Just been booked to perform a set for a large group of people that will mostly consist of a more younger audience than I am realy used to. Ages ranging between 11-15, as well as a smattering of adult and older audience members. Now I would realy like my set to appeal to this younger audience as much as it does to the adults, and am wondering what experience others have had with this type of crowd?

I have a few ideas up my sleave already as to what I will most likely be performing though it would be nice to hear some of your oppinions on such a performance.

Thank You

Jordan

What sort of stuff are you thinking of doing?

I find children between 11-15 respond better if you treat them slightly older than they are. I was in the same position a few months back and I didn't change my set list that much and it was still a big sucsess. I did PK touches using two adults in the group and the kids were as amazed as any other audience I have performed for. Trick with kids is to treat them just as you would anyone else. Best way to lose a kids interest is to talk down to him. And that's from both teaching and performing for children.
Pete

Jordon,

Not knowing what material you plan to present, here is my 2cents:

I would advise involving them in the show as much as possible, both on and offstage.

I wouldn’t feel at all squeamish about mixing magic and mentalism, especially considering the age of the younger ones.

Teenagers are very interested in mind reading and demonstrations of psychic ability.

Don’t talk down to them!!

Respect their intelligence. Interact with the older ones as you would a young adult.

Realize that some in your audience probably have more than just a passing knowledge of magic and it’s various sleights and gimmicks. They may remind you of this throughout the show.

They may not be up to snuff on mentalism methodology, but that is not to say they can’t dissect an effect if they want to.

Routine the performance to move at a steady pace. Not everything in the show needs to have remarkable visual appeal, but mixing things up visually throughout the show can’t hurt.

And most important ... have fun and encourage as much laughter as possible.
This is great age group to perform for!!!

Steve

Hi, sorry for my ignorance with the original post in terms of detailing my own thoughts.

At the moment my initial ideas are to perform an act conisisting mostly of visual PK effects, allowing for the audience to get involved and be very much hands on in the performance.

I also really like the idea of employing a game theme to an effect climaxing in a prediction, (chinese whispers/pass the parcel anyone?), other than that I am planning on keeping my act as visual as posisble and with as much audience participation as possible.

I probably will not include very much straightforward mindreading apart from as a way to initialy explain what I do. Although a giant group drawing duplication does appeal....

I also second your thoughts on not talking down to the children I have already realised that children are far smarter than many of us recognise and I will be treating them with the upmost respect as I do all my audiences.

P.S

Had not even considered PK touches for this crowd, thanks for the suggestion.

If memory Serves Paolo Cavalli has an effect called PUN which is a theme of chinese Whispers could easily be assumed. A word is selceted and then a game of word association is played and the mentalist has to work back and get the original word. Just a thought
Pete

Jordan,

The group drawing duplication sounds like a great idea.
Maybe a chair routine, since you brought up Paolo.

Steve

That sounds interesting thank you very much Celloboy, I already utilise a word association effect in my standard act and was going to modify this to fit the chinese whispers approach, I think that I shall investigate Cavalli's effect though, if not just for further reading. Do you know where this effect can be found or is available?

I have found that they love spectator as mindreader effects.

And PK always goes over well - youth like "visual" mentalism

As long as you remember to thank Uri.

When dealing with kids you have to remind them to follow directions closely. I recently attempted to do Kurotsuke for some younger kids. A young girl got the black stone and she started doing a little dance. When I asked her to reveal her stone all the other kids said, "She was dancing - of course you could tell she had it". She did not follow my instructions of keeping the color of your stone hidden.

I think I need to follow my own advice of reminding them to follow instructions closely. Of course, do this in a kid-friendly manner

For kids, I recommend Simon Lea's Comic Book Test. I always use it when I perform for middle schools (7-12 year olds). There's a review of it in the latest edition of Magicseen magazine.

http://www.mental-magic.com/cb.htm

Pun is on page 47 of his book Sigma. His website is http://www.paolocavalli-mindworld.com. The book is worth a look. Some really nice routines in there.
Pete

I adapted Tony Eye's Bloody Simple Movie Prediction to instead use comic books instead of movies. Kids really get into it and you can let them keep the comic too. Last time I ended up predicting Superman, which also turned out to be the kid's most favorite hero!

Letting kids keep stuff is the secret. In my comic book test, a pair of x-ray specs are forced on the young volunteer (in the nicest possible way of course). These specs are then proved to work. The fact that she or he gets to keep the specs excites not only the volunteer but all the other kids as well. They really beleive they work and the kid on stage is pretty popular after the show.