A couple of random thoughts here on a very interesting thread. I've been juggling for a few years now (can do a Mill's mess and 3-club cascade, 4 ball half-shower when the stars are aligned correctly), but have only started to learn magic sleights in the past six months.

- shawlie said the true test of magic is in front of an audience. I couldn't agree more. I recently realized that I juggle to entertain myself, but I do magic to entertain others.

- Juggling actually gave me the confidence to start doing sleights. I guess I realized my hand/eye coordination was fairly decent when I was able to pick up three ball patterns relatively quickly. The overhand shuffle came more easily than the three ball cascade did, for whatever reason. Similarly, sponge ball false passes, etc. seem to come pretty easily.

- Practicing magic is much easier for me than practicing juggling. Maybe it's just because my puppy will run off with any dropped ball, and my two year old son tries to grab clubs out of my hand.

Eric.

I have juggled for almost seventeen years now. I tried sleight of hand for the first time when I was twelve at about the same time I started to juggle. I failed miserably at sleight of hand magic and had such a bad experience with it that it has taken me almost seventeen year to come back to it.

As a boy I found that juggling was easy to learn how to practice because once I understood what to do it was easy to make myself do it and keep doing it until I did it right. Magic was harder for me as a child because it involved many things that were not easy for a child to grasp. Audience control, patter, misdirection and doing a trick until I didn’t' have to think about the mechanics of it were things that I had to become much more mature before I could grasp. Juggling was easy because I could tell if I dropped the ball or not. As an adult I found that I could easily do things that I failed at doing as a child. I practiced my magic with discipline but I did not yet have the maturity to truly understand what I really needed to do when performing a trick.

This is not the case with everyone because I have seen many children that seem to perform magic with ease. This was my own personal experience however.

Enjoy the journey with magic and juggling.

I only know the basics of juggling.

Such as eating the apple, onion or egg while juggling.

You might try some coin flourishes such as the 1, 2 3 or 4 coin roll on the fingertips.

or the Coin Roll outs or

Coin Stars.

The M.P. or the Coin that falls up might be a good addition to a routine that uses magic and juggling.

You might also consider some card, coin or other object work with two people ala passing.

Of course Multiplying Balls ie 8 balls without a S...might be also be a good combination with your juggling.

Also a chosen card (signed) in one of the oranges you have been juggling.

or one step further

in a lime, inside an orange or

in an egg in a lime in an......

but I digress into stream of concience(SIC)

Help me my mind is falling and I cant st......(mini lol)

Thanks for sharing.

Harris Deutsch
Laughologist

You eat and onion while juggling? Just eating an onion would be a trick in itself to me. Wow!

I mentioned this in another jugglers vs. magicians thread (that one was more about the people rather than the disciplines, it's in the "Food for Thought" forum), but the biggest difference I find between the two is about the approach to more simple methods and gimmicks.

As a juggler I'm used to the "what you see is what you get" attitude where there is an obvious link between the difficulty of a trick and its value as a spectacle. Beyond basic showmanship such as selling the danger when juggling torches, everything's pretty much what it says on the tin.

As a magician, the KISS principle becomes far more important. While you should still have sleights in your arsenal, difficult methods won't impress people if you're doing it right, because they shouldn't notice. While I still prefer to use ungimmicked props as much as possible I'm slowly coming round to their value in terms of realising the impossible. But I'm battling my juggling insticts all the way; it still feels like cheating. I've often wondered if Penn and Teller's sometime obsession with making it clear their stuff is cool tricks has to do with Penn's background as a juggler before he got into magic.

The opposite extreme is bad magicians who are obsessed with everything having a gimmick even when none is necessary. I've met a few of those, and also found great amusement in watching them flounder when the wretched devices jam on them at vital moments (I guess the sort of person who can't be bothered learning a basic palm likewise doesn't see the need for having emergency get-out routines to follow in case things don't go according to plan: another thing any performing juggler learns the need for early on).

Somewhere between the two extremes lies the consummate performer.

One more thing: if you want to test yourself as a magician, go back to your old juggling buddies and try out your tricks on them. They will focus on EVERYTHING. Every sleight, every gimmick, every gaff. If you can misdirect them you can snake anyone.

In order to be a performing juggler you must never stop practiceing. Juggling is an art. Magic is a skill.
My opinion
Al Angello

In my humble opinion, the two arts are one in the same. It all is a matter of presentation and focus.

Historically the magician was called juggler. All the old paintings of cup and ball performances are titled "the Juggler". The Magician tarot card was once called the Juggler. In front of him was a set of cups and balls.

I considered myself a juggler for many years. People kept walking away from my performances saying, "what an incredible magician"


Incidentally - Jim Henson was quoted saying the jugglery of Michael Moshen is the closest thing he had seen to real magic.

From Dictionary.com I thought it was interesting



jug·gle ( P ) Pronunciation Key (jgl)
v. jug·gled, jug·gling, jug·gles
v. tr.
1. To keep (two or more objects) in the air at one time by alternately tossing and catching them.
2. To have difficulty holding; balance insecurely: juggled the ball but finally caught it; shook hands while juggling a cookie and a teacup.
3. To keep (more than two activities, for example) in motion or progress at one time: managed to juggle a full-time job and homemaking.
4. To manipulate in order to deceive: juggle figures in a ledger.

v. intr.
To juggle objects or perform other tricks of manual dexterity.
To make rapid motions or manipulations: juggled with the controls on the television to improve the picture.
To use trickery; practice deception.

n.
The act of juggling.
Trickery for a dishonest end.

SenseiStrange
You are absolutely right the magician was called a juggler 200 years ago for one reason. If he called himself magician he would have been tarred and feathered, or even worse burnt at the stake, because the word magician was thought to be someone who was in league with the devil, and a practitioner of witch craft. Isn't that what Harry Potter is all about?
I AM
Al Angello
juggler, magician, comedian, and sorcerer

The two are similar in terms of practice and commitment. Juggling is very straight forward, though, - either you can do it or you can't. Magic tends to have many people who can "kind of" do stuff, and pass it off as the real thing.

Magic also requires MUCH more in terms of psycholgy, misdirection and just general sneekyness, things that jugglers don't need to worry about. These can take years and years to perfect, regardless of how well the moves work at home.

Both can be pretty boring, too, without the years of work it takes to build up a good, confident personality.

Hi all,

Just thought I'd give my 2 pence worth on the juggling/magician thing. The first ever depiction of juggling appears as paintings on the tomb walls of an unknown egyption prince dating back to around 1994BC. Later both the Greeks and the Romans are known to have used juggling as a form of entertainment. Some historians believe that the word juggler stems from the Roman word "ventilator" which means "thrower of knives". Whether this is true is open to debate, but what is clear is that jugglers of this period in time would manipulate objects, perform conjuring or magic tricks as well as sing, dance and play musical instruments.

Of course we shouldn't concentrate solely on the Western World. The Eastern countries, with China at it's forefront, have also had a lot of influence on what jugglers do today. Back when the Roman and Greek jugglers were manipulating balls the Chinese, using their vast skills in manufacturing, were producing some extremely ornate juggling props that included props fashioned from wood into shapes of animals that would be thrown and balanced on different parts of the body. The Chinese were also the originators of acrobatic plate spinning, the devil stick and of course the diabolo, all af which can still be seen today.

Whizzing through time to France in the 6th Century AD we see the first appearence of the "jongleur". Jongleurs are believed to be the decendents of the jugglers left over from Roman Occupation. They were professional entertainers and would travel from village to village performing their vast array of tricks to the locals. Times for the ‘jongleurs’ were very hard for many centuries, until the birth of the troubadour at the end of the eleventh century.

The troubadours were poets from the wealthy classes of society who were interested in literary pursuits. These aristocrats felt they needed an assistant during their performances; and jongleurs, with their many talents were ideal for adding a little light hearted fun into the troubadour’s recitals. For the first time since the Roman occupation the jongleurs were beginning to receive respect from the upper classes as they travelled from court to court with the troubadours.

In England, at the time of William the Conqueror, the title "The King of the Jugglers" appeared and continued to appear for over four centuries and brought with it many privileges. We must remember that the word juggler at that time in England had as broad a meaning as "jongleur" did in France. The title, consequently, could have applied to a musician, a poet, or indeed any enterprising showman who had gained the favours of the court.

Throughout the Middle Ages jugglers mainly worked in the marketplace and the travelling fair where they would perform for money. As time went on the different skills that made up the jugglers reportoire began to form their own niche. Musicians, singers, dancers and macicians were all slowing pulling away and foring their own identity. By the 17th Century, during the time of Newton and the discovery tea, street performers (including jugglers and magicians) were viewed in a more sinister light, which, considering many who practiced the art during this time were in fact rouges and outlaws is not at all surprising. They were seen as nothing more than beggars, the lowest of the low, performing on the dusty road for scraps of food or clothing. And when the hurdy-gurdy (a mechanical musical instrument like the barrel organ) was introduced, it became necessary for the jugglers to provide musical accompaniment to their routines.

By the mid 18th Century, Sergeant Major Philip Astley returned to England from the Seven Years War. He was a gifted horseman and on his retirement from the army he performed as a trick rider in London’s Pleasure Gardens. It wasn’t long before he was able to open his own riding school on the south side of Westminster Bridge, where he would teach during the mornings and perform in the ring, or ‘The Circus’ (which derives from the French word for circle) during the afternoons.
Soon he decided to add some variety to his shows and invited other performers to show their skills in The Circus. Juggling routines and magic acts, now very much separate entities, formed part of these initial acts.

Today juggling and magic can't be further apart from each other. But, it should be remembered that whether we are magicians or jugglers we both have the same roots and it is therefore not surprising that juggling and magic compliment each other.

Yet again I've written more than I had intended. If you've managed to get this far I hope what I've written is of some use. If I've got some dates wrong (which after all is quite possible) please correct me.

Take care,

The main difference is that magic cannot be separated from the performance. The magic exists is the spectators mind and without someone watching there is no magic. The performance and presentation is everything.
Juggling can be just juggling for yourself it doesn't have to have an audience. You can be a great juggler, but a really bad performer, but you can't be a great magician, but a really bad performer.

Phil

The International Jugglers Association was founded in 1947 at the invitation of the IBM convention that was held that year in Pittsburg. I think 8 jugglers attended that IBM convention that, and they formed the nucelous of the IJA. There are over 3,000 members of the IJA today which started from those humble beginings, so the jugglers of the world have a place to go to learn their art because of some smart magicians back in 1947.
Boring but true
Al Angello

Roslyn,

Thank you for your interesting post on jugglery. By and large I see that they can be seen as separate arts - but jugglers with skill really skirt the boundaries between the two.

Skill

I think any great skill becomes magic.

In my personal jugglery people walk away magiced. Many patterns when done with phenomenal skill become optical illusions.

Card flourishes too are on the boundaries between the arts, but I don't think any layman would see it as anything else than magic.


I suppose when compare the arts you have to define them - but definitions are limited and confining. Furthermore definitions are subjective.

In my experince, jugglery is magic when the audience sees magic. Magic is the emotional result, not the technical method.


Walk in Peace,


Sensei Strange

Hey Everyone,
I've been juggling for twelve years and working with magic for about four years now. I have to agree with a lot that's already been said, but my person challenge hasn't been to seperate, but to intergrate. My cups and balls routine is as mush juggling as it is magic. I also Flair Bartend, and I took some moves from that realm and applied them to Cups and Balls to get a fun flashy style that's packed with magic. I think that the two are different arts, but like someone said earlier, the great thing is somewhere between the two.
Yes, Juggling is all about showing off, but so is magic. The Methods of showing off are simply manifested differently on stage. I've seen Micheal Moschen on stage, he leaves you with an awesome feeling of magic all while wowing you with juggling.
Just my thoughts
Dan

Dan
I always try to combine my juggling with my magic, and that cup and ball routine is a perfect trick to let them compliment each other.
Thanks Dan
Al Angello