Hi all,
I have been looking extensively through the Café' and have read about some good canes, but when I check to find them, nada. All that seems out there is the Tango Dancing Cane. Is that one any good. The vortex is gone as well as the precision magic one.

So what is a magician to do? I am also looking for a red and a white LED battery operated cane that can dance too. But would settle for just a good one at this point. I don't really want to make my own (who has the time) but am looking for a quality one to buy.

Any help?
thanks all in advance
Randall
Randall Magic

Denny Haney carries some of the best out there. Contact him and he will steer you in the right direction.

Kyle

Jeff doesn't sell the Vortex anymore?

Last time I saw him, he still had a few.

So how do you get a hold of Denny Haney?

Never mind, I found him. Thanks. Didn't know his last name.
Randall

No problem. You can always find him through his magic shop.

Kyle

Re: Dancing Canes

Way back in the 60's, there was a Bat Masterson cane sold as a premium for the advertiser--Sealtest Ice Cream. It was a nice looking black wooden cane with a plastic knob and ferrule which were painted silver. Since they were meant for children, they were only about 30 inches from end to end. I bought two of them on eBay with the intent of combining them to make a standard length adult cane, using my Creekmore classic cane as a guide for the length. Never got around to actually making one, but I think it's worth investigating. It would certainly make for a unique and classy dancing cane.

Years ago I had an idea for a magic act based on the Bat Masterson image of a magician attired in cane and derby hat--or even the Bret Maverick image. Never quite got beyond the pipe dream stage, but I envisioned doing card manipulations (appropriate since Maverick was a gamblet). As I recall there was even a Bat Masterson episode when Bat was held captive and was doing color changes and card flourishes for his captor and ended up springing the cards into the villain's face to get him off guard and take the gun away from him. (The flourishes were close-ups of the hand, so that part might have been someone like Jay Ose doing the magic.)

My Mississippi gambler idea (which I came up with back in the 60's) would have included a sequence of rope-twirling and flourishes with a six-shooter. Although professional lariats are available from Western supplies stores, I was able to do the basic effect using magician's soft-rope with the end made into a hondo. Dube Juggling sells the book _Will Rogers Rope Tricks" at http://www.dube.com/book/WillRogersBook.php
and professional rope manufactured specifically for rope spinning and favored by professional ropers as well.

In my standard manipulation act, I would sometimes open with the dancing cane (with the changing to a silk streamer at the routine's end) followed by serpent silk a la Anverdi, card productions, billiard balls, linking rings--and ended with a return to the dancing cane based on a Marconick idea of a dancing cane attached to a hat. That way the cane effect bookended the entire act. If you're unfamiliar with the Marconick dancing cane and hat effect, it was included in his hardback book _Marconick's Original Magic_, which I've mentioned a couple of times in this forum.

----- Amado "Sonny" Narvaez

Fukai from Japan has a wonderful cane and routine.

So what about the Tango dancing cane? Anyone own one?

I've had a couple of Tago canes, they are pretty decent. Juan Mayoral manufactures an excellent LED cane aswell.

The vortex is very good - you could e-mail Jeff and see if he has any left.

Many years ago, I bought a hollow balsa wood cane made in England. ($150 wholesale)
I smashed it in a car door one night.
It weighed ony 1.5 oz, and floated like a ghost.
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I performed a 3 minute dance at a convention in front of Peter Pitt and even he liked the cane.
I would love to find another.
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I now make my own out of plastic shower rod covers, cost $2. Floats great and well balanced due to a paper clip at the tip.

If you don't mind paying higher postage and possible custom chargers, http://www.52magic.net has all kinds of Dancing canes on their site, they have metal, plastic, folding, different colors, etc.

I'm looking to buy a Precision Magic cane, heard they are very nie. I want a new 'classic' cane to have as a backup and I heard that PMs canes are some ofthe best you can find.

During the last year I've been using light-up canes that I manufacture myself. Light weight and really atttention grabbing.

I feel the light up canes have an advantage of creating a black art effect which helps with the illusion. The pupils dialate and make the gimmickry invisible.
I used to do a strobe light effect with mine, that too makes the gimmick disappear.

I agree with Magic Ian. Those strobe lights does wonders and really work in our favor.

Exactly, that is what I LOVE about light-up canes. I did perform them on the wild (aka street) a few times, with specs less than 3m away from me, and still the illusion was perfect.

I think my main problem with light-up canes is they aren't analogous to anything in the real world. The Creekmore canes all look like something you would see in the real world. People have seen them in movies and TV shows. I can't think of any movies where a "normal" character (or even an abnormal character) walks around with a cane with lights up and down its entire length. There's something to be said for the classic black and white cane. I can accept a cane or staff with something special like a light on the _top_, because that would be similar to a cane with gems ornamenting the top. But lights along the entire length is a little bizarre and unnatural.

More believable/acceptable than the light-up canes would be a dancing lightsaber, which I think did appear on the market for a while a few years ago. The Lucas movies have at least made lightsabers a device relatively familiar to the general populace (there is even a lightsaber Wikipedia entry), although I would still question why a magician would have one in his possession--unless he's also a retired Jedi knight. I can imagine that Ben Kenobi was a member of the IBM--Interplanetary Brotherhood of Magicians.

Even a dancing fluorescent light would be a little more natural. Check the videos at these links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQAccEq9za0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jx2KiAAIN70

These routines use something from the real world. They have even been used in magic before, going all the way back to the 60's when I saw Joe and Georgi Smiley do their Neon Rod Through Lady illusion. Everyone knows what a fluorescent light is, and a floating fluorescent light is not that much more unnatural than the classic Blackstone floating light bulb would be.

Just my two-pennies.

----- Amado "Sonny" Narvaez

Where is the Dancing Cane made by Precision Magic available ?

Do they have their own on line shop or is any other contact to them available?

Thanks.

Oliver.

Precision Magic is closed for good. I'm looking to find their canes too.