Naquada

Tonights Gala Show was on the whole very good again. It opened with Jade from the USA, performing her chinese act, with silks, parasols, rice and water balls and a nice costume change at the end.

Jade was followed by Dana Daniels form the USA, a comedy magic act with Dwaine, the mind reading dove. Svetlana from the Ukraine was next, a contortion and modern dance act (with fire!) and was a good break from the magic.

Francis Menotti again performed a great routine with an egg bag and mobile phone, with some great twists and touches that really made the egg bag special, even performing mentalism and predictions, down to predicting his own death on stage in a fantastic comical way. After his body was dragged off stage the world class skills of Mahka Tendo from Japan produced some excellent card manipulations and productions.

Just Alan opened the second half, and presented his award winning act The Sands of India, it was a lovely piece about an indian fakir, producing coloured sands from a bowl of water, a nice piece, and did make up for my disappointment yesterday.

Juan Ordeix again did some mind blowing mentalism, three balloons with cards in through out to the audience matched three cards freely selected from the deck, a beyond explanation prediction of the money spent, bill serial number, playing card and date in a sealed envelope along with the actual money, and card left the audience lost for a method.

Voronin from the Ukraine just was singularly the best act, and should have closed, mixing the traditions of Buster Keaton and Jacques Tati, he held the audience with his silent act, polished and flawless it was a joy to watch, he even involved the rest of the gala show acts.. it was just wonderful.

James Long, the traditional end of show illusion act closed, which I think was a shame, I dont think anyone could have followed Voronin, on his own, great but I think he looked weak after what I think was perfection. A tough slot to have. James did a number of good illusions, but it was a weak finish I think to a good show..

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The offical results are:

1st. Satoru (Japan)

2nd. Pattrick Przysiecki (USA)

3rd. Gainfranco Preverino (Italy)

awards of merit went to Francis Menotti from the USA, and UK entries John van der Put and Troy Von Scheibner.

David Berglas also presented a special award for promotion of the art of magic. The 1st Berglas International Magic Award was presented to the Macmillan Family for their continued efforts and work organising International Magic Weekend. They got a standing ovation from the audience.

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Todays lectures were the ones I had been looking forward to all weekend, Juan Ordeix, Darwin Ortiz and Francis Menotti.

Juan Ordeix opened with strong and compelling mentalism, a very clean book test, although similar I think to a Banachek idea, it was a good twist on a proven routine, and probably different enough to warrant it being new material. He then talked through another method for a book test, using a nice set of utility items, and a nice prediction using a wipeboard, a thought of image and a bit of preparation.

He also have a nifty method for swapping a note or card in front of the audience, although maybe not as workable as the other items, on the whole a very good and workable lecture.

Darwin Ortiz, gave a lecture which obviously contained very strong and technical card work, he also had reprints of card shark, and lecture notes with unpublished material, as well as the new book Designing Miracles and the solid work on theory and presentation Strong Magic. I got a copy of Designing Miracles, to go alongside the copy of Strong Magic I already own, and he was nice enough to inscribe both books to me afterwards.

Francis Menotti did a excellent lecture and really proved how good, and clever his material is. I’ve picked up he has a keen eye for little details and touches, often overlooked which make his performances really nice.

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The close up show today was pretty good as well.. opening with Darwin Ortiz, Juan Ordeix and finally Francis Menotti. All three gave a great show, hosted by John Lenahan.

Given Juan Ordeix’s mentalism act today, I’m looking forward to his lecture later on today.. He was the mentalism winner from FISM, and has some really great looking material

InternationalMagic, Magic