THE ANDY HURST LECTURE MARCH 2010

 Andy performed and taught a selection of effects, mainly with cards and many with a mentalism angle to them. He started with "Dead Knock Out" in which cards are dealt face up onto the table until a spectator chooses to stop. Despite this being a fair and free choice the magician reveals that the spectator was in fact controlled through suggestion and actually stopped precisely where the magi wanted him to. This effect is based on the commercially available trick "Knock 'em Dead" by Peter Nardi but leaves you with a clean and regular deck at the end so you can go directly into other card effects. "Ticker Master" is a non-card mental effect in which a story is told about a night at the theatre. The magi has booked an entire row of seats. One ticket is set aside at the outset which will be the magicians seat and then a participant chooses a ticket by a very fair method of elimination. Despite the clearly fair method of selection the magicians prediction which has been on view from the get go shows that he knew exactly where the spectator would end up sitting. This is based on a trick that Andy first had published in Semi Automatic card tricks Volume 4 and is ideal for platform or close-up work and could easily be adapted for use as a childrens trick. "Cancelled Again" - An impossible revelation of a card that a spectator cuts to in a deck they shuffled while the magicians back is turned. All possible.

 22nd October. Malcolm Malan Lecture. (Reported by Bob U)

The president opened the meeting and introduced Malcolm Malan, an ex member of the Exonian Magical Society. Malcolm was a member around 1980 to 1982 and remembered Roger Barons, so felt it was quite an honour to be asked to present the Roger Barons Memorial Lecture. Overall a lecture enjoyed by all those who attended. Malcolm expressed his views on balloon modellers as performing artist's supplying not just balloons but also entertainment for the passing public, parents and customers (the kids) alike. He said when he is working he does not stop talking, a point quite apparent in his lecture. He said lot's and by his own addmision could have said a lot more if time had allowed. This lecture was all about his philosophy behind his work, covering everything from the way you look, how you conduct yourself, how to be in controle of the situations we find ouselfs in, crowd managment, playing games wilst ballooning and time managment. We were treated to some onederful one liner and out's for every occation. This does not seem to be a lot of report for someone who talked almost constantly for two hours. you had to be there to appreciate the man's wisdom and experiance. 

CLOSE UP COMPETITION 2009

1. Dave Johnson, David?s well routined miscellany ? practiced ? as much as ever. The effects were almost enjoyed by everyone!! Opened with his Cow poem, followed by taking out his very large contact lenses. This was followed by a strange card trick. There were then three envelopes ? 2p, 10p and Chinese coin and each enveloped was picked and the coin revealed (still not got it licked!!). Dave finished in his usual style and finess with jiggers,rubik cube and blank to real notes

2. Tony Griffiths Tony went into one of his character story routines involving Tony trixter, involving a coin bag and an egg bag routine following with twisting the aces, he also combined a coins across style routine from pill box to bag.

3. Simon Croft, Psychability. Mystery ? envelope. Pack of cards we choose place 17 - Queen of Clubs (very clean) There are the psychic hot lines who try to steal your money. Pack handled out and shuffled. and a card freely chosen. Psychic hotline ? he phoned the number on the mobile and we listened on the phone and she revealed the card.

4. Cosmo Opened up with a magicians gag involving a thumb tip matrix Cosmo followed this with a 3 card location involving casino cards which matched the chosen cards and climaxing in a royal flush, a signed coin in bag of flour

5. John Niess, John intrigued with professional card cheats. A warming up exercise - - face up and face down mixing. 4 aces revealed plus then a stage further revealing 4 royal flushes. 2 more shuffles ? then a dealing set of singles, doubles, triples and fourths. Final deals and separation of reds and blacks. Moved to pure magic. 2 cards, 2 hands and 4 coins ? very clean matrix.

The winners were John Neiss and Cosmo with peoples choice .