Well, tomorrow is a big day for me, I will be doing my biggest "show" since I have been performing magic. It will be at my Uncle's house again, and I am very happy that he is so excited to have me come. I did a party at his home a few months ago, about 20-25 people. It went great.

Other than that I have only done immediate family shows (like at our own house when company comes over). At this party there will be over 40 people. At the last party with 25, I noticed that that some people towards the back had trouble, or could not see because I do very close up magic and everything I work with is small. (Cards, pens, cigs, etc).

I am going to have to do a "walk-around" show for this one. I have never done this. If anyone has some tips I would really appreciate it. My usual nervous-type attitude will still be the same, but one thing I learned from the last show (which is a big confidence boost) is I thought people would "catch" things I did, but I could have fooled these people with anything. But I still could use any advice anyone could give me. Please keep this in mind- I do not mind going inside to "reset" en effect and stringing effects together probably will not be happening.

Thanks for any help. There will be loud music, too, which for some way was helpful with misdirection at the last show, and people will be all over the place. But I'm still nervous!!!

Let us know how you did.

The best advice I could give would be....are you ready?...........

...Just have fun!!!!! Don't sweat the small stuff.

If your audience sees you are having fun, they will too. Take the attention off of your self and engage your audience. It's not about YOU!......there ya go!

Hey Natte:

Are they serving alcohol? Have a drink!!!
Jim

Hey dude sounds like you have a plan which you built up on your experience so go with this plan.

Watch your angles and have fun.

Yup, like slyhand said just watch your angles and enjoy yourself! This might be too late but you also mentioned that people towards the end had trouble seeing in your last show so maybe next time you might also want to use jumbo cards in some of your routines.

Good luck and have fun!

Everything was perfect, the nerves went away after the first effect, a lot of people were "buzzing" so that helped but even the people who weren't even drinking loved it. I actually liked the "walk-around" atmosphere.

Congrats!

Sounds like everyone had fun, and you may have discovered a venue for yourself. Often (around here) businesses will hire a magician for their Christmas parties just to walk around and "do a trick or two" for the different tables. And if it all packs in your pockets, you're ready to go.

Glad you had a good show.

Glad it went well. These types of events are great confidence boosters so, to paraphrase a popular tagline, "Just keep doing it!"

Thanks, guys. One thing I liked about the walk-around was that NOT EVERYBODY'S eyes were on you all at once. (like the last show). an effect here, an effect there, when they least expected it, and about 3 or 4 people watching you per effect, while another group right next to me were just doing their own thing. That made me comfortable, everyone NOT running over when an effect started. I feel I picked the proper time to approach the small pocket of groups to do an effect. The most important thing with me was that I did not go over my head with my effects, what I mean by that was I am working on many great effects which I REALLY wanted to do, but I didn't do them because I felt I needed more practice time. So I stuck with my "SURE FIRE" effects, (the ones I have the most confidence doing). For an example, I really wanted to do "The Crossroads Deck", which is very easy, but I didn't really rehearse it, so I can always do it another time. I've learned in magic that you don't do an effect until you have it PERFECTED in practice. Even if I could have done the actual EFFECT properly, I didn't feel I could PRESENT it properly, yet, so I scratched it. Everything was great.....Thanks for the replys......Jimmy.

Also, people (that were at the last party) were requesting " do the trick where the 4 jacks change into the 4 aces!!!" (I call it NFW, lol),and it's AMAZING how things change when you practice and get some confidence in you, because about a year ago, I would only do NFW to MYSELF, I was to "jittery" to do an effect that involves the "E-C". Now, the "E-C" is my baby. I do this a million times a day and it's an effect now that I HAVE to do because I have so much confidence with that count. NFW is a hit everywhere I go.