Blood makes noise...

Passion breeds many things. Love, education, sadness, and even anger (especially anger). I cannot think of one person more deserving of the word "passionate" than Denny Haney.

The highest compliment I can give Denny is that even my wife liked him.

I only got to truly meet him within the last decade when I lectured at his shop in Baltimore. After that, any chance I got I would stop by and visit just to hear stories and talk shop and gossip a bit. Him and I saw eye to eye on many things (even if he was shorter than me). His magic shop contained a wealth of knowledge and with his passing that shop has got a lot less of that knowledge in it.

I have mentioned before how we are losing our greats slowly and they are NOT being replaced. It's like a sports tournament bracket. (or the Highlander if yer nerdy like me) We are slowly being whittled down to the last man standing.

My prediction that has been in full view the entire time...

I'm not trying to be dire or come off as one of those idiots who like to claim "magic is dying". I'm not that delusional. We are however seeing a definite decline in magic of those who know any history of the art or how to perform. The worst part is the ones who are dipping their taint in the well will be long gone before the damage they are doing fades away.

There are very few of us who care enough to try and inject some knowledge into the lives of magicians at large. The fewer there are, the fewer there are that can be helped. I personally have no idea how to reach those who need to be reached on a macro scale. The ones who need it don't want to hear it and you can't really give it away for free because no one will value it. You can't even put it on social media so the people who really need it will see it.

I stole this from Shaun Robinson on Memes for Magicians

I think I am a mix of excited and terrified to watch the next decade of magic unfold. I want to see who will step into the light to rise up and take over the mantles of those whose hearts were too full and just had to give some of that passion and love away to those who wanted it. If you are very lucky you might one day become that person. Someone people will look up to and travel just to learn from and hang out with. If you are really REALLY lucky, one day some weirdo might even talk about you on the internet in their magic journal for 3 people to read.

Farewell you magnificent bastard.

Let's talk about death shall we?

Magic has been hit hard the last few years. We lost a slew of people in the industry including Tom Mullica, Eugene Burger, and today Harry Anderson (Spoiler Alert).

Here is my thoughts on today's news. For those wondering, I did not start wearing a fedora because of Harry. I was doing it before I even knew he wore one. My introduction to him was from Night Court. I never saw him do much magic til' later. (aside from what he did on TV)

When I was in 7th grade I bought his version of needle through arm and performed it. (My parents were hippies and pretty open minded) Flash forward MANY years later, I got to meet and hang out with him at his magic shop in New Orleans. He was pleasant and put up with us just hovering around when not street performing. I have heard various stories from he was great to he was terrible and a bit in between. One thing I know for sure is he was a sharp guy who had some great ideas, was an excellent performer, and had the fucking WORK on magic square. (I hate magic square but I can admit when it's good)

Do yourself a favor and get his Penguin Magic lecture and watch it. It's a lot of stories and some good thoughts on tricks.

There was no one else like him was there?

Now in a more general sense, we are losing our legends and no one is stepping up to take their place. Magic as a performance art is slowly taking it in the neck from all of these youtube kids. They can do great tricks, but can't entertain an audience and I wonder what will become of the art form when those guys fall away to get real jobs. The world does not embrace the unique or talented like it used to so it's not being fostered. What are we going to say in 20 years? "Man remember that one guy who had all of those Youtube hits? Wasn't he great?"

The answer is no... no we won't.