Talking About Pounding The Pavement

There is nothing like it like getting out there and pounding the pavement looking for more work.

The reason I like getting out there and pounding the pavement is that for me - over time - it works.

After several visits of giving out my promo and meeting the managers - then doing a promo night to let them see me work for the audience (their customers).

And when they see me work for their customers they can see the benefits.

I landed another restaurant job for another night this week. In doing so making an opportunity for a win - win situation that can build good customer (public) relations and build good business for both of us.

That is the reason I love this business so much because it can and often does help to build good business in the way of re-Pete business and customer (public) relations for others as well as myself as a magician and as a performer as I “showcase” my magic art.

Just my opinion!

Glenn Bishop's Published Works!

Here is a list of stuff that I put out on advanced artistic magic.

Glenn Bishop's First Lecture Notes - Notes on the shell game and many card routines that I was doing in my restaurant work at the time

Early Bishop (The Comb Bound Book) This was a book on my first lecture notes including pictures of the complete routines.

Glenn Bishop's Shell Game For Table Side Tricksters (The Comb Bound Book)- This was my complete shell game routine including my original pea in the shot glass ending. An ending that fooled Eddie Fields, Ed Marlo and many other magicians in magic.

The Life and Magic of Billy Bishop "Bish The Magish" - My Dads life story in magic and some of his best tricks - Published by David Charvet!

Glenn Bishop's Tested Card Work For Card Shark Magician's DVD-1 - This DVD had many of my best card work including the gem poker deal and my cold cutting the aces routine Glenn Bishop Cuts The Aces - of cutting the aces from a shuffled deck!

Glenn Bishop's Tested Tricks For Tableside Tricksters DVD-2 - This DVD had many magic routines that were right out of my act including my shell game routine and my cups and balls routine and my coins to glass and my dynamic diamonds routine.

Glenn Bishop's A Different Look At Tested Card Work DVD-3 - This DVD had a lot of great stuff on it including some card control idea's. And my another look at Marlo's Miracle aces and my favorite way to do a sandwich transport.

Glenn Bishop Punch Deck Pro DVD-4 This was it my complete punch deck card control system and how I use it to control cards and deal poker hands.

Glenn Bishop's Ace Cutting and Block Transfer Shuffle Triumph's (The Comb Bound Book) my complete system of how to use the Dai Vernon Triumph shuffle to control cards, stack poker hands, cull poker hands and cold cull stack the four aces from a shuffled deck of cards.

Glenn Bishop's Ace Cutting and Block Transfer Shuffle Triumph's (The 7 e-books) my complete system of how to use the Dai Vernon Triumph shuffle to control cards, stack poker hands, cull poker hands and cold cull stack the four aces from a shuffled deck of cards.

Glenn Bishop's Ace Cutting and Block Transfer Shuffle Triumph's (The 2 DVD set) my complete system of how to use the Dai Vernon Triumph shuffle to control cards, stack poker hands, cull poker hands, the triple duke triumph and cold cull stack the four aces from a shuffled deck of cards.

Including a marking system that was never before published and works with this riffle shuffle cull stack system. And a routine that uses the riffle shuffle cull stack with two hands and my scissor bottom deal.

Glenn Bishop's Jog Shuffle Stacking Ideas (The DVD) More ideas on Jog Shuffle work that I have had over the years. How to cull and stack two hands on the fly with the jog shuffle cull stack. How to jog shuffle up a winning hand for a Texas holdem demo.

Glenn Bishop's DVD on Three Card Monte and The Shell Game - The three card Monte routine I do for the lay audience. I teach the way I do the crimped corner - plus my three ten ending where the three bent cards change into three tens. On this DVD is my complete shell game routine plus some never published moves that feature a new shell steal that has never been published before.

That is about it - all the books and DVD's are now sold out and I have no idea when or if I would ever produce more product and sell any of this stuff again. Maybe after I retire from performing - but that doesn't look like it will be soon - you might say I just got my second wind.

Just my opinion.

Me Own A Magic Shop? (Part Two)

Pictured is my Dad in front of his magic shop (Now Closed).

I have to say that there are a few parts of the magic shop business that I do miss. This magic shop over the years became a meeting place for professional performers both young and old. Magicians like Eddie Fields, Jack Pyle, John Shirley, Jay Marshall, Bill Weimer, George Sands, Bob Brown, Marshall Brodien and many others came by the shop for a visit from time to time. And some came very often.

The opportunity to session with so many different professional magicians and to talk shop about the business side of magic was in my opinion the best part of this magic shop.

However the hard part of the business was that if you are in the magic shop business in order to stay in business you have to move product. And that is why I think my dads pro magic line of tricks did not sell that well. Magicians that were pro's - well they have an act that they do for a living and they were not looking for new material. And magicians that do magic for a hobby were only interested in my dads pro magic line from the collector's point of view - not from the performing magicians point of view. So the idea never got off the ground after the first two tricks were packaged and put out for sale.

This is one of the small reasons that I tend not to lecture for magicians. The reason is that my magic stuff in my lecture - my jog shuffle cull peg deck system - my shell game - my cups and balls routine - my stuff - is right out of my act.

I used my jog shuffle peg deck system at the magic castle and I don't think that any magician that watched me had any idea I was using it to control cards and deal poker hands with it. But it is of little use to a magician that doesn't want to deal poker hands. Like Jack Pyle's work with a deck - only a magician that wants to work in that style would be interested in that kind of magic and that makes the market for that kind of thing very limited.

On an audio tape Ken Brooke's (who was a great performing magicians in the UK and worked and owned a magic shop business) said something like - that there were two kind of magic tricks. Tricks for the magician and tricks for the performing magician. And in his magic shop he always tried to sell the performing magician a trick that he can do in his show and make the money back - like the sale of the performing trick was an investment in his act.

Just my opinion!

Me Own A Magic Shop?

No thanks!!!

A lot of people ask me why I would not be interested in owning or running a magic shop.

Because if you own a magic shop at some point you have to sell to magicians.

There are magicians out there that make a living selling magic to magicians. Some magicians have a mail order business and sell all sorts of things to magicians.

Some magicians make a living doing lectures at magic clubs and at magic conventions. And at these social get together's they have all sorts of stuff that they sell in their lecture. Years ago I did lectures for the local magic clubs back when I lived in Chicago.

I have also written a few magic books and produced several DVD's on the advanced art of magic. Also the advanced art of culling and stacking card control systems for the magician that wants to look like a card shark. However in my opinion the market of magicians does not support performance magic - it only supports magicians magic.

In my opinion magic is less a performance art done by professionals and more of craft that is practiced by amateurs. And this kind of magician in my own opinion is not really interested in good quality performance material that is audience tested and honed for about a lifetime of performing shows - in front of audiences.

What a lot of them are interested in is just being able to fool the boys at the next magic social function with the latest trick or idea from a book or a DVD that comes on the magic market. For a lot of amateur magicians today - magic is a social hobby.

My dad owned a magic shop as a semi retirement activity and noticed that there were very few magic shops that were owned by professional magicians. So he decided to put out a line of magic tricks - and instructions that where how he performed magic. You would think that this would be a huge hit - magicians getting the opportunity to buy magic that was audience tested by a pro. Not just any pro a pro that made a living and performed on the Ed Sullivan show and the Palace Theater.

However the line of magic did not sell that well just because in my opinion the magicians that came into our shop were not interested in material that was tested by a pro. They wanted the shiny new toy - the latest new card book - or the new video tape.

One of the problems with magic in my opinion is when people that look at magic - from the outside looking in - they often confuse the social hobby - with the performance art. And they confuse the hobbyist that engages in the practice of the craft - with the seasoned professional performer - that is often out there in the trenches - performing and doing his best to grind out a living in this - non theater - variety stage-less world of ours.

And for me - I like being in the trenches and grinding out a living doing what I love doing. And that is entertaining audiences. To me that is Magic!

Just my opinion.

Onward and upward!

Even More Pounding The Pavement

Just to let anyone reading this know. Pounding the pavement and looking for more contacts - places to work is part of the business.

As I grow older I find that this kind of work doesn't end. Because without looking for the new audience, new clients, new venues and new opportunities. The work that I happen to be doing at the moment seems to grind to a stop. Because in my opinion without the one you can't have the other.

As I continue on with a story about when I first moved to the St. Louis Midwest. I was told by the local magicians that there were no night clubs or restaurants that were interested in booking a close up magician. And I was also told by the local magicians that there were no night clubs that would be interested in booking a comedy stage hypnotic show at all in the city of St. Louis.

After hearing that I thought what a great opportunity. So I went out and booked a night club - to do my hypnotic show in - the night club that did a full window display that you see in this picture. Booked to do a comedy hypnotic show once a week for about 6 months. Then I also found work in two different restaurants to perform close up magic in - once a week.

Speaking of performing in restaurants - the thing I like about it is that I am in a business where I am helping the restaurant build customer relations - word of mouth advertising by making people happy with my close up magic show. This is done in an inexpensive and practical way as my little close up magic show entertains and helps to draw re-pete customers for the restaurant.

Just one of the little things that I love about my business!

As I continue to have success in pounding the pavement this week!

Onward and upward!

Book The Pro- Just My Opinion!

Glenn Bishop "Bish The Magish" At WORK! Performing magic in front of an audience!

In my opinion. All magicians are not great entertainers as all magicians are not on the same skill level.

As said by many of the older professional magicians that I have known while growing up in show business. There is a big difference between an amateur magician and a professional magician.

At this time I would like to talk about what I think makes the difference when it comes to a magician from a show business point of view. Some might say that a professional - like a professional magician is a person that makes his or her full income off performing magic.

Having grown up in show business in my opinion there is a lot more to the business of being professional than just making money. My Dad (The late great Billy Bishop) used to say that the difference between an amateur magician and a professional magician was 200 shows. I have said this many times over the years because as I get older I find it to be true. It says in a way the more stage time - or time on stage a magician has over the years the better they get. And the better their show gets.

I have said many times that "working" makes a magician and the magic better and in my opinion that holds as true today as the day I first said it.

From a magicians point of view I would say that the difference between an amateur magician and a professional magician is that the amateur magician does tricks where the professional the real professional creates illusion.

Now many reading this may not understand that - however here is a hint. The "magic" isn't in the tricks it is in the magician.

I think that the big mistake that people can make when booking a magician is that they confuse how many years a magician might be into magic - with how many years they really perform magic in front of people doing shows. And in performing magic and doing shows in my opinion "experience matters"! And "experience is important"!

A magician can call themselves a magician and be into magic as a hobby and have been into magic for many years - however they may have only done two shows a year - amounting to very little stage time - or time on a stage - learning the real skill of entertaining people. They may charge less but in show business as in any other business you get what you pay for. The sad thing happens when one of these so called magicians charge a professional fee.

And what they get in my opinion is a person doing tricks instead of a magician doing magic!

Just my opinion!

Part Two of Glenn Bishop's Ace Cutting And Block Transfer Triumph's DVD Set

As I said before in this blog I was at a show and I let a guy use my deck to do what I thought would be a card trick. He took my deck of cards and riffle shuffled it on the table several times and dealt out five poker hands and he had the three aces.

Because I was interested in this kind of card work - being a fan of many of the old TV western shows like Bat Masterson and Maverick. I wanted to be able to do this kind of card work on the fly so to speak. So it became a challenge for me.

Here was the "challenge".

To take the four aces - put them into different spots in the deck. Shuffle the deck - then by using a riffle shuffle cull and stack three aces "on the fly from the shuffled deck" - cull and stack three aces for a five hand game of draw poker.

The aces and the deck are not marked or tricked up in any way. After I worked that out I worked out being able to riffle shuffle up the four aces on the fly for a five handed game of poker from a shuffled deck.

I published a full book on how I do this and other cool things with this riffle shuffle technique. And as of today I have never seen another riffle shuffle technique that can do as much and is as easy and less top heavy - than the technique I use - and published in my book.

A few months ago I produced the 2 DVD set and included the book on the 2 DVD set in PDF format. I sold out of the first run of this 2 set called Glenn Bishop's Ace Cutting And Block Transfer Shuffle Triumphs 2 DVD's. Besides the cool riffle shuffle work there are several great ace cutting routines and how to cut the aces on the fly from a shuffled deck.

It is interesting that I am not the only magician in the world that is interested in artistic card magic like this. In my opinion writing books and doing DVD's about this kind of work makes me an authority on this kind of card work. And in my opinion is why I am the "real deal" when it comes to this kind of card work.

And why I call myself the St. Louis Card Shark and the Man Called "Mr. Swindle!" As Jay Marshall used to say - that is my story and I am sticking by it!

Just my opinion!

Summer - Magic Shows!

Performing At Santa's Village Dundee IL.

Performing At Taste Of Chicago!


State Street Mall, Chicago - First Season!

State Street Mall, Chicago - Second Season!


Performing magic outside has it's own challenges. The sun, wind and rain can play unexpected surprises when performing outside at any outside event.

I hope you have a great summer and a great fourth of July Weekend!

Onward and upward!