Conjuror At The Table — Al James

I have a bit of a bias here, I used to watch Al perform at the Chicago Magic Lounge, and his take on the cups and balls is a personal favorite of mine. I was able to talk a bit of magic with him and he couldn’t have been nicer even though he was light years better than me.

This is a book on restaurant magic with some history tossed in.

I think you can break it down into three parts

A higher level view of getting into restaurant magic and how to do it: He goes into a fair amount of detail about finding gigs, getting publicity, and putting your marketing materials together. Even how to prepare for a gig and what to look for when figuring out who to perform for. You can tell there is a lot of experience behind his advice.

Routines and tricks: He offers several routines and tricks that he had performed and others performed at restaurants and bars around Chicago. There is even a card control tossed in. There are lots of books with tricks, but these have worked in the bar setting.

Chicago bar magic history: If you have heard the introduction to Chicago Bar Magic they give at the Chicago Magic Lounge, you have gotten just an overview (understandably because most people don’t want a half hour of magic history at a show). Al provides a more extended and in-depth account of Chicago Bar Magic that is worth a read on its own if you are interested in magic history.



About Me

Suburban dad, database administrator, amateur magician and high school sports official.
I have been doing the database thing for almost 30 years, most of that with SQL Server along with other platforms, most recently InfluxDB.
I perform magic with a volunteer organization and enjoy practicing it, learning new things and the history of the art.

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