Do seasoned seance performers endorse "packs small, plays big" theory and bring as little possible "to the table"?

Or, as some have written in well-known tomes, gaff your own table to your liking and don't worry about using a client's table when you arrive at their home?

I like that. Fitted with goodies like the fake Flea Circus outfits. Cool.

Gaffed to the hilt electronic tables he brought with him worked miracles for Del-Ray. Why wouldn't it appeal to many others? No muss or fuss with prep and set up. Just show up and perform. Sounds good to me.

Mark Edwards says carry everything under your arm, but as written in Seance articles, speakers, magnets, rubber tubing, etc. can be affixed to the underside of a portable table and you're ready to go when you arrive.

Many people expect to sit at a table for a seance. This means that if you bring your own table, it has to be big enough to fit everyone.

If you are just doing a read based seance, no effects are needed, but if you approach what Leo Kostke calls a "Hollywood Seance", and what is meant by that is to try to do live what many have seen in movies or on TV, then you have to ring in tricks.

You could carry a smaller gaffed table that seats five or so. You can incorporate this seating limitation into the show. Have the first part of the performance be mentalism, to warm up your abilities and build rapport among the participants. Then do some interactive material, such as pendulum work, to find those with "mediumistic gifts". Invite these people to sit at the table with you as your "inner circle. Light a candle, turn out the lights and begin the dark portion...the seance.

Another thing to consider is that it is almost impossible to get a complete blackout when you are working in people's homes or other venues that are beyond your control. You should never rely on complete blackness for your seance to work.

A single candle burning can be quick effective and spooky. Having some PK things happen in the dim light can heighten the effect. And if the candle goes out right before the end, you have a minute or so before the eyes of the sitters adjust to the darkness. You can quickly get a hand free and do something to bring the seance to a climax, such as giving a yank to some threads set up to make a book fall out of the bookcase across the room.

Good advice Todd. Rather than rig a room or a client's table, a portable one with the necessary materials in place would be both time saving and advantageous for the performer's range of effects to produce.

Two friends and I built a table for our seance. We used it a few times and decided that unless we hire roadies to carry the table in and out, we're making the seance more portable.

We didn't get roadies. We made it portable.

Oh, and our table was made according to the instructions in "Manifestations."

Consider the haunted close-up pad idea from The Bigger Book of Boo.

The benefits of a gaffed table AND it packs small.

The idea of the "Haunted Floor"/close up pad in BBofB is really limited only by your own imagination. After building the first one for myself I custom built one for a "worker" back in Invocational days that had a battery in it and hidden mini electromagnet. Amazing what was done with it much less rigging it for a Thayer type rapping hand.

But if you build one, please do it right. That means really working with hardwood flooring, knowing how to use a table saw and router, finishing it right, etc.

Back to working on Traveler's Journal. His handwritten notes are the fits to transcribe!

TEB3/Lary/Traveler