hire portland magician

Hire a Portland Magician

by Kip Pascal
Hiring a Portland Magician In a big city, like Portland, Oregon, can be hard. There are just too many magicians to choose from. If you are in charge of finding entertainment for your next corporate event, you need some tips. For example, hiring a magician who advertises a live bunny rabbit could be the worst choice.

Bye Bye Bunnies and Balloons

When I search for “magicians” and “Portland” in the search engines, I find a bunch of possibilities … pages and pages of Portland magic entertainers. How do you find the best for a corporate event.First, and foremost, eliminate all of the internet listings that feature a live bunny rabbit. That may be good for a small birthday party, but not for a company party. If the magician is “featuring” the rabbit, then … well … that’s probably his big climax. You want better than that.I don’t know about your city, but in the Portland listings, there are more than a few magicians who feature their cute bunnies.Note: I am not eliminating all live animals from performances. There are some great magicians who produce birds in their acts, feature lions, and so on. But if a magician includes this in his search engine description, then it’s a sign to beware a lackluster act.I also tend to avoid the “balloon blowers.” Magicians who feature balloon tying for the event will spend all of their time … tying balloons. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather watch some good magic.If you want a balloon blower, say, to open a new grocery store … then hire a clown, who ties balloons — the more skillfully tied exotic creatures, the better. (In other words, find someone with a good repertoire of animals, monsters, cowboys, and so on. Don’t settle for everything looking like a balloon dog.)

    Note: There is a super skilled balloon blower in Portland — Scott Davis. If you want balloons, check out his sculptures.

If you want a corporate magician don’t go for the guy who specializes in balloons. Find someone who specializes in … magic.

Magic Tailored to the Event

Look for a magician who asks you a lot about your upcoming event. I promise you, you don’t want a “one size fits all” when it comes to magic acts. You don’t want a illusionist to bring a tiger to a banquet, do you? Neither do you want a kids’ birthday-party performer to try to entertain adults at a cocktail party. Those just aren’t good fits.Here’s a special tip for finding someone who tailors the show….

Competent Close-Up Magician

Rather than finding a stage magician who is willing to do walk-around, close-up magic at your corporate event, it’s much much better to find a close-up, restaurant magician who also does standup.Find a truly talented restaurant magician, someone whose hands make magic … a sleight-of-hand artist. (Are you following my thinking?) I guarantee that if he works lots of restaurants, then he has hours and hours of practical performance time, logged. That’s a given.With a little search engine research, you can find magician Hart Keene. He seems to have a reputation as a great restaurant performer in Portland, Eugene, Salem, Albany, Roseburg and other Oregon cities and towns. Wow.If I were to continue to pursue the search to see if he could be a possibility, I’d see if he did corporate events in Portland. That’s important.

    Note: After about two minutes of research, I find that Hart Keene does indeed perform magic for Portland corporate parties and events. And that there are a lot of testimonials attesting to the quality of his show.

Now’s the time to contact him, see if he can combine a standup performance with walk-around magic, and what he recommends for my particular needs.Of course, you’d perform a similar search for magicians in your city or surrounding area.Unsolicited recommendations are a must. You need to read what folks have to say who have no prior connection to the Portland magician.Note: Hart Keene really is a notable magician in Oregon who skillfully combines and tailors magic for corporate events. I make no commission by recommending Hart Keene’s magic. He is skilled and entertaining: Hire Portland Magician

Keith Pascal is an author who has been a magician most of his life. He paid his way through college with magic. Now, Pascal focuses on writing for the magic and martial arts communities.