Repertoire Written by Asi Wind with John Lovick

I’m sure all the readers of this newsletter are familiar with the name Asi Wind, whether from his off-Broadway show, Inner Circle, his wonderful guest-spot on Penn & Teller:
Fool Us, or the buzz that always surrounds his magic convention appearances. Asi is a deeply thoughtful magician; his forceful presentations combined with his ingeniously constructed methods produce routines that stun laymen and magicians.

Asi has published three books of material for magicians. For some reason, the first two flew under my radar; I only recently became aware of them. His most recent book, Second Wind was brought to my attention by one of my students. If the existence of these books is also news to you, I’m delighted to bring you up to speed. All three books are excellent and are worthy of your time and money.

Repertoire was published in 2018. It contains twenty-one routines for close-up and parlor performance situations. As the title would suggest, all of these come from Asi’s professional repertoire. Since I’m familiar with Asi’s work, I had no doubt about the quality of the material presented. What surprised me, however, was discovering he is an accomplished artist; the routines are accompanied by almost one hundred watercolor paintings by Asi. This gives the book a charm seldom seen in magic texts.

Some of the routines in the book have been previously published in one form or another, but, since Asi never stops thinking about his tricks, most have been tweaked from their original versions. About the creative process, Asi says this in the Preface:

“Here is perhaps the best advice I got from one of my early art teachers: Don’t strive to be a good artist, strive to be a better artist. Becoming a good artist has a final destination; becoming a better artist is an ongoing journey. I have performed shows where I felt like I killed. And now, years later when I watch the recordings of those shows, I cringe at how bad they were. I want to believe that my performances today are much better, but probably years from now I will be just as critical of them. I might even read these words and deny that I wrote them.

“One of my biggest influences is Tommy Wonder. It’s very clear that he was the kind of magician who would never stop reworking his magic, always finding better ways to achieve the effects he was after. Tommy published three versions of Nest of Boxes, and every one of these versions would have been satisfying to most of us, but not to him, because Tommy Wonder was not a good magician. Tommy Wonder was a better magician…

“If we adopt the attitude that we can always get better and the things we do are all works in progress, then once in a blue moon we might look at something we have done and say, ‘I did that? That’s not bad.’ I try to create pieces that will stand the test of time – work that I won’t regret having my name attached to many years later. And if I don’t achieve that, I will settle for just getting better.”

The opening effect, Time is Money, incorporates one of my favorite things: origami as a method. In this, a spectator’s signed bill (of whatever denomination he chooses to use) vanishes and reappears under his watch. Asi describes the necessary preparation in great detail. This is an excellent walk-around item. Asi next explains what might be his most famous creation, his handling of Any Card at Any Number. The method builds on ideas from Ken Krenzel and Allan Ackerman, in which all the work is accomplished as the deck is removed from the card box. As with all good versions of this effect, competency with a memorized deck is required; however, any memorized stack will work. I particularly like that Asi’s presentation makes the assisting spectator the hero. This is always a good approach. The trick that follows, Out of the Blue, uses the same basic method to accomplish a Brainwave-type effect.

True Colors uses The Gilbreath principle to produce an effect in which the performer identifies the colors of the cards without looking at the faces. Asi offers many suggestions on amplifying the drama inherent in this effect. Somebody Stop Me is a clever version of the Stop Trick. With his back turned, the performer is able to stop the spectator on his selected card as he deals the cards face down onto the table. S.A.C.A.A.N. is a version of Any Card at Any Number in which it appears the deck is shuffled before you begin. The trade-off is that the spectator’s choice of card is limited. You will also need to have a reliable faro shuffle in your toolbox.

In A Coin Trick, based on Simon Aronson’s Prior Commitment, the date on a borrowed coin is used to discover two selected cards. You’ll probably fool yourself as you work through it. I had the pleasure of being fooled firsthand when Asi performed Double Exposure for me at the Sorcerers Safari Magic Camp. This is a version of Triumph (inspired by a Michael Weber routine) in which the revelation (a face-up/face-down deck rights itself, leaving only the selected card face up) is revealed on a photo taken on the assisting spectator’s cell phone. This is a great, memorable effect. Again, you’ll need to do a reliable faro shuffle.

Catch 23 is a super version of the Chair Test effect; it is a mental routine that can play for a large audience. In it, the contents of envelopes (apparently freely distributed among four people) are related to the people onstage. There is also a Bank Night aspect to the routine. So much is going on here, I can’t see how anyone, magician or layman, could backtrack on the method. The Trick that Never Ends is based on a concept by Chan Canasta; in it a spectator finds his own card and makes a choice that could have altered the trick completely.

Another amazing stage routine is Torn, Marked, Stabbed, Crumpled, Burned & Restored Page. A spectator chooses one of several books. The spectator tears a chosen page from the book and the magician sets it on fire. The page then returns to the book, reattached to the spine. Again, the construction of this piece is really clever. You’ll have to do some arts and crafts work to prepare the props, but once you’ve completed that, you have a miracle to perform.

Make No Mistake is a visual double-color change card routine. Crossing Over applies the Biddle Trick to a concept of Chan Canasta. In Reverse Engineer, a spectator finds a named card by reversing it in the deck while the cards are held under the table. Supervision is another effect great influenced by Canasta’s work. Folded under Pressure covers the procedure of the Mercury Card Fold under a series of natural actions. If you do any tricks using the Mercury fold, you’ll find this very worthwhile. Lazy Seconds Force uses the movements of the push-off second deal to force a card (and not in the way you would immediately assume by reading what I just wrote).

Not-so-Straight Triumph is Asi’s take on John Bannon’s classic routine. S.C.A.A.N. is another version of ACAAN, but it uses a selected card rather than a named card. The trade-off is that it does not require a memorized deck. In Lucky 13, several spectators manage, through a seemingly random group of actions, to form a packet of cards that runs numerically, Ace through King, in a named suit. The final offering, Echo, is a two-deck coincidence effect with a kicker – the cards that match transpose.

Keep in mind, these are all performance pieces, and as such will place demands on your performance skills and your technical abilities. There are reputation-makers here if you put in the time and effort to master them.

Repertoire II (2024)

As the title suggests, Repertoire II is the sequel to the book we’ve just discussed. I won’t go into as much depth as my previous review. Asi has again contributed material from his working repertoire. Everything is explained in meticulous detail, accompanied by Asi’s wonderful water-color paintings. The focus is again on card magic, but there is also a method for the center tear that does not involve tearing up the folded piece of paper. (It is destroyed, however.) Let me just touch on a couple of things I found particularly intriguing.

The XY Deck is Asi’s preferred method for preparing a stripper deck, based on Barrie Richardson’s method from his book, Act Two. With Asi’s method, spectators can shuffle the deck, and they can do this in any way they wish; it makes no difference if they turn cards around during the shuffling. You will still be able to strip out the required cards. Asi uses this in his routine Reds and Blacks, the routine that was the finale of his show, Inner
Circle. Asi discusses several routines that utilize an XY deck, including the aforementioned Reds and Blacks, a fine variation of Simon Aronson’s Shuffle-bored and a version of Paul Gertner’s Unshuffled that does not require perfect faro shuffles. (In fact, it doesn’t require any faro shuffles.)

The other concept that receives extensive treatment is Card to Box, which features a method for loading a selected card into a closed card box. This was inspired by ideas from Gertner, Jim Krenz, and Juan Tamariz. The load is totally concealed under a natural action and is completely deceptive in close-up situations, even when performing surrounded. You will need a table or some other performing surface. Asi offers several strong routines that use this procedure.

To sum up, Repertoire and Repertoire II contain excellent, field-tested, deceptive routines. Even if you never add any of this material to your own repertoire (and it would be a shame if you didn’t), it is instructive to learn how a better magician (did you see what I did there?) solves problems. Both books get my highest recommendation.