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Kyoki_Sanitys_Eclipse Inner circle 1513 Posts |
I am not new to magic as I have done it for about 3.5 years. I have only done my magic for friends, family and at the restaurant I work. My friend has recently got into magic, six months strong, and we are looking at getting paying gigs. We are getting offers but we really don't know what is appropriate to charge. If anyone could help me with what should be charged for multiple types of events/venues it would be greatly appreciated. We are interested in all types of events/venues at this point. If it helps we are in an low to medium income area.
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MKoeppel New user Switzerland 76 Posts |
You may want to check this link:
http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/viewt......&forum=5 as it specifically deals with pricing-in experience and also takes account of the income in the area. Additionally, you might also want to purchase Jamie's book "The Approach", it contains lot of information on topics like these. HTH, markus |
AidanHeritage Regular user 102 Posts |
I'd second Jamie's book - it's full of excellent advice.
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davidpaul$ Inner circle Georgetown, South Carolina 3086 Posts |
Quote:
On Mar 19, 2015, Kyoki_Sanitys_Eclipse wrote: Your friend is into magic 6 months and looking for paid gigs?? Wow!!!Good luck to you both. When you go out into the real world performing for "real people" OMG, it's a whole different ball game than performing for family and friends especially if you are being paid. But I guess you will find that out...just make sure you do your homework and don't jump into something you are not prepared for. The end result could hurt you and fellow professional magicians who are qualified. You have to start somewhere but with the lack of experience, your friend in particular, it may not be wise. Better to get your feet wet in a different arena for awhile before seeking paid gigs. It could come back to burn ya.
Guilt will betray you before technique betrays you!
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Yellowcustard Inner circle New Zealand 1334 Posts |
There is a possibility that you will follow the advice above and relies you have a few things to get in line first. But hay its good your out asking and want to get in to this has a profession so do go for it.
But something about pricing think of how much work goes in to a gig. Its not just turning up on the night. There is the research., preparation and practice be hide all routines. As well as costume or uniform it dose not matter how formal or casual you go you will have a costume / uniform then there is travle and so on. I was also advised to never do free gig because something is only worth what the last person paid for it. With our science road show we have a school offering of 5 shows and these all have cost attached and we have never done any of these for free. However we do have something called side show science and we have done part of this free for fundraiser and community events. And yese pricing dose vary but for a hour rate you should be looking at $$$ rather then $$. hope this helps good luck.
Enjoy your magic,
and let others enjoy it as well! |
scottds80 Special user Victoria, Australia 730 Posts |
You can charge a less amount than the going rate while you gain experience, and study what the market will bear as you raise your prices with experience.
I began at $30 for a kids party show when I first started, it went to $50, $100, $150, $200, $250 then now $300 over the years.
"Great Scott the Magician", Gippsland
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Kyoki_Sanitys_Eclipse Inner circle 1513 Posts |
It's not like we don't have any experience I have been performing at the restaurant I work at for almost two years now and people ask me to do shows I just don't know about pricing.
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Dick Oslund Inner circle 8357 Posts |
This "happened" at Magic Inc. some years ago.
A young man asked, "How much should I charge for a TRADE SHOW? An old pro. put down his coffee cup, and replied, "When you are "READY" to do a TRADE SHOW, you will KNOW, how much to ask! Fools rush in--where angels fear to tread! SCROLL UP, AND READ DAVID PAUL$'S POST AGAIN!!!!! Working tables at a restaurant is a lot different than a kid's birthday party! It's a big pool! --And, THERE AINT NO SHALLOW END!
SNEAKY, UNDERHANDED, DEVIOUS,& SURREPTITIOUS ITINERANT MOUNTEBANK
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Kyoki_Sanitys_Eclipse Inner circle 1513 Posts |
So are you saying you have to just jump in and learn how to swim
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55Hudson Special user Minneapolis 984 Posts |
When you say you are performing at your restaurant, do you mean you do a trick every now and then or you are working as a magician strolling from table to table?
Performing a one-off trick is very different than a show and strolling is much different than a stand-up or stage show (even small stage like a birthday party). With 3 1/2 years of magic experience you may well be prepared to perform for money, but someone charging (and worth it) after only six months would be unusual. Are you part of a magic club? (If not, why not?). Ask an active performer in the club, who is familiar with your level and breadth of skill, what they think you should charge. (Never what they charge - very rude!). Most people start with unpaid gigs for non- profits or fund raisers. Find some fundraiser - they are going on all the time - and offer to do 15 minutes of entertainment. Put together a short routine (3 or 4 effects) and go for it. Not paid so you can't disappoint, short enough that you can practice through every detail. Now you have the basis of a show. You can start adding in one more effect to build it up. Increase the price of your show as you increase the length and the entertainment value - the more you do, the better the show, the higher the pay. I know this hasn't answered your question. All prices are local, and I don't know your market, but Jamie D Grant's advice is a good as any (and better than most). Best bet ask someone local who knows your skill level. Hudson |
Rainboguy Inner circle 1915 Posts |
The best advice I can give is:
BE WORTH WHAT YOU ARE ASKING! For a relatively new beginner to performing Magic, IF YOU'RE WORTH IT, and want to make $1,000, in my personal opinion, and in my experience, you are way better off performing 10 shows at $100 each than trying to get $1,000 for one show! After all, getting paid to gain experience as a performer "ain't such a bad thing, after all!" Once you get to the point when you ARE WORTH IT and regularly get $1,000 (OR MORE) a show...........YOU HAVE ACCOMPLISHED SOMETHING!!! |
Dick Oslund Inner circle 8357 Posts |
Quote:
On Mar 25, 2015, Kyoki_Sanitys_Eclipse wrote: No. That was an analogy (and analogies always 'Limp'!) Before you start charging money for a show, you must have something salable. Just knowing how to do some tricks, AINT SALABLE! "THOSE WHO THINK THAT MAGIC CONSISTS OF DOING TRICKS, ARE STRANGERS TO MAGIC. TRICKS ARE ONLY THE CRUDE RESIDUE FROM WHICH THE LIFEBLOOD OF MAGIC HAS BEEN DRAINED." --S.H.Sharpe I believe someone said it above. Put together a short act, perhaps 15 minutes. PRACTICE the tricks, then REHEARSE the act. There's a big difference between "practice" and "rehearsal"! Read "Maximum Entertainment" by Ken Weber. Read "The Approach" by Jamie Grant. Read "Magic & Showmanship" by Henning Nelms. Those books will introduce you to some of the knowledge and skills you need in order to entertain with magic. You must understand that MAGIC IS NOT INHERENTLY ENTERTAINING! The performer must make his act or show ENTERTAINING with his PRESENTATION, and PERSONALITY. Producing an entertaining program that can play almost anywhere for almost anybody, is a real challenge. Back to that "bottomless pool"::: Don't jump in, until you know how to swim! As the mother said to her young son: "Don't you go swimming until you know how to swim!!!") Sophocles said it a few millennia ago:> "One learns by DOING the thing!" After you've read the books, I mentioned, Do some free shows for the nursing homes. Do some shows for local charities, etc. There are fellows ln the Café that sign off their "advice" by saying" "Have Fun!" THAT'S WRONG! The performer's job is to help the audience have fun!!! When you can do that consistently, you can charge a fee for doing it.
SNEAKY, UNDERHANDED, DEVIOUS,& SURREPTITIOUS ITINERANT MOUNTEBANK
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Aus Special user Australia 996 Posts |
Kyoki_Sanitys_Eclipse here are some other resources that are worthy of study:
http://www.murphysmagic.com/Product.aspx?id=55652 http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/viewt......&forum=5 There is a lot of moving parts to doing this for a living so read as much as you can. Magically Aus |
sirbrad Inner circle PA 2096 Posts |
Having done magic for 35 years and 25 years professionally, 3.5 years sounds very new to me. 6 months is next to nothing. I started at age 7 and did shows for years for only tips. But I also practiced and rehearsed for 12-24 hour days as I was obsessed, and very well prepared. I did friends and family birthday parties and got paid for them, but I knew many of them. I did my first paid gig for all strangers and adults for a Retirement Home at age 15. So I had 8 years of experience and was very well prepared.
These days you see people rushing out to a gig after a week or two if that. Wait until you are actually ready and that your routine is very well polished. Usually if you have to ask you are not ready. I had no one to ask back then but I also was a perfectionist, and was in no hurry to rush out and do gigs. I knew I was going to be a professional anyway so I wanted to be sure that I was ready, and be able to represent magic in the best way possible. Not like some hacks who did not put the work in and think they can just go out and get paid right away. Magic is a lot of hard work, and long hours and you want to be sure you are truly ready as the audience deserves to see magic the way it was intended to be seen. I would practice all day and night each trick individually, then make routines, write scripts, rehearse it all, tape it and play it back every day. Once it was time for the show I was then able to focus almost entirely on presentation and showmanship. That is how you know if you are truly ready. When people say you are too good to work for free and start offering you money. That is what happened in my case. Then it became a full-time profession. But it still a lot of hard work, long hours, and a lifestyle 24/7. Some do it part-time which is fine, but I was always one to dedicate myself fully to what I was doing. I started doing magic part-time with other jobs, but ended up staying up 30 hours doing magic on top of it, and I knew then that I just needed to stick to magic as it paid better and was a lot more fun. But when I first started out it was rough, and like working 3 jobs. Eventually I got enough gigs that I could just do magic full-time. But most will only do magic as a passing hobby, very few stay the sourse and become a professional, and even less long-term. But for me that is all that I wanted to do and has not changed in 35 years. Also look into Jim Snack's Success In Magic Course. I bought it and was already a pro for 22 years and still found it useful. Probably the most comprehensive and informative guide on doing magic as a business out there. But there are many others and many other great books you just have to do the research. David Ginn has a lot of great advice for Kid's Shows, for Restaurants Live From the Jailhouse is the best I have seen as far as DVDS, and aso there are several books on the subject all of which I have and are great, including The Restaurant Worker's Handbook, The Restaurant Reader, and obviously the great Magic Menu books. But as stated once you are experience enough you don't have to ask others, you already know.
The great trouble with magicians is the fact that they believe when they have bought a certain trick or piece of apparatus, and know the method or procedure, that they are full-fledged mystifiers. -- Harry Houdini
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sirbrad Inner circle PA 2096 Posts |
I started out doing magic for the love of it, the money came later on. Those who start it for just the money normally do not last. You have to already have a passion for what you do and be very competent at doing it. If you are those things and more, money will find you won't have to find it.
The great trouble with magicians is the fact that they believe when they have bought a certain trick or piece of apparatus, and know the method or procedure, that they are full-fledged mystifiers. -- Harry Houdini
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sirbrad Inner circle PA 2096 Posts |
I think that "having fun" is very important, and if you are passionate about what you do and are having fun it is contagious and so will your audience. If you do routines that you don't enjoy doing most likely it will show, unless you are a really good actor. But even so you are working WAY too hard! Chances are what you enjoy your audiences will enjoy too. Especially if you are experienced enough and know what works. Way back when I started out I bought magic that I saw other magicians kill with, and magic that the crowd loved and I loved as well. I then did my own routines with my own style, and personality injected and had great success. I loved what I did and it showed, which made it a lot easier for the audience to love and a lot less work for me to try and "act" like I was having fun.
Jamy Ian Swiss also said something similar in an interview, that if one is "simply trying to make the audience happy and is not passionate about his magic, that is the way of a hack." You have enjoy what you are doing and do it well. Or as I said you are simply torturing yourself. If you enjoy what you do and your audience enjoys it is a win/win situation. I also find it odd that some magicians think that if another magician enjoys his magic that the audience won't, when in fact it is the opposite. I have performed and watched magic for over three decades so I know what I like and I know what audiences like, at least based on my own experience. I know what great entertaining magic is. Some magicians tend to play it safe and are afraid of magic and resort to one-liners and comedy gags the whole time. If it works that is fine but that is not what magic is about in its purest form. I believe amazement and mystery should always be the primary focus and the other stuff is just added in where it fits. I love doing comedy gags and one-liners but it is not all that I do. After 35 years of performing you tend to know what works and what you enjoy doing. If you don't enjoy it then it becomes more work, and a lot harder work. But after so many years you can gauge what works for you and for your audience, and it does not matter what some other magician on an internet forum thinks. Everyone is different and no audience is the same, no act is the same, and no magician is the same. So use what works for everyone and if you are passionate about what you do so will your audience be. Especially if you are experienced enough to know what you are doing.
The great trouble with magicians is the fact that they believe when they have bought a certain trick or piece of apparatus, and know the method or procedure, that they are full-fledged mystifiers. -- Harry Houdini
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pueraeternus New user 28 Posts |
It may turn out that Kyoki_Sanitys_Eclipse & Co. has a flair for performing and a natural talent for being entertaining regardless of their skill level as a magician. There's tons of mechanical props that could impress lots of people that just need a performers touch to be able to sell it. So, even if someone may not have the experience performing as a magician they still may put on a very entertaining show that people would be willing to pay for. In my case I've been doing magic on and off for 30 years and I couldn't see myself performing for money b/c I don't have (or can't muster up) the performance part. If the entertainment industry just relied on truly talented magicians there would be a lot of unhappy prop. makers.
Although, I can't argue that the more expierence (years) that you have performing is every going to hurt you. Since there's lots of people and situations and only time will help guide you. |
Jamie D. Grant V.I.P. as seen in Ripley's Believe It or Not! Twice! 2413 Posts |
Thanks for the shout-outs, gang! You guys rock!
TRICK OF THE YEAR: Industrial Revelation, BOOK OF THE YEAR: The Approach, The AIP Bottle, and my new book Scenic 52, can all be found over here: SendWonder.com
Kindness takes practice. My TEDx talk |
jclightman New user 50 Posts |
Lots of good thoughts in this thread. I think the best advice is in getting involved with a local magic club if one is in your area. Or travel a bit if able. When I started performing shows, I was doing so under the tutelege of another very experienced magician. First I helped him do his shows. (Pretty much for free….but what a HUGE education that was for me! I probably should have been paying him to give me that opportunity.) Then he started booking me to do the shows he couldn't. It was really great experience to have someone like him to critique and help me along the way. Also, I still talk to him today about appropriate pricing. It really does depend on your local market more than anything.
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