If Someone Else You Try To Be

Thoughts on Being Yourself Or A Character Of Originality 

Last night I was reading a book on magic (re Reading) by a famous mind reader called Bob Cassidy.

I really enjoy his writing and love his thoughts on performing and approach rather than just the effects.

There was a two line saying that really struck home to me with regard to a lot of magic I see people performing at the moment weather live,on the internet or on TV

If Someone Else You Try to Be

You're Condemned to Mediocrity

(the artful mentalism of Bob Cassidy,Page 134)

I am lucky to work with and know many leading professional magicians and one of the biggest traits of the ones that stand out is their natural and relaxed approach to performing

We are not all creative enough to invent our own effects but all the magicians I know that are workers find a way to make certain tricks their own by stamping their own personality

No greater example of this could be said by my friend Harry Robson and his Borrowed Ring on Shoelace 

The nearest I have been able to come to making something my own is probably my Gold Cup Con trick which takes a classic plot and re frames it (photo above of me performing this at a corporate event)

I am a big fan of classic effects so on many occasions I am performing magic that has been done by other magicians for many years.This is because finding plots that suit you is really important in enabling the natural relaxed performance I try to convey

This does not mean you have to copy other peoples presentation of said classic plots

I do believe that the magic clone culture is in large a result of magicians now learning most of their new material from DVD

I can only liken it to following a Sat Nav and not knowing how you got to your destination

I started this blog saying how I gain most of my knowledge and inspiration in magic and that is from books.

When reading you put your own interpretation on the writing and in a lot of cases subconsciously come up with something unique

Of course I still watch magic DVD and go to Magic Lectures and watch magic on TV etc etc

This all comes back to my previous blog on making magic memorable and why people will remember you and your magic

It is hard to be unique but there is nothing worse than a bad copy of anything whether it is a cover version of a song a piece of art or in my mind especially a magic performance

Comments or questions welcome

Carl

www.magicbycarl.co.uk