This the second in a series of articles about the mishaps of a professional magician.
The success of any entertainer depends on many different factors.
The ability to be creative and to upgrade a performance to a degree of excellence from what is learned from each show, is just the start.
The amount of time devoted to practice and construction of said show is relative to the professionalism of the finished product.
The trials of learning and incrementing a new routine or trick into your show can sometimes result in a different outcome or direction.
This phenomena creates at times, situations that are embarrassing, funny, unexpected, and just plain weird.
I was the lead trumpet with a musical group called "The Whispering Shadows".
Though I had no outright training in magic, I was the one chosen to perform the role of magician, wherever we performed.
My early days of magic were nightly nerve wrenching affairs.
In the beginning, the sight of me pulling a rubber chicken out of a saxophone followed by a flash of fire, were at times, a lot of silliness.
This was a result of the lack of knowledge and experience on my part.
Even so, the audiences' were receptive and did enjoy the comedy concept that we were presenting.
I was always a fast learner and I was always striving to find or create new things with my new art form.
The more the group traveled, the more magic I discovered and learned.
At one particular night-club called "Casuals-On-The-Square" which was mentioned in my first article, the owner (Warren) was a real first-class guy.
He was open to new ideas and was more than willing to see new routines that would excite his audiences.
He was always in my ear to suggest a new stunt or trick.
His latest big idea was for me to appear in a puff of smoke to start my show.
Mind you now, he never had the tools for me to do his wild ideas.
He just sort of left that for me to figure out on my own.
If I have learned anything, in all these years, is that imagination can be a true catalyst in ramping up wild ideas for those of us who have no prior knowledge of the basics.
Bookies in the early years, wrote their numbers on papers that were treated with chemicals.
When dried out they would burst into flames when touched with the lit end of a cigarette.
Which was a quick out if raided by the police.
Magicians utilized this item for flash effects with their shows.
Photographers, many years past, would use black powder to generate a flash to take photos.
My idea was to use the two together to produce the flash opening appearance.
By placing a little black powder on a piece of flash paper and touching it with a cigarette would produce the 'poof' effect we needed.
Lets jump ahead to the evening's performance.
It was time for my magic show to start.
I was crouched down hiding behind the speakers of our sound system.
In front of me on the floor was a canister that held my flash combo and I had a lit cigarette.
Without even a practice try and with my heart beating I still felt that I was ready.
Warren dimmed the lights and my music started.
The entire stage was pitch black and I couldn't even see my hand! I started probing with my cigarette searching for my cache of flash.
I couldn't hit the damn canister to save my life.
Then suddenly a huge burst of flame and smoke erupted right in front of me! I jumped to my feet, and postured in my best 'here I am position'.
The first thing I heard were the gasps and applause.
The second thing was this gigantic orange sun in my vision.
No matter where I looked, this bright circular light was blinding me and I could see nothing.
My first trick was a rope trick which I immediately started to do even though I couldn't see a thing.
As I'm going through my routine I can hear the audience laughing and clapping.
The bright sun in my eyes was ever so slowly reducing in size and within a short time, I was able to see my hands.
Now as I'm looking at my hands, I can see that the hair on my left hand is singed and the hand itself was black with soot.
My right hand was untouched.
I finished my show in that condition with one white hand and one black hand and told everyone that I had an equal opportunity show.
Warren thought it was a great effect and wanted me to add it on a permanent basis.
Needless to say, that never happened.