250: At Home With Lupe & Norm Nielsen

After the 2015 MAGIC Live! convention, I stayed over for an extra day so as to visit with one of magic's legends: Norm Nielsen. I spoke with Lupe about coming over to their home to chat and see the poster collection. She told me that the bulk of their collection is now in Chicago preparing to be auctioned off by Potter & Potter over the next two years. But I was still welcome to come by for coffee and a visit. So I did.

Fortunately, I had visited their home and collection in 2007 when I also snapped some lovely photos which are on this blog. I also posted some pictures from this year's visit. Perhaps you can tell what a difference eight years makes.

Lupe talked about Norm's poster collection at the Order of Merlin breakfast at the combined IBM/SAM convention in St. Louis. You can Click Here to hear that interesting, historical presentation. Unfortunately, you cannot view the beautiful posters that she showed in her presentation, but the stories are interesting.

00:01:56 - Norm Nielsen and Lupe talk about their magic poster collection, how he came to start collecting and what is happening to it now. He also talks about his long career as a performer and builder and creator. He has many stories about other magic legends he has met along the way, not the least of which was his good friend, Tobias "Theo" Leendert Bamberg "Okito" (1875-1963) . During this chat in Norm's living room, his lovely wife, Lupe, fills in some details and gives us some additional background information. David Sandy and Lance Rich are also in attendance "in the studio audience" who ask some relevant questions, too.

00:59:07 - After our chat, we go out to the workshop where David shares a funny story about Faucett Ross. This is a legendary story that is Mac King's favorite story and has to be heard by this larger, podcast audience in order to preserve it for posterity.

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Check back with Potter & Potter from time to time to see when the Nielsen Poster collection will be put "on the auction block".

213: Chicago Magic Bars & Lounges

Chicago has a rich history of magic bars within the city limits as well as in the outlying areas. The "hay day" of magic bars in Chicago ended around 1998 with the closing of the last magic bar. But Joey Cranford and John Sturk are pumping new life into an old concept with the new nightclub/theater called "Chicago Magic Lounge". This will be a recreation of the early 20th century, prohibition era lounge one night each week on the upper part of Chicago.

Bill Weimer is a local magician who was an integral part of the Chicago magic bar scene from the 1970's through the 1990's. He worked seven of the nine or so Chicago-land magic bars. He has a lot of stories about these clubs in their glory days and in fact, wrote a book about his experiences called "Now You See Them, Now You Don't".

00:03:18 - Joey Cranford and John Sturk talk about the newest venture that will open on March 5, 2015, The Chicago Magic Lounge. They talk about their vision of the Lounge and what they hope will happen. They will also encourage local magicians to come and hang our and create a "magic lab" where performers can try out new stuff.

00:40:56 - Bill Weimer talks about the history of Chicago-land bars from his perspective of one who has been there and done that having worked at seven of the nine or so magic bars within the city's boundaries over a 20 year period. Bill wrote the book on bar magic entitled "Now You See Them, Now You Don't". In this podcast, Bill shares some of the stories from his book and his perspective as a working performer.

Order your copy of Bill's book at his website http://www.magicbarbook.com/

170: Day 5 - IBM/SAM Combined Convention 2014

It's here...the final day of the Combined Convention. This brought us the long awaited results of the days of competitions. But first, the I.B.M. hosted its annual Order of Merlin breakfast which honors those who have 25 or more consecutive years of membership in the organization. Lupe Nielsen was the guest speaker who showed us slides from Norm's and her massive collection.

The afternoon included a lecture by Dani DaOrtiz before the buses loaded for the evening gala show, "The Magic of Korea". Afterwards was the awards presentation back in the hotel. First of all, The FISM Close-Up champion was Shin Lim and the Stage champions were Trevor and Lorena Waters. The representatives who will go forward as the representatives from North America for stage will be: Trevor & Lorena Waters, The Reed Sisters, Tim Wright, Trent James, Trigg Watson, and Christian & Katalina. The Close-up representatives will be: Shin Lim, Alberto Lorenzo, Reuben Mooreland, Chris Hannibal and Michael Dardant.

The I.B.M. winners for Close-up was Alberto Lorenzo in second place and Michael Dardant in first place. The stage winners were: Den Den (from Japan) in second place, and Hun Lee (Japan) in first place. There were no Gold Medal or Gold Cup winners announced for the I.B.M. this year. First place in both categories included a cash award of $2,000 and second place received $500.

The S.A.M. close-up winners were: Reuben Mooreland in second place and Seoul Park (S. Korea) in first place. Winning the Silver Medal Award of Merit for close-up was Seoul Park. In the Stage competition, Hun Lee (S. Korea) took second place and Den Den (Japan) took first place. The Silver Award of Merit for Stage went to Hun Lee. I believe that the S.A.M. cash awards were the same as for the I.B.M.

The highest award from the S.A.M. for stage is the Gold Medal Award of Honor which has only once before been awarded. It went to George Saterial. It was awarded for the second time this evening to Den Den (Japan)

And the People's Choice Award, along with a $3,000 prize for each went to Shin Lim for Close-up and to Hun Lee for Stage. Congratulations, one and all.

And speaking of money, there was both a silent and live auction for select memorabilia from Joanie Spina, They raised $5,500 which all will go to help offset some of the astronomical medical expenses for Joanie.

Here are some photos of a small part of the Nielsen poster collection that I took in 2007 while Dick Olson and I were visiting with Norm and Lupe Nielsen in their home.

Time stamps for this podcast:

00:01:58 - At the Order of Merlin (25+ years of consecutive membership in the I.B.M.) breakfast, Lupe Nielsen was the guest speaker. She allowed me to record and broadcast her speech on the Neilen poster collection.

00:35:19 - The new National President for the S.A.M., Kenrick "Ice" McDonald, tells us his vision for magic and what he hopes to achieve during his one year tenure as President.

00:39:28- Eugene Burger and Larry Hass chat after lunch about fine tuning your act, the importance of scripting, and more.

01:04:32 - Stan Allen, editor and chief of MAGIC Magazine, tells us about M360 and how it has evolved as well as a little about next year's MAGIC Live! convention plus the Magic Summit planned for this coming Fall.

Download this podcast in an MP3 file by Clicking Here and then right click to save the file. You can also subscribe to the RSS feed by Clicking Here. (please note: this RSS Feed subscription system may not work with Android systems). Remember, you can download it through iTunes. See the preview page by Clicking Here.

250: At Home With Lupe & Norm Nielsen

213: Chicago Magic Bars & Lounges

170: Day 5 - IBM/SAM Combined Convention 2014

The Magic Word