The compound movements of card magic

I call this essay the compound movements of magic, since this idea is more familiar to people than the big 7. However, the main idea sprang from the big 7 of weight lifting.

The Big What of Weight Lifting?

Recently, I started to get more interested in human movement. This isn't just weight lifting, but also locomotion, stretching, spinal movements, and weird ways of exercising. I basically would like to learn how the human body functions and which functional movements we can do.

When I was into a similar deep-dive five years ago, I came across a guy called Paul Chek. Paul is regarded as the father of holistic health. This means that he's approaching health from a perspective where things aren't just isolated instances. The problem in your shoulder joint might not just come from a shoulder mobility issue, but it's likely to also come from an imbalance in the lower body. The idea is that the whole human body is connected, everything works together in order to make us move like we were designed.

But Rico, what does this have to do with magic? I'll get to that in a bit.

Paul's philosophy goes even deeper. To a point where psychological functions and emotions are also connected to physical issues. As above, so below. Which means the opposite is also true. But this is a discussion for a different time.

You can forget all that I told you above except for one thing. The part where Paul views the entire body as a connected whole. We start to see that this is true also with recent research and something that is becoming a trend nowadays, which is facia. This is a concept that's too deep to go into in this post, plus I don't nearly know enough about it.

It's important to see the whole body as a connected whole because that also means that plenty of exercises that we're doing in the gym are not designed for the human body. In the gym people are using countless machines, the machines are made to have muscles work in isolation; however, the human body is not made to have muscles work in isolation. Muscles always work together in a group in order to achieve "primal movements". (It's not wrong to work on machines if you want to isolate the growth of certain groups, however, if you would like to train and get a generally strong body, there are better ways).

While looking at Paul Chek's system for exercise in his book "How to eat move and be healthy", he discusses the idea of primal movement patterns. In other words, movements which the human body is made to do.

These movements are:

1. Push

2. Pull

3. Squat

4. Lunge

5. Lift

6. Twist

7. Gait

Most of them are kind of obvious, but what the fuck is gait?

Gait is the movement of walking or sprinting.

So with that out of the way, again, what does this have to do with magic?

The idea of training primal movements is to move in accordance to the design of the body. If you train only these movements, you have a well-rounded training schedule and the most efficient way to train the entire body. Which lead me to think, "Are there movements such as this for card magic? Movements, or rather techniques, that allows us to do all basic plots in magic. But even more, allow us to Jam and make up new plots?". Are there "most efficient techniques" that if we only know those 7 techniques, we will be able to be a skilled and well-rounded card magician?

Yes, I believe that there are!

The Big 7 of Card Magic

This idea is by no means new, while thinking about this I remember conversations that I've had with Michael Vincent, Daniel Prado, and many other magicians. The idea of the 7 most important techniques in card magic have been around for ages, but it's always nice to see a reminder.

The big 7 are:

1. Visible Control

2. Invisible Control

3. Palm

4. Double Lift (visible switch)

5. Top Change (Invisible Switch)

6. Peek

7. Force

Yes, I do realize that this list could've been 5 points long in the following manner:

1. control

2. Palm

3. Switch

4. Peek

5. Force

However, I do think it's essential to list visible and invisible control, and switch as a different category, as they achieve different things and also communicate something different to the audience.

A visible control, for example, such as a jog shuffle, communicates that the card is lost. It has been shuffled into the deck and is now hopelessly lost.

Whereas an invisible control such as a pass communicates that the card is left at the place where we all know it is, in the middle of the deck. Would we be able to tell the exact numerical location of the card? Probably not, however, we would be able to say "the card is in the middle", a quality that the visible control doesn't have.

This is also true for the visible and invisible switch.

The visible switch, such as a double lift, shows us that the deck was near the card, this isn't necessarily bad, and in many instances it's much safer, more economical, plus it will get the job done.

However, an invisible control such as a top change communicates that the deck never even came near the card which was changed. We could also refer to these switches as "full contact switch" and "no contact switch". Of course, using those names looks at them from the perspective of the spectator.

Note: A color change such as a shapeshifter change or an Erdnase Change is also a visible switch, or full contact switch.

What Does This Knowledge Bring Us?

Now that we know the big 7 of car magic, what does this knowledge bring us?

It brings us multiple things;

1. Direction

2. Understanding

3. Freedom

4. Being able to (eventually) teach

DIRECTION

Understanding the big 7 allows us to have direction in our practice. We might be a new magician who's just learning card magic. In that case, knowing these techniques gives us a direction to focus on.

As a beginner

The world of magic can be so overwhelming, there is so much material out there, so many tricks and gimmicks, where do you start? And how do you build a framework to become a good magician?

Well, in the case that you are keen to learn about card magic, it's best to first master the big seven. Not only will the big seven allow you to nearly all the tricks in card magic (I say nearly because you can't do packet tricks; however, we could also consider packet tricks as a subcategory of card magic). But, It also allows you to pick up most magic books and straight away perform the trick. This doesn't mean that the trick will look good straight away. It also doesn't mean that you don't have to work on the trick. However, you will have a strong enough basis that with hard work, you can get a trick performable for people within a few days. Note how I say performable, to master a trick is an entirely different subject, it will take many hours of performance and refinement.

As an intermediate

I've met many magicians throughout my life, and very few of them were able to do all the big seven well. The magicians we usually love and praise can do them, and a few of my friends are able to do them. However, a lot of us seem to get stuck on the dopamine train. We see this cool way to control a card, or this new cool switch and lose a lot of time trying to master that move, but eventually giving up the process towards perfection, once we can do the move "well enough".

Because of this, I see a lot of lacking passes, poor double lifts and badly executed top changes. Knowing the big seven will allow you direction of what to truly focus on.

The good news is also that you don't need many different techniques to achieve these moves. If I look at my card magic, I only use three different invisible controls; the spread pass, the turnover pass, the side steal. Furthermore, I only use a jog or mahatma shuffle as a visible control in 90% of the cases and for the other five I usually revert to only 1 technique in each category.

You don't need to be able to do many different double lift's or top changes. You just need to be able to do one technique exceptionally well.

For me, knowing about the big seven gives me direction as to what to focus on in my personal practice. Which techniques to drill. But, especially, when being short on time, I know that I will get the most bang for my buck if I practice the big seven.

In another essay, I talked about going back to the basics, how the people that excel in their arts are always the one's that are the best at the basics, well, the big seven is your basics.

UNDERSTANDING.

I like to think of magic in terms of systems. It's kind of like playing the piano or any musical instrument. You begin by learning different chords, notes, scales, etc.

Finally, you learn how to combine those things and to make music.

After you've been imitating people for a while, you will slowly start to understand how to make your own music out of this. How all of it fits together into creating a song.

It's the same in magic. We first learn all the basic techniques of magic, what they achieve, but also what they communicate towards the audience. Then after a while we will start to realize how these techniques can flow together into a routine.

The ambitious card is a good example of this, since in the ambitious card all of the big seven can be used. What's even more is that we can use the big seven to start to jam with the ambitious card. Which brings us to our next point.

FREEDOM

With an increased natural understanding and ability to execute the techniques comes a larger freedom. We now reach a point where we can start to make up magic tricks, play with magic in the moment, also considered to be "Jazz Magic", and where we can get ourselves out of sticky situations.

Since the big seven allow us to do so manny things, and create all effects in card magic, except for packet tricks (although, the elmsley count could be considered a top change). It will also allow you to do just about anything that you can imagine. Because of this, you can start to just play with ideas once they come up in the moment, and you will discover how much fun it is to combine random magical moments in front of an audience.

BEING ABLE TO TEACH

Finally, when you have a more profound understanding, you will begin to develop the ability to teach people. To teach is to learn. To learn is to teach. When teaching someone else you will start to gain an even more in-depth understanding of your magic, techniques and movement. You automatically gain by giving.

Since we first need a solid understanding before we're able to teach, the best way to build this understanding is to master the big seven, and to then learn many different routines that incorporate these techniques. What's more, you could also read routines and then think about ways to achieve the same effect using only the big seven.

Understanding how the big seven flows together will automatically build an intuition for magic, and what's possible.

This intuition and understanding will be a great friend while teaching people.

Conclusion

In a world where attention is scattered, it's more important than even to be able to focus our mind, attention, and time. This can especially be difficult when we don't know what to focus our attention on. The big seven allow us a clear path to focus on and clear goals to achieve.

We want to master at least one technique within each of seven different categories. Mastery is not just being able to execute the technique in isolation, but also in a routine, together with other techniques to achieve a deeper level of magic.

Just changing a random card with a top change can be magical, however, changing a card that was introduced and placed aside before into the spectator's selection reaches miracle levels. Combining techniques will allow you to layer your magic. This will make your magic more deceptive and impactful.

Finally, mastery over the big seven doesn't just make you a better magician, it also makes you a better magic teacher. By becoming a better teacher, you will gain an even better understanding over magic, which again makes you a better magician.

Master your craft, share the joy of magic, give and you shall receive.

See you next post,

Rico