A few weeks ago, I was cruising down the Nile River, talking about theoretical constructs of magic with Michael Ammar (“I’ll take ‘things I thought I’d never say’ for $1,000, Alex”). Along the way, I brought up my concept of writing a magic book, and this provoked a very interesting conversation.
According to Michael, he was always hesitant to use a memdeck, because once you put in the work into memorizing it, you would be compelled to use it, even if it wasn’t the right tool for the job. And, because it’s a stack, it would restrict the other magic you could do around the deck before you performed your memdeck miracle.
His argument did strike a chord. I had to admit to myself that when you finish learning the memdeck, you will definitely feel compelled to use it. I remember when I finished putting in the work of memorizing a deck, I was seeking out combinations of tricks I could do together that wouldn’t destroy my stack - effects like Triumph and others. However, like most things that are new and exciting up front, I lost my dependency over time as it settled into being part of my working repertoire.
As I posed back to Michael, I think the argument is the same whether learning an invisible pass, truffle shuffle, or any other sleight requiring work to master. If it takes time and effort to learn, won’t you feel compelled to use it?
If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And that’s a real concern for almost any magic, which is why I think it’s essential for every magician to be well-rounded. The more you learn, practice, and implement, the better your magic will be.
What do you think? Do you feel that the memdeck is especially susceptible to this concern, or is it the same as any other technique?
How strong is our cohort?
I know last week I addressed the 4th birthday of the channel, but this week, we hit another major milestone: Erudite Magic surpassed 5,000 subscribers!
If you watch many YouTube advice channels (I do), you’ll know that subscribers are a vanity metric and don’t really mean too much. However, it’s taken 4 years of steady content around a fairly niche subject to get to this point, and I’m incredibly grateful to each one of you who has subscribed to make it possible.
I have no idea how many magicians out there are interested in magic books, and from that group, how many are interested in watching videos about it. But, it’s amazing to know that there are at least 5,000 people interested in magic book content. If you know others who are interested in talking about magic and magic books weekly, please feel free to let them know via the button below. There are even some perks in it for you…
Do Your Research! (or let me share mine)
Due to a recent change in my show’s lineup, I’m having to replace a piece or two from the old repertoire. When that happens, I hit the books. Hopefully, you can benefit from my research or help me out with some things I haven’t considered yet. After all, I’m betting you are the best-read magicians on the internet!
Anyway, I’m looking at implementing Barrie Richardson’s Dollar Divination routine, which I know from Theater of the Mind. Obviously, I started there with his original write-up, but then I started to research it via Denis Behr’s excellent Conjuring Archive.
From there, I realized there was an article about presenting this feat in Mentalism Incorporated, Volume II, by Chuck Hickok. It’s been a while since I read that, and I didn’t remember it mentioning the Richardson trick. But sure enough, he gives some presentational ideas that are worth checking out if you own the book and are looking for advice on how to structure an effective mentalism show for corporate audiences (like me!).
But here’s where the really delightful part kicks in: when I clicked on the category for this trick - “Bill/Number-Reading” - I found all kinds of prizes I had previously not seen. For example:
Alain Nu published a beautiful routine in Syzygy that lets you not only reveal a serial number, but also perform a drawing duplication. And, the whole thing is designed to be done close-up!
If you want to go old school, there’s a version from Ted Annemann in Practical Mental Effects. Unlike Barrie’s version (or most of the other versions I read), it’s impromptu and requires no gimmicks.
Ted Lesley has an excellent version in his amazing Paramiracles. The genius of this version is the hands-off nature of the switch. It utilizes his Teleport Envelope, which has a myriad of application possibilities. I highly recommend checking it out!
Paul Curry has a similar version to the aforementioned Lesley routine, but with some very nice psychological subtleties justifying the entire procedure. It’s called Payoff, and you can find it in his book, Worlds Beyond. It’s very easy to do.
Even though I found some great content, none of these were what I want for my routine, but that’s beside the point.
The point is that there’s so much joy to be found on the journey. I’ve built up my magic library for these exact instances, and it’s delightful to rediscover authors, subjects, and even tricks that I missed the first time through the material.
No matter what stage of your act you’re in, I hope you’ll find a good excuse to do some research on a topic that interests you. Let me know what you’re studying - I’d love to ‘tag along’ in your reading!
Another memdeck routine
As you no doubt know by now, I’m writing a book about memdeck magic - making the subject more accessible for those who are intimidated. I shared my first trick with paid subscribers a few weeks ago, and now I’m going to share another trick that will hopefully make its way into the final copy.
This one is based on another classic, and you’ll certainly see the Harry Lorayne influence in my magical journey. You only need to know the first five or so cards in your stack, which makes this one of the easiest tricks I can think of when you’re first working on your stack. The trick can play slightly differently depending on how many cards in your stack you currently know, but you’ll see.
If you’re a paid subscriber, try it out and let me know your thoughts. If you’re not yet a paid subscriber, you can try it for a month to see if you like it and it’s worth your hard-earned money to both support the channel and gain early access to tricks that will be in my book (among other benefits like having access to the voiceover version of this newsletter). Regardless of your subscription status, I thank you for being here this far into the newsletter!
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Erudite Magic Digest to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.