A recent showing on television of the remake of the classic movie: “The War of the Worlds” made me think of the extraordinary circumstances and events which occurred on October 30, 1938 when Orson Welles who was at that time relatively unknown, broadcast his radio drama over the WABC radio network. The first two thirds of the one hour broadcast was presented as a series of semi-real news bulletins, which made many listeners actually believe that a Martian invasion was in progress. This broadcast was to be the making of Orson Welles as a celebrity! 

What isn’t so widely known about Orson Welles however is that he was a very enthusiastic and competent magician who frequently performed card tricks.  In an interview with Tannens Magic a couple of years before he died, he said : 

“My father loved magic and bought me a couple of big illusions when I was a young boy. In those days we had Thurston and all those great stage magicians. I started doing sleight-of-hand when I was 11 or 12. The first thing I wanted to do was the boxes (that’s what Thurston did). I loved Houdini but he wasn’t an illusionist; he was a challenger. He challenged the audience. He didn’t seduce them. He set up a kind of Olympic game and then won it at the end … he was dynamic … he had a kind of contempt for illusionists.” 

Even David Blaine, who like past performers has cultivated an air of mystery and eccentricity has named Orson Welles as one of his major inspirations in this aspect.

Photograph: A young and dynamic looking Orson Welles photographed by Carl Van Vechten

In the modern era where it seems that the world and his dog has a cellphone, it’s surprising to realise that there are  some card tricks which can even be performed using this rather impersonal medium.  Here is a simple trick for you to try over the phone with someone you want to astonish! 

Call your friend and asked them to find a deck of cards which you then tell them to give a good shuffle.  Next tell him to deal the cards face down into a pile one at a time in such a way that is no way you can hear how many cards he’s dealing.  Tell him he can stop whenever he likes but to make sure he doesn’t go past half of the deck.  When he tells you that he stopped, tell him to take a peek at the last card which he dealt and to remember it before returning it face down on top of the pile. 

Next, he is to deal on top of that stack of cards, the number of cards corresponding to the value of his chosen card-that is to say if he has chosen the five of diamonds then he needs to deal five more cards on top of the stack.  If he chose a picture card, the Jack’s will count as 11, Queens as 12 and Kings as 13. Now get your friend to pick up the pile of cards he has dealt and put it back on top of the deck from which he was dealing.  He now has the whole deck in his hand. 

At this point, remind your friend that there is absolutely no way you could possibly know which is his card. Tell him to deal the cards one at a time face up reading them out to you over the phone as he does this.  Naturally, he must not give you any indication in his vocal tones as to which is his card.  All you have to do now is to ignore the first card he reads out, but as he reads out the second card, you start counting with this second card being number one in your mind.  The third card which he describes to you will be your number two and so on….. 

Seemingly magically, you will find that as you count, you will have at least one card which will correspond exactly for example if his card was a five of diamonds then as he reads it out, you will be thinking of the number five.  This is of course because of the fact that you asked him to add the number of cards equal to the value of the card he chose on top of his chosen card and then because you ignored the first card he read out then you must get corresponding cards to the numbers you are counting in your mind!O

ccasionally you will get more than one card which corresponds to the numbers which you are mentally counting and if this happens you just have to try and guess which one is correct. This will be made easier of course if one of the cards is red and the other black in which case you can suggest it is one of these colours and if this is not correct then you can immediately name the correct card in one go.

Nowadays, poker has really become the gambling card game that is most frequently played whether it be Stud poker or Texas poker. The many TV shows which feature high-stakes games usually attended by charismatic poker players have been one of the main reasons for its success but the huge growth in online poker has also played a great part. 

Some people however just like playing around with a deck of cards. Let’s face it, a deck of cards hardly costs anything to buy and yet it can give hours and hours of pleasure.  You can get even more value from money out of a deck of cards if you’re able to perform a few card tricks with it.  If you are a person who both enjoys playing poker but also likes to perform the occasional card trick then there is a new website which will probably be of great interest to you.  In this fascinating site (follow link below) you will not only find lots and lots of information about the various types of poker game and tips about playing poker online, but also card tricks - some easy, some little more difficult but all having a poker slant to them. So next time you have friends round for a fun game of poker, why not entertain them a little either before or after with a few poker style card tricks! Visit: http://www.poker-card-tricks.com/

People often ask what might be the easiest impromptu card trick to be able to perform when handed a deck of cards by a stranger whether in a social or a performing situation.  Certainly one of the most easy card tricks utilises the principle of the Marker Card or Key Card and here is how you do it.

Take the deck of cards and give it a shuffle yourself - face down,  then hand it back to your spectator in such a way that you can catch a glimpse of the bottom card.  This is fairly easy and quite natural as you’ll find when you try it.  Let’s say that the bottom card which you glimpse is the eight of diamonds….   Next, ask the spectator to remove any card from the middle of the deck and look at it without letting you see it then to place it on top of the deck. Have them cut the deck a couple of times before they hand it back to you.  All you have to do then of course is find the card directly beneath the eight of diamonds - the card whose back touches the face of the eight of diamonds,  and it will be their chosen card! 

Card tricks don’t get much easier than this do they?

Magic, irrespective of whether it’s card magic, illusions or sleight of hand, can be very funny. In some ways, a good comedy magician can be just as funny as a stand-up comedian. No matter how verbose, sharp and quick-witted a comedian might be, you would have to go a long way to be funnier than comedy magician Tommy Cooper.

I was recently watching some tv re-runs of comedy shows from the 70’s and 80’s. Tommy Cooper was featured in one show and stand-up comedian Les Dawson in another. After watching them I realised how different they were in the way they delivered comedy and yet how similar they were in the cleverness of their delivery.

Here’s what I mean ….

More often than not Tommy Cooper would begin performing a magic trick or card trick only for it to go terribly wrong or he would simply stop half-way through because of a lack of enthusiasm with that ‘Oh I can’t be bothered’ look he delivered so well. Classic! Sometimes however he would deliver a trick perfectly with a totally unexpected and magical ending, showing in truth what an accomplished magician he really was. (Tommy was a member of the Magic Circle). Only someone with a real skill can make it look like they don’t know what they’re doing!

There’s an analogy here I think with music and this is where Les Dawson comes into the picture. Only an accomplished musician can actually play an instrument so as to deliberately make it sound out of tune. Les, whom I once had the pleasure of meeting, was a master of this on the piano; a regular feature of his tv shows would be him sat at the piano, looking very serious, and playing well for a several bars, then suddenly and radically he would start playing a semi-tone out. The comic effect was brilliant and one of the highlights of his act.

So whilst Tommy and Les might have been worlds apart in their style of comedy, it was their real skills - one with magic and one with music - that enabled them both to make people laugh.

Video: Tommy Cooper Tribute - YouTube

Video: Les Dawson Playing Piano - YouTube

Card tricks can often be fraught with difficulty and the better you get at performing them, naturally the more ambitious your card tricks become.  I’m reminded of one of the earliest card tricks that I ever performed which is known by many titles but which I will call The Vanishing Ace.  It truly is quite impressive but is so simple to perform that even a beginner is not likely to go wrong with this one. 

Basically the effect is that the audience or spectator is shown three aces fanned out in the magician’s hand.  The ace of diamonds is clearly to be seen nestling between the two black aces: the ace of spades and the ace of clubs. The magician closes the fan of three cards and places the three aces into the pack.  Magically in this most easy of card tricks, the magician is able to make the ace of diamonds disappear from the pack and appear from one of his pockets or indeed from anywhere that he chooses.

If you’re really serious about starting out doing card tricks than this is possibly the one card trick that you are never likely to get wrong and it is therefore worth checking out.  It is also a surprisingly visual card trick which makes it even more impressive.  If you would like to learn this nice and easy card trick then visit my Vanishing Ace page where you will find clear concise instructions as to how to perform the trick along with a couple of diagrams just to make it extra easy to learn.

This trick is in my category of unusual card tricks.

Amongst the magic fraternity and particularly amongst those keenly interested in card magic and card tricks, the question is often aired as to who might be regarded as the greatest exponent of card tricks and sleight of hand in history.  I should like to put the case forward for Richard Cardini. I think many other card magicians would agree with me that ‘The Great Cardini’ as he became known, had a facility and artistry in performance which might never be equalled!

Cardini’s real name was Richard Valentine Pitchford and he was born on November 24, 1895 in a small coal mining town in Wales.  During active service in the First World War, he is said to have honed his skills in card manipulation and learnt many of his card tricks in order to while away the long hours between fighting in the trenches. It is even believed that because of the intense cold and damp conditions, he frequently practised wearing gloves which would explain why in his later masterful card manipulations and card tricks, some of them were performed wearing white gentlemen’s gloves! Pitchford was eventually injured in battle and sent to hospital where he continued to improve his considerable skills.

During his long and successful career, Cardini as he later became known, performed his wonderful sleight of hand and card tricks at many celebrated venues including the London Palladium and he even performed a command performance for the King of England in 1938.

Cardini’s mastery of card magic, card tricks and card manipulation earned him many accolades and in 1958 the New England Magic Society claimed that Cardini was “the greatest exponent of pure sleight of hand the world has ever known!”  This author for one would not disagree especially after seeing the only known footage of Cardini performing his card magic on television, broadcast in 1957 in The Festival of  Magic.

Cardini died on November 13, 1973. Here’s my web page dedicated to the Great Cardini.

We all have those days when we feel really bored and can’t think of what to do.  These can often be particularly rainy days when video games and television seem to have lost their appeal. At times like this, what can really save the day is a good old-fashioned deck of playing cards with which you can play so many games and even perform a card trick or two if you know any.  It’s something that you wouldn’t normally do and this can make it more fun than you might imagine! For sure then, it’s a wise idea to have a deck of playing cards in the house.  There are many card games that can provide fun for hours on end and who knows maybe neighbours or relations who call on you might want to join in.  Nowadays, Poker is particularly popular and poker is a game that can be fun for a lot of people to play together at the same time.  It really is a case of the more people the merrier where poker is concerned. You never know, maybe you’ll end up having a regular poker night once you’ve opened the pack of cards and given it a try. Many websites teach the rules of poker.

Surprisingly, one of the best things about a pack of cards is the fact that they’re probably one of the cheapest items you could ever buy usually costing no more than the price of a glass of beer and in spite of its cheapness, and a deck of cards is likely to last you years and years.

As stated above for anyone who knows how to do a few card tricks, the humble deck of cards is all that is needed to wow a group of people.  There really are hundreds of card tricks that you can learn with the standard deck of playing cards although if you’re going to do this, don’t forget the practice does make perfect and it’s a good idea to make sure you’ve really mastered the trick before you perform it in front of friends and family. If you want to learn a few easy card tricks than visit my card tricks website where you will find all manner of free card tricks from very easy to the more advanced.

Today we’re surrounded by so much technology but we often forget to enjoy the simple things in life and we often neglect games played by our forebears, such as dominoes or cribbage, in favour of video games or computer games.  However, it is the games often learned and played long ago that provide the most enjoyment and entertainment.  A simple deck of playing cards can provide wonderful fun and be enjoyed by anyone of any age.

Many people are shy in a social context and often don’t know how to start a conversation with someone they’ve just been introduced to. This is where a good card trick can come in handy and help you engage in good conversation; even someone who doesn’t generally feel comfortable in the company of other people can find themselves easily engaged and in a more natural way by being able to perform an entertaining little card trick. When you’re looking for a way to break the ice all you really want is something that will prompt social interaction. Many people do not have confidence in their social skills and the fear of failure or embarrassment often stops them from ever learning. Card tricks can be the foundation for great conversation and repartee - but don’t worry, you don’t have to be as good as the professional magicians you see in cabaret! Let’s face it, for many people starting a conversation from scratch with someone you don’t really know can be quite a challenge; finding the right words can be stressful and it’s often the case that you worry so much about what you can say next that you find you are not listening to what is being said to you. One thing most people agree on is that listening skills are really important for good social interaction. I think there are few people who truly take the time to listen to what the other person is saying - it’s not easy after all. Think about it … how many times have you met someone new and within minutes (even seconds) you realise you’ve already forgotten their name! Of course you heard the name but you did not listen. Andy why? Because you were not relaxed and in control of the interaction.