I remember doing magic when I was young. We would visit family for Sunday dinners or a holiday and I always brought something along to perform. I did that a lot.
Eventually I started doing children’s parties and while that was enjoyable and there was a lot to learn, it really wasn’t where my heart was. I was always interested in doing close-up magic.
I was fascinated with sleight-of-hand and I knew my audience was going to be in the corporate world and events with adult audiences. So I started to think more about that.
What I kept bumping into was how to make the leap from doing children’s parties to the corporate market. But the question was bigger than “how do I do more corporate events?” The question was really “who do I need to be to get those gigs?”
That’s where I lived for a time and it was okay. But now I find the question has changed again.
Now it’s about BEING A MAGICIAN. “Who do I need to be so that an experience of wonder just seems to happen around me?”
And that’s much bigger than doing tricks.
“The show was really engaging and entertaining! I’m an astrophysicist with excellent perception and logical skills, yet I couldn’t figure out how Dennis did his illusions.”
World-renowned professor Alex Filippenko experienced our March installment of CONJURING WONDER at the Claremont Club & Spa with his wife, Noelle, and questions the nature of the universe even more deeply now!
Sign up and be the first to hear about future dates for CONJURING WONDER at The Claremont Club & Spa.
Excited to share the new promo video for CONJURING WONDER - Magic: Up-Close & Personal.
Join us monthly at The Claremont Club & Spa in Berkeley for The Bay Area’s Premiere Close-Up Magic Experience.
Tickets available at www.conjuring.live.
Oakland, CA - Dennis Kyriakos sells out the premiere performance of CONJURING WONDER at The Claremont Club & Spa, in Berkeley, CA.
Imagine making your way through the stunning lobby of the Claremont Club & Spa and unwinding with a glass of wine while mingling with other guests.
Take your seat around the table as a dapper gentleman is introduced and the mysteries unfold.
Suddenly, objects vanish and reappear before your eyes. Uncanny coincidences unfold. Secret thoughts are revealed.
You are left charmed, bewildered, and amazed.
CONJURING WONDER will be presented monthly at The Claremont Club & Spa. Stay informed when future tickets go on sale here.
The world of Magic is filled with larger than life personalities, impossible miracles, and legendary stories that border on myth.
This recent article in the New York Times tries to capture all that with the story of one man and his Holy Grail.
David Berglas is famous in our little world for many things but nothing comes close to the legend that’s been created around a trick known as Any Card at Any Number. To be more specific, The Berglas Effect.
It goes like this. You’re asked to name a playing card in a standard deck of cards. Another person is asked for a number from 1 to 52. You’re then asked to pick up a deck of cards sitting on the table — untouched by the performer — and count down to the number named. The card you asked for is found exactly at the number named. Fucking miracle.
Most magic tricks go from Point A to Point B to Point C and eventually reach an astonishing climax. It happens the same way every time, so essentially the performer needs to follow the steps.
But not The Berglas Effect. It’s almost impossible to teach or explain because, depending on the method used, it’s never the same twice. It requires spontaneity, an open mind, and a set made of brass.
It’s rarely seen because it’s hard to do but I’m not necessarily speaking about technique. There are many versions of the trick. Have you noticed new video banners on the redesigned website? The final moments of those two card tricks you see there is a version of ACANN. There’s also a different version in my virtual show.
The challenge is creating the space so the power of the effect can exist.
It would be so easy to post the entire video of those performances but that would be a disservice. You’d miss out on that feeling in the center of your body when the bottom falls out. Who am I to deprive you of that?
No. Better if you ask about it when next we meet.
One of the first and most memorable gigs I had came soon after we moved to the west coast in 2012.
The venue was a “maker space” in the Mission District of San Francisco. It was my first time in that part of town and had no idea what to expect. As I parked the car and walked around the corner to find the graffiti filled front door, I thought “well, this is another fine mess you’ve gotten yourself into.”
The place was filled with tables, shelves, and workspaces of electronic gear. It looked like the laboratory of a mad scientist except it felt like there was some method to it all.
At the time, I was temping to support my family and rebuild things here in The New Frontier, using skills I developed while studying and working as an actor in New York City. But I was also taking any magic gig I could get my hands on.
This particular evening was a short performance before dessert for a group of about 20 gathered to celebrate a friend who was changing jobs. For years the guest-of-honor had worked as an editor for gay porn films and now he was starting a new gig at a company that made straight porn.
And man, did they roast him. They even had a custom cake made that looked like…er, on second thought.
As it turned out, it was a fun group to entertain and we had a blast. Yeah, I’ve been wrong about these things before.
Anyway, as I stood in the back of the house waiting for an introduction, my eyes drifted around the room taking in the audience, the set up of the performance area, the decor, etc. Eventually I noticed something scrawled on the wall.
If you weren’t standing right next to it you would have missed it. I snapped a picture and it was my cell phone wallpaper for over a year.
Recently, I was having a conversation with a friend. He’s a semi-pro with a solid “day job” who does magic on the side and regularly produces his own one-man show, which has quite a following.
We were on the phone some time in May talking about what we were going to work on while shut down and sheltered-in-place. He had a plan based on the fact that, as things began to open up, people would be interested in hosting smaller, more intimate events and he asked what I thought about his idea.
“Does doing that or anything else you’ve done in magic make you happy?” I asked.
I don’t think it’s about “the marketing plan” at all. That’s a necessary evil to get your work seen. The question that needs to be answered is “does it bring you joy?”
Everything else lines up around that.
Actual size. Almost.