719: Kenton Knepper - Word Wizard

While attending the recent Poe’s Magic Conference in Baltimore, Maryland, one of the presenters was Kenton Knepper. We sat down in a quiet room for a very intense conversation that included his roots and moving to Phoenix, Arizona, and his friendship with noted mentalist, Larry Becker, plus his influences that led him to writing “Wonder Words” for which he is best known for as its author. Kenton has written about 20 different publications over the decades. We discussed NLP (Neurolinguistic Programming) and hypnosis and much more in this week’s episode. Kenton doesn’t often attend major magic conventions so it was a rare privilege to sit down with him for this episode this week.

John was a friend and inspiration to Kenton

In this week’s episode, Kenton talks about the development of his Wonder Words, what it is and how it works, his relationship and inspiration by Larry Becker. He also encourages us to go out and just do it, whatever “it” is and try it. Our conversation went quite deep and I was truly engaged in our conversation so much so that something happened at the end of this episode that has never happened in all my years. Be sure to stay tuned to end of our chat to hear what happened.

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Kenton himself says: "KENTON PRINCIPLES is my legacy book. It compiles and expands on my most important principles in magic and mentalism. It will be the go-to book for the application of my ideas to anything you perform, magic or mentalism. Once you know these principles, anything is truly possible."

482: Les Arnold - More Inspired

Les Arnold has one of the funniest magic parody acts on the scene today. He works with his daughter (known as “Dazzle”) and has appeared four times on “Masters of Illusion” TV show (to date). Les was one of the early members of the legendary “Long Beach Mystics” in Long Beach, California and was a shop teacher until retirement when he converted his part time job as a performer to full time. During his formative years, Les built many illusions and developed his stage act today known as Les Arnold and Dazzle.

You can catch Les Arnold appearing at the Magic Collectors Expo in Minneapolis, Minnesota on June 20-22, 2019 and also at the I.B.M. Convention in Scottsdale, Arizona on July 10-13, 2019.

Les Arnold and Dazzle Full Act on Masters of Illusion

Time Stamps for this podcast:

00:02:50 - Les Arnold talks about his early beginnings with the Long Beach Mystics, how he developed his act “Les Arnold and Dazzle” act with his daughter, and how he keeps focused on what material works best for his character/act.

01:05:23 - Product Review: “Mint-O” from Vanishing, Inc. - a mint (Lifesaver or Polo circular mint) magically penetrates onto the cord of a set of headphone. Very visual with three different methods. Recommended.

01:08:00 - Product Review: “Snapped” from the Other Brothers - wrapped candy (i.e. Airheads, Hershey bar, etc. - some flat, wrapped candy) automatically, quickly and visually vanishes behind your wallet, deck of cards or other similarly sized item. Recommended.

01:10:40 - Product Review: “Fully Automatic Card Trick (FACT)” by Caleb Wiles - A seriously, fully automatic card trick that the volunteer does in his hands. There are instruction cards in the deck that the volunteer will follow to make this a “hands off” trick for the magician. It will take time to remember the set-up, but highly recommended.

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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. You can download or listen to the podcast through Stitcher by Clicking Here or through FeedPress by Clicking Here or through Tunein.com by Clicking Here or through iHeart Radio by Clicking Here. If you have a Spotify account, then you can also hear us through that app, too. You can also listen through your Amazon Alexa and Google Home devices. Remember, you can download it through the iTunes store, too. See the preview page by Clicking Here

390: Larry Becker - A Piece Of My Mind

Larry Becker is a legend in his own time. He is a master mentalist who blazed the trail for many who followed. As mentioned in the podcast, Larry was cool long before mentalism was cool. He and his business partner, Lee Earle, created one of the most successful partnerships in mentalism with their company "Mentalism Unlimited". Between them they created some of the most original material that is still used by top mentalists today.

Larry would like to be remembered for his "Russian Roulette: routine which had a real element of danger. This "possibility of death" at every show kept Larry on his toes and his audience on the edge of their seats.

Larry Becker's Mental Masterpieces DVD trailer performing his "Casino Royale".

In this podcast, Larry talks about his partnership at an advertising agency in New Jersey, meeting people like Cardini and Milbourne Christopher, his performance in the military, his move to Arizona, and the rise and fall of his partnership with Lee Earle.

719: Kenton Knepper - Word Wizard

482: Les Arnold - More Inspired

390: Larry Becker - A Piece Of My Mind

The Magic Word