Greetings Friends,
Thanks so much for the feedback we have been getting on the recent issue Bryce Kuhlman edited of our” Secret Arts Journal” and Abbi’s ” Bali journal” article! If you missed the recent issue you can get it for free at
http://www.secretartjournal.com
ON THE ROAD IN JUNE
We are heading east this June for a series of performances and workshops in NY, NJ and PA. If you check the tour schedule
http://mcbridemagic.com/calendar.php
you can see when we will be near you. Abbi and I enjoy connecting with friends while we are in the area!
WE LOVE DA’ FIRE!
When Abbi and I are not performing or teaching, you can find us near the magic fire circle making music and dancing round the flames, weaving our magic. We just concluded our Vegas Vortex – MayFire event in the Valley of Fire. It was an amazing weekend of friendship, magic, music and more! A highlight was seeing the Aurora Borealis in the night sky.
SUNSET AND SUNRISE MAGIC IN VEGAS
Abbi and I and our friends from the Vegas Vortex are converging at DARK SKIES LAS VEGAS. We’re really excited that my brother, Clay Patrick McBride, will be joining us for this adventure. This will be the largest fire and dance event in the history of Las Vegas!
We will be hosting the opening ceremonies as well as sunrise and sunset drumming, dance and magic each day of this Burning Man style event hosted by the Las Vegas Artists community. Cameron Grant and his group are doing extraordinary events that are not only pushing the envelope, but burning it! Check out the new magic and community fire scene in Las Vegas by going to
http://darkskies.vegasartists.com
The day after we get back from Dark Skies, I will be the first magician to perform magic at the new Wynn hotel! I’ve worked for Steve Wynn since I was his house opening act down at the Golden Nugget back in the mid 80’s, and I’m told he will be at the private party where I will be performing on Monday night, along with the governor and a lot of Vegas’ celebrities. Should be fun! Sorry to say, this is a private event, but I will notify you when I do a show there that is open to the public.
NEW BOOK ON MAGIC, MAGICK AND SHAMANISM
If you want to read more about our passion for fire and magic there is a new book just out called CONVERSATIONS ON THE EDGE OF THE APOCALYPSE, contemplating the future with Noam Chomsky, Alex Grey, Ram Dass, George Carlin, Deepak Chopra, Rupert Sheldrake and yours truly…. I’m honored to be in such progressive company. The new book, by David Jay Brown, is a series of interviews. The title of my interview is called: MAGIC, MAGICK AND SHAMANISM. Our conversation explores the relationship between performance, ritual and fire magic, and mentions the Mystery School of magical arts.
Here is a recent review of the book I think you’ll enjoy….
“Conversations on the Edge of the Apocalypse could not be more timely. These interviews of visionary thinkers, and the provocative interactions between those people interviewed, provide diverse road maps for navigating our way through an era of terror, conflict, and incipient disaster. Readers who are interested in novel paradigms, especially worldviews that will help humanity survive and even prosper, will find David Jay Brown’s book a source of delight, of wonder, and even of hope.”
–Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., co-author of Extraordinary Dreams and How to Work with Them; Co-editor of Varieties of Anomalous Experience
…from Conversations on the Edge of the Apocalypse By David Jay Brown
Palgrave Macmillan, 2005
www.mavericksofthemind.com/apocalypse.htm
FIRES RISING
Thursday June 2nd through Sunday June 5th, 2005
http://www.4qf.org/_FiresRising/index.htm
Join us for an amazing community experience in the Magic of Fire Circle. Three all night Fire Circles and many daytime playshop tracks. A conscious progression of ecstatic experience, and the Alchemical techniques of Symbol, Rhythm, Movement and Song.
STARWOOD
We are happy to be returning in July, to the Starwood Festival in Sherman, NY for one of America’s largest bonfire celebrations. This is held at the Brushwood folklore Center, where Abbi and I created the World Magic Festival in 1992 and 1993. We will be facilitating an all night Alchemical Fire Circle, as well as offering workshops and performances. For more info:
http://www.rosencomet.com/starwood/
MAGIC BEYOND WONDERDOME!
Later this summer, we are all getting together to witness and support the Gary Stadler and Bryce Kuhlman’s new mega-magic Dome at the Burning Man art festival in Black Rock City, Nevada. If you have not heard of, or been to, Burning Man, this is the year! http://www.burningman.com Abbi and I will be creating a special “illuminations” magic show to perform inside Gary’s “INNER MIND” installation. For a sneak peek of what Gary is creating, go look at http://www.heartmagic.com/inner_mind.html
We’ll be back from Spain at the end of June and will be home for a few weeks in July. If you are in Las Vegas drop us an email and we’ll create a time to get together. A bunch of us are going to visit Lance Burton at one of his shows; he’s added lots of new material, lighting and sets to his “New Wonders Await” show at the Monte Carlo. Also, Mac King has added a few new things to his show that we are going to check out as well in mid-July.
We’ll keep you up to date on things on the road and here in Las Vegas!
Love to you all, and see you soon!!
Jeff & Abbi
This time of year we often have visiting teachers and magical friends stay with us when they are performing in Las Vegas or teaching at the Magic School. Yesterday, Max Maven was here at our home. Max took us to see Michael Close and Vinny Favorito in a new comedy show at Binion’s Horseshoe… a very funny show! Having Max in the home is great fun, I can easily learn more in an evening of conversation with Max than a month of reading books on mentalism and magic! As the evening progressed Max moved through all types of intellectual terrain, covering diverse subjects from gospel music to wrestling to kabuki theater, underground comics to physics, and always bring the main point back to the performance of fine magic.
Hope you’ve had a magical Halloween. It’s actually one of my favorite holidays, being the mask man I am. One of my favorite memories was when I was eight years old, dressing up like my childhood hero, Lon Chaney in The Wolfman, complete with an “over the head”, Don Post official wolfman mask, and gardener’s gloves that I had glued fur and fingernails onto. I would prowl the neighborhood in the pre- and post-Halloween season, gearing up my wolfman-ness (actually more like wolfboy-ness). Inside I was a ferocious wolf-dude, lurking in the shadows, often banging on my neighbors windows and striking frightening poses while they watched TV. To my dismay, no one seemed very alarmed when they turned from the tube and saw a pint-sized wolf-boy. I could almost hear them saying “Oh that McBride kid’s at it again; maybe we better start locking the gate.” Anyway, these early escapades very well might have been the early stirring of my career in mask magic that eventually led me to Las Vegas.
A few nights each month, we like to catch some of the new shows that have opened. I’ve heard good things about the new rock musical built around the music of Queen’s Freddie Mercury, which is called “We will Rock You.” It’s playing at the Paris Hotel. A few nights ago we caught the comedy magic show of Levent! I haven’t seen Levent since the 80’s and, wow, he packs dozens of effects – mostly fine manipulation and extraodinary original sight gags – into a power packed hour of side splitting comedy and knuckle busting sleight of hand. If he comes to a comedy club or magic convention near you, make it a point to see him. Siegfried and Roy are in the news here almost every day. While Roy may never perform as he did a year ago, he is alive and is speaking with clarity and hope. He is a living testament to the amazing healing powers of the human body. Just a few months ago he was near death and now he’s talking and working with therapists and moving towards a new life. You can still see their magnificent animals at the “Secret Garden” exhibit at the Mirage. I am fortunate to have seen their show many times and to have worked with them at fundraising events and magic conventions.