Thursday, June 26, 2014

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 20th June 2014


Noel Clair, host for this meeting with the theme of “Rope Magic”,  led off with lots of appearing and disappearing knots.  He recalled his younger days when he frequently did reef knots, and showed us how he could multiply reef knots magically.

Joel Howlett of JD Magic did “Linking/Unlinking Rings” but with rope.  He tied the ends of three ropes so that each formed a single circle, then he interlinked the circles and unlinked them.   He followed this with the “Jumping Knot of Pakistan” invented by Pavel and improved by Daryl – a knot of white rope jumps from a white rope to a red rope.  Then he did lots of cut and restored rope effects, including a section where the rope was clearly cut and separated (one held in each hand) and then joined again into one rope – yes, impossible!

The “Equal / Unequal Ropes” is a classic effect, the favourite of many magicians, and Barry Whitson did this one neatly and mysteriously to our enjoyment.

The item shown us by Andrew Pickard was wonderfully colourful – three separate coloured ropes merged into a multicoloured circle of rope – a neat item.

The card item that John Ferguson did was invented by J C Wagner, an American magician who passed away recently.  What an inventor of card items was Wagner !    – the detail in this trick is amazing, and the placement of each and every card is crucial.

Pavel, the famous inventor of rope tricks, featured again in the “Knots on Rope” performed by David Whitson.  This is a mysterious effect in which knots appear on a rope as it is pulled through a colourless cylinder (and these knots are not false – they are really tied on, as David showed us by untying them!).  Your author has been puzzled greatly every time he has seen this done.    Another item that David did for us was a card with a cheetah (fastest land animal) speeding across by magic to another envelope some distance away.

Noel Clair performed the “Six Card Repeat” with a surprising ending that shocked those of us that thought they knew where this was going!   Ending the “Six Card Repeat” has been something of a challenge and it is great to see some imaginative variations !   He rounded out the evening with “Adventures in Time”, in which burnt matches became UN-burnt, a broken match was restored, and the time on a clock went backwards.