I guess I'll post this here. But I was having a conversation with another magician. We were discussing Specialties. And we both realized that we both had specialties, or genres that we prefer. Then we got to talking about what we wanted people to call us. For some reason, there is a difference between a magician, and a mentalist. IF you get my meaning. Could you good people just give a list of titles? Titles for things such as Cardist, Mentalist, Hypnotist. And a second question which kind of builds onto the first. What would you call someone who is into bizarre type magic. (Other than a bizarrist.) Thanks.

I'd rather think of it in terms of the character that you are portraying.

Among mentalists (a term which is not used much to describe the performer to lay audiences) there are those who present themselves as having developed their intuitive abilities, others have psychic talents, another group says that they are entertainers and the act stops when the show is over, and so on.

To magicians, these people are all mentalists. To the lay public (paying audiences) they are unique individuals with different talents.

Among magicians we have con-men-gone-straight, card experts, comedy performers, escape artists, manipulators, dove-and-bunny guys, kid show performers, illusionists, etc. The titles used for these specialties among magicians don't seem very important to me.

If we think instead of an individual performer's character, we see that he or she will have to draw from several areas to have a complete array of effects. Perhaps someone who is primarily a manipulator will add a Zombie Ball for a stage show. A performer who specializes in bizarre magic might do the Cups and Balls at a Renaissance Fair.

I think that focusing on the titles for various specialties is counterproductive, in that the lay public doesn't know these terms, and among magicians, once you are in the cardician's guild another magician might wonder why you are learning a dice routine.

Yours,

Paul