25 June 2019

Congratulations to the 2018 Canadian Rising Star

The winners of Magicana's Allan Slaight awards will be announced every day this week, starting yesterday. Special congratulations to Carisa Hendrix for winning the Canadian Rising Star award!


From the Magicana Twitter feed:

24 June 2019

Guelph: Mastering the mystery of the mind with The Evasons

From the River Run Centre:
Thursday, April 16, 2020

Jeff and Tessa Evason make extrasensory connections using an incredible talent known as “second sight.” Audience members are amazed when Tessa perceives birth dates, personal details and even the names of distant loved ones — all while standing on stage wearing a blindfold. The Evasons intuitive gifts will captivate you!

“This act is so good – we’ve never seen better!” – Penn & Teller

Read more and buy tickets.

22 June 2019

Winner of Cheap Tricks 2

Earlier this month, The Sentimentalists hosted a contest for inexpensive impromptu magic: Cheap Tricks 2.


One of the participants, James Alan, had this to say on his June 12th post on his blog:
I appeared alongside John Roldan, Jim Byrnes, Beyond Mental Borders, Jonah Babins, Harry Zimmerman, Jacqueline Swann and Shamus MacGregor. The contest was judged by Steffi Kay of the Sentimentalists, Ben Train, Rayn, and the previous champion Chris Westfall. (I was a judge on the first contest in 2017, but agreed to give up my spot to Chris.)
My set of constrains was that I had 3 hours to build an act using a budget of $5 with only material procured at a the nearby A&W. I also had to present in the theme of a XXX-rated Adult Film…. magic for grownups indeed. I’m so glad I forgot to invite my mother to watch. I’m more glad that magic elder statesman Mark Lewis was in the audience to witness me debasing the art of magic.


You can watch the winning NSFW performance on James Alan's YouTube channel.

Congratulations James!





21 June 2019

Memdeck - The Next Step Webinar with Michael Close

From Michael Close:
Sunday, June 23, 2019
10:00 am (EDT)  &  4:00 pm (EDT)

Memdeck - The Next Step Webinar
You’ve put in the hours, memorized a stack, and can now perform a few basic effects with it. What’s the next step? What skills do you need to acquire on the road to memdeck mastery? You’ll find out in our new webinar, “Memdeck, the Next Step.” You can ask questions during the live broadcast of the webinar; if you can’t join live, you’ll have unlimited access to the replay. The webinar will run about ninety minutes.

We’ll discuss:
  • A review of basic memdeck skills
  • A review of basic memdeck effects
  • The challenges of “the next step”
  • Estimation
  • Culling
  • False shuffles
  • Thinking on your feet
  • Other useful tools
  • Explanations of many useful effects

The information in this webinar is “stack independent” – it will apply regardless of which stack you have learned.

This webinar is geared to those who have memorized a stack and have some confidence with it. It is not geared to memdeck neophytes. (If you have not yet memorized a stack, you should wait for another presentation of our “Demystifying the Memorized Deck” webinar.

Read more.


20 June 2019

Toronto: Jeff Hinchliffe's Memorized Deck workshop

From the Browser's Den of Magic Newsletter:
Young Jeff here with a special announcement for the card guys...I am doing my second Memorized Deck workshop.

The date will be SATURDAY JULY 13th, and the workshop/lecture will run from 6:30pm-10:30pm. That's FOUR HOURS of memorized deck magic! The cost is $40 and will be limited to twenty participants. To sign-up you can either call the shop (416-783-7022) or e-mail me directly at jhinchliffe13 AT gmail DOT com

I will be covering a wide range of information about memorized decks, including breaking down the differences between different stacks, stack-dependent and stack-independent material, and how to maintain your memorized deck when performing non-memorized deck magic.


Read more.