234: FISM Italy - Day Three

On the third day, magicians created more magical moments. More stage competitions and the last of the close-up contests. That means tomorrow, I'll get to attend some lectures since there will not be any afternoon close-up contests to watch.

But today, between contests, we talked with friends and made new ones as I chatted with some of the talent from the gala shows plus a perspective from a competitor. We also chat with the new SAM National President, Dave Bowers.

the evening broke up the registrants into two groups. While one was at the Close-Up Gala, the other attended the "White Dinner" where everyone was encouraged to wear at least one white item, whether a white scarf, pants, Hat or carnation. The performers in the Close-Up Gala included: the Fat Brothers, Guy Hollingworth, David Williamson, Eugene Burger, and Armando Lucero with David Stone as the Master of Ceremonies.

the midnight show was actually a lecture by Dan Sperry on "the dark side of magic" And the midnight bar session featured Luke Jermay, Tony Montana and Juan Tamariz.

Street artists and their shills working the crowd during FISM 2015

Time stamps for this podcast:

00:01:33 - Dave Bowers, National President of the Society of American Magician

00:05:28 - Trigg Watson

00:12:08 - David Kaye, aka Silly Billy

00:23:03 - Topas

00:36:05 - "Mecki" Ludwig Gantner and Peter Pudill, from Vienna, Austria

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233: FISM Italy - Day Two

More great competitors made for some outstanding shows. And some really. Great lectures, too. By Luke Jermay, David Stone, Paul Wilson, Dani Da Ortiz, Luis De Matos, Rob Zabrcky and many others. And the competitions (both close-up and stage) run opposite and in conjunction with the lectures.

the evening show was the "Magic Mentors" featuring Xavier Mortimer, Dan Sperry, Gaetan Bloom, , Juliana Chen, Simon Pierro, Marco Zoppi, Armando Lucero, Raymond Crowe, James More, and as MC, Topas who introduced the following presenters, Max Maven, Lu Chin, Luis de Matos, Marco Tempest, Rafael, Mike Caveney, Tina Lennert, Guy Hollingworth,

And the dealers...oh, the dealers! Such great stuff from all over the world. I have finally started "dipping into the pond" and buying a few things. And the activities go late into the, uh, morning. On this second day, the late night (12:30) show was "he great Jabba extreme freak show"

Time stamps for this podcast:

00:49:39 - Paul Stone talks about Innovention an dmore

00:13:04 - Sandy Marshall, son of Jay Marshall and owner of Magic, Inc. in Chicago, Illinois

00:24:21 - Mark Mason, owner of JP Magic

00:28:59 - Danny Orleans talks about his lecture here at FISM plus some tips on trade show business

232: FISM Italy - Day One

Well, here we go, day one of the six day (and night) congress. After arriving a week early flying into Milan and traveling to Stresa for a couple nights, to Padova for a couple more then ending in Padova, we traveled to Rimini to check in for the International Championships.

Day one was filled with stage and close-up contests and plenty of lectures from dawn to, well, almost dawn the next day. My favorite so far for stage illusion was Mag Edgar from Spain and for manipulation (and maybe the Grand Prix) Lee Chang Min from the Republic of Korea.