see me at about age twenty, in the library of my friends and mentors Dieter & Agi Haldimann, performing a routine with chips conceived by Eckhard Böttcher (all credit to him!), who at that time had a very successful magic shop called “Zauberbutike” in Germany. I hope you’ll forgive the imperfections of a youthful and inexperienced but certainly enthusiastic Young Giobbi.

Hello everyone!

In any performance it is attractive to present something topical. An easy way to do this, is to use the current day’s number, in our case number SEVEN, and this is what the 7th episode of the Magic Advent Calendar is about. In the PDF you can download as today’s Magic Advent Calendar gift, the piece “Seven” will fit the bill. Some of you may recognize it as an early write-up of the trick that later went into my book Confidences.

I go even further, and give you the complete PDF of what were the notes for a lecture I gave at Brent Geris’s Magic Apple magic shop in Hollywood, Los Angeles, on ? April 2012. I titled them The Unedited Card Magic of Roberto Giobbi to make it sound intriguing, but really it was exactly what it read: I had only little time to put the notes together, so nobody could proof-read them, and I thought it was a clever way of “staging” any mistakes in it. Of course it was not so clever, but just necessary 🙂 Nonetheless, the edition was limited and numbered, and only 50 printed an signed copies exist, legal ones, I mean 🙂

You’ll find that most of the content later went into my book Confidences, and the item titled “TTTCBE” (The Trick That Can Be Explained) even made it into a commercial trick, one of the very few I ever put out, with moderate success, although those who have it insist that it is quite good (you can get it from The Magic Apple or directly from me, if you really need to…). I can only tell you that I have fooled luminaries like Juan Tamariz and Bernard Bilis with it, so it has to be good – oh my, this sounds like a mail from Penguin 🙂

To read or download The Unedited Card Magic of Roberto Giobbi CLICK HERE.

Do not send in any editing suggestions, it’s too late now 🙂

PS: My book Confidences is now out of print and will likely never be reprinted. However, I do have a few copies left, which I’m happy to sign to your name and send them to you, but you will have to buy it: CLICK HERE.

Hello everyone!

For many December 6th is a holiday, where Santa Claus leaves little presents in children’s shoes. Well, here is my present for the child in you (and me!): it is an old clip my friend Marco Aimone, the president of the magic club in Torino, Italy, sent me years ago. It aired on Italy’s national TV RAI – I have not been able to find the original airing date and place.

This clip is short and sweet, and it uses Card Magic to show yet another little quarrel between Donald and Mickey. Also, it gives us a glimpse into how non-magicians perceive magic and magicians, and important thing to learn, if we want to better understand ourselves and what we do. I like this little clip, and I hope you too.

To watch Mickey and Donald, CLICK HERE.

See you tomorrow!

Hello everyone!

Here we are at the 5th installment of the Magic Advent Calendar.

Hello everyone!

Here we are at day 4 of the Magic Advent Calendar. It is a short film clip, which was originally recorded as a private demonstration and explanation of the “Houdini Color Change”, described in my Card College Volume 3 (p. 744), following a very kind inquiry from a reader who did not come to terms with my description in the book.

I would like to remind us all that a Color Change is not just a “pretty effect”, which of course it is, provided it is well done, but that to elevate it to Artistic Magic, it should be given a meaning, a dramatic unity, which makes it more than just a “quickie”. This can be done by previously having a card selected (premise), then apparently failing in finding it (conflict), only to magically corriger la fortune by mysteriously transforming the wrong card into the spectator’s selection (resolution with astonishing miracle). Now it is an esthetically pleasing impossibility that fulfills the deep human desire to get out of trouble just by a snap of the fingers – who wouldn’t want to be able to do that (and in these times)! This is just one of the things Juan Tamariz pointed out to me many years ago in one of our night-long sessions, when he said to me, “You have to put emotions into it.” But that’s another story…

The clip is very “home-made” :-), in the “writer’s corner” of my studio in Muttenz, where many of my books have been written. I hope that all that matters to understand and learn the sleight is there, everything else is not… But since it’s free, you will forgive the “amateurish” quality…

To watch the clip CLICK HERE.

Enjoy!

PS: If you like the idea of this Magic Advent Calendar and its content (and my innocent ramblings…), you can leave a comment on this page. Then everyone can read how great I am, and how much of a connoisseur YOU are 🙂

Hello everyone!

This is day 3 of the Magic Advent Calendar with a version of Paul Curry’s “Open Prediction”.

In 2012 I was asked to create a basic course of card magic for the Magic Agora project, a great idea for an online school of magic, which unfortunately folded after a short period – the reasons for this would make for a fascinating essay on the obscure psyche of today’s practitioners of magic and the magic market…but I won’t torture you with that 🙂

Instead, here is one of fourteen chapters of what became Introduction to Card Magic, certainly one of the first if not the first interactive multi-media e-book on basic card magic (it is sort of Pre-Card-College). Chapter 9 deals with audience management, and is illustrated by a self-working version (if there is anything like that…) of “Open Prediction”. My open prediction is that even the very advanced among you will find this interesting, and maybe even use it, let alone those who just started out in magic!

To read the PDF CLICK HERE.

Enjoy!

PS: If you’re interested to obtain the complete course, you can get it HERE – I put a price tag of € 6.95 to it (no, it’s not a printing error) so that everyone can get it. I’m sure even experts will find the holistic approach of the course inspiring, and those among you who teach card magic will find it to be a ready-made curriculum for their course.

Hello everyone!

Welcome to day 2 of the Magic Advent Calendar.

My Advent gift to you today is the last segment, over one hour long (!), of my first lecture at Penguin’s, the Penguin Lecture Live – Stand-up Card Magic, which runs a total of 5 hours 25 minutes!!! At the time it was a live stream, and the server broke down, as it couldn’t handle that much – I still hold the record for the longest Penguin Live lecture 🙂 Here people who attended the lecture online sent in questions via Twitter to Dan Harlan, who is a great moderator as you will see. We discuss some interesting questions related to the lecture, of course, but also independent issues, and all can be understood and appreciated even though you do not have the rest of the lecture.

To watch CLICK HERE.

If you want to see the complete lecture, you can buy the download of it directly at Penguin Magic HERE, or if you still prefer the DVD with the lovely Penguin-graphics, you can get it directly from me, signed if you wish (please mention on order form), CLICK HERE. The content is not just a bunch of very good tricks from my professional repertoire, but really a comprehensive course in the art of performing card magic in stand-up situations (parlor and small stages). This is not an expense, it is an investment 🙂 The lecture, BTW, was so successful, that the Penguins asked me to do a second one in the same year, and you can get a bundle deal (only from me) HERE.

And now enjoy!