Tonight saw me venturing out to a 21^st birthday party for a young man named Andrew. I love performing to any one and any time but these type of events let you adjust your effects a little to be more personal for the clients. Tonight I started with the my close up set and the night went in to full swing quickly. People laughing and cheering and generally having a good time but then I saw him.

This little 13 year old boy in the corner just not having a good time at all. As I approached the table I changed my usual introduction and substituted it with “Good evening, my name is Alan and I am the magicians assistant for the evening.” I then followed on by getting little Adam up and performed all my routines as if I was the assistant and he was the magician. After the short set and his ten minutes of fame, all be it at one little table, he was beaming with pride and had started to enjoy the party a little more.

I later found out from his mother that he had just recently lost some one rather close and he had been a little quiet for about a month, this was the only thing to make him close to his old self again which for me, makes me feel great and judging by the praise from the family it made little Adam feel a little better about him self.

What is the moral to this little post. Well, its simple. All performers should be able to adapt what they do to suit their clients needs. But it also helps being able to take the spot light off yourself and adapt your act a little to give some one else the lime light for a while. All in all it would have been a fantastic night even if this did not happen but I must admit, It made it ten times better.

Do not be afraid to adapt, change and progress. Be afraid when you notice your are not!

Alan

This weekend saw the start of my holiday period gigs in RED in Greenock. This club has some fantastic regulars as standard who are always up for a laugh but this time of year just makes them even better and brings out the best in everyone else.

This point was highlighted at the first table perfectly. As I started to perform for them a young lady by the name of Emma comes bounding over to the table and yells “ AW THE MAGIC MAN” plants a massive kiss on my cheek and says “ Right I demand a trick”. Now do not take that the wrong way. I love performing parlour and stage shows where I have my own space to do what I need to do but this is the exact reason I love going back to the trenches in the very town I got my start.

The night basically followed suit with that first table. All Super energetic and happy to participate with the magic. So after the night of moving from table to table and making the little light inside the already bright and happy folks get a little brighter. Having my little ears deafen a little with the screams of delight as the impossible seemed to happen in their own hands, then being fondled as I stood for the photos that where demanded I found it extremely easy to understand why I love my job.

Now I know this blog has basic been me saying I love my job but what it is really here to do is thank everyone at RED for giving me a great time in doing my job and thank you for having a great time in the process. Hope to see you all soon.

On a side note. How do I get lipstick out of a white shirt? Answers on a postcard please.

Alan

Hello everyone. As you may have noticed the site has went through somewhat of a change and a few of you fine people out there have been spamming my in box with questions about it, so lets see if I can't answer a few of them in this little blog. First and foremost, people seem to be freaking out that there is no store for my lecture notes and downloads. Do not panic, I will have a small store section up soon. I am not abandoning it, arranging all this stuff just takes time.

The next thing people want to know is why I change my site when the old one suited my style etc. Well the main answer is that it did suit my style when I made it. But as life goes on things happen that make you grow up a little and look at things a little differently. As a performer my outlook on what I do and who I am has changed some what and my site needed to reflect who I am now. We all have to grow up some time, it is one of the scary facts that no one wants to accept.

I know this first blog is short has basically said “ look the site had to change to suit my personality now and a store is coming so hold tight!” But more blogs will be added weekly. I may add more than one a week but you should expect at least one per week minimal. These little blogs will be there to keep you fine folks up to date what what I am doing and where ill be performing any live, open performances etc. That is one of the main advantages of this new site system. It is easier to post blogs on the go. On the old site it became a massive hassle to even get a title post never mind a blog.

So its adiós for now. Keep coming back to see my usual rantings and I will see you all next week.

Alan

Well hello folks. Im trying to take a more active role in my site so decided to do a small blog/diary at least once a week for you all. It will be all magic related with some free little tricks along the way. Typos and grammer will go out the window a little but I will make sure all is understandable.

So where do I start with my thoughts in this strange field? Well, to keep it relevent I thought I would discuss something that will not be considered by most up you out there. What would you do if you lost a hand? No, what would you do if you lost a finger? I know it seems like an odd question but this became very relivent for me in he past week. No I have not lost a finger BUT I have lost the feeling in the tip of my right hand thumb. This is a trivial thing compared to the lost of a limb or digit but keep with me.

I had a small accident in my day job which lead to the loss of all sensation in my right thumb. Ive been told that it will come back in time but its leads to an interesting problem till then. When im looking at my hands I can have it function normaly but when I look away and try to do normal things it becomes very difficult. Holding a deck of cards was fine but doing a pass, seconds, bottoms and even tops became a chore again and in the past week ive had to addapt a few things to allow me to work as I normaly would.

Now what is the point in this small post? Why would I comment on something so trivial because I have 99% of what I do covered with small alterations on how I handle things? Well I have brought this up to urge you to never take what you can do for granted. There are folks out there who work through far worse day in day out and a prime example would be Rene Lavand. This man done some of the most extrodinary things while only having one arm. So the next time you do a pass or simply cut the cards and try to make it look like nothing. Keep in mind to others it is everything.