What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 15th January 2016

Al Hirschel opened the time of Magic, with the theme “Free Choice”, and demonstrated a favourite close-up item of his.  A match is pushed through the centre of a matchbox.  Not surprising, you say, until you realize that there is a block of brass in the tray of the matchbox !  

Al had been fascinated by the television show “Fool Us !”, with Penn and Teller, and gave a review of this, which led to general discussion by club members.  We were all intrigued by the way in which Penn and Teller, critiquing the trick just performed for them by the magician on stage, were able to talk in magicians’ code to the magician (and maintain the secret of the trick) without the audience being aware of how the trick was done. For instance, they used “tortoise” to speak about a coin trick.

The classic fooler item of a card with black spots was presented by David Whitson.  The spots change and change again at David’s command.   Then he presented the first phase of a Jumbo 3-card monte item “Chase the Ace” which he is developing.    (Members should note that the magic session at the club is a good time to try out items you are developing in a non-threatening atmosphere !)   He showed us the “Silver Shackles” in a different presentation to one he had done before.

John Ferguson performed the classic Jumbo “Split Deck” trick, with President David and Treasurer Al, in order to show how much in tune with each other are our office-bearers. 

Neil Lynch workshopped a card trick, in which he threw away cards (of the spectator’s choice) until the only card left in his hand was the spectator’s chosen card. 

Ambitious Card is a fine card effect, and it was beautifully presented for us by Joel Howlett.   The signed card kept appearing at the top of the deck regardless of how obviously Joel placed it in the centre of the deck.   Joel added to the “Ambitious Card” plot by combining it with “Signed Card to Wallet”, so that the signed card this time disappeared from the deck, and appearing in his wallet.

Noel Clair has become known in our club for his routine of “Time Travel”, and by popular request, he presented it again for us.  Having marked the time on a clock, he carried out several actions – burning matches, breaking matches in a handkerchief etc.  Then he returned us to the current time and showed us that the previously burnt matches could burn again, and the previously broken matches were now whole again.

Appearing and vanishing thimble was the contribution of Steve Irwin.  Steve loves tricks in which things appear and vanish in your hands, and this was a dazzling vanish and re-appearance of a metal thimble on his finger.