Monday, July 18, 2016

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 15th July 2016


 David Whitson, the host, introduced the themes of the night, which were, “Colour Changes” and “Classics Tricks’.  It was a brilliant night.

John Ferguson demonstrated the use of the Svengali Deck.  A card was chosen by a spectator, which was returned to the deck.   The chosen card then appeared inside a sand frame.  Both items are classic tricks.  The Svengali deck was invented by Burling Hull in the early part of the last century.   The sand frame allows a chosen card to appear in a picture frame when a covering of sand drains away. It was invented by Eugene Bosco.

John also showed the Magic Egg cup or Ball Vase.  The cover of an egg cup is lifted to display an egg.  The cover is replaced.  Waving his hand, and lifting the cover again, he showed that the egg had vanished. This classic trick dates from at least 1675, when it was first published (340 years ago!).  Many of those present  remembered using this classic from childhood.

A favourite trick of Al Hirschel is a brass key, made by Viking Haenchen.  Al was able to move the tongue of the key up and down at will, but as soon as it left his hand, the tongue was firmly locked in place. No-one else could move it.  Neatly turned brass magic is really wonderful.

Following the theme of the night, Michael Blakeman did a card trick – a nice colour change from red to black in which he simply slapped his hand on the red card on top of the deck and it changed instantly to a black one.

Following the theme of “Colour”, Steve Irwin set up four Jumbo cards of different colours, turned his back, and asked someone to touch one of the cards.  Steve not only knew which one had been chosen (blue), but when he turned back to face us, he was wearing a blue sponge ball on his nose !!  Hilarious !

Joel Howlett loves manipulation of objects, and this was the theme of his presentation.  He produced one, then two fans of cards.  He produced a series of cards from thin air (like the Miser’s Dream).   He asked a spectator to choose and sign one of several spoons – a free choice – and then as he shook it, the spoon bent slowly and finally broke in two. One member came up afterwards puzzled by what had happened….

Using a brilliant script from Jim McKeague, Joel transformed the fairly tame cups and balls.  He named all the balls – two ladies and a gent, then we found out what a Romeo the gent was – and how jealous etc. etc – you get the picture, and it was fascinating.  Then taking the Multiplying Billiard Balls (from Buatier de Kolta), he not only made them multiply but also move through his fingers – like liquid – and then he started juggling them.  (No, he didn’t drop even one!)

President David commenced with the Egg Bag, a trick that complements the Ball Vase used by John (but who had forgotten to bring it!).  David’s clever manipulation of the egg and bag would have really stirred up any children in the audience – finishing with his showing a cloth chicken inside the bag – “this is Henrietta, who helps me with this”.  Another classic item he showed us was the Chinese Sticks.  He also had a lot of fun with the classic Die Box.

Yes, it was a brilliant night.  If you missed it, you missed something special.