Can magic earn you a living or better yet brings fortune for you? In term of possibility, only 1 out of 4 thousands magicians (Amateur or Pro) can really grow rich with magic.(unofficial statistic) And most of them are settled down in Euro and US now. Japan, Asia? Yeah, Cyril Takayama.

Everything in this world must related to the theory of Demand and Supply. Demand of magician in this country is very few if compare to singers or dancers and there are more and more amateur magicians claim them as Pro, the supply side has became greater. (Ponder this, can laymen distinguish between an amateur and Professional magicians)

IMHO, magic only can be hobby can't be your career. It's right, at least, in Malaysia. (If economic boom, even beggars can earn more than bank managers)

If something is not worth doing, it's not worth doing at all.

Yeah.... i believe so too.

Im sure pro-magicians can survive but not earn fortunes in Msia.

Whether you are pro or amatuer magician, laymen will still be entertain. It depends the type of entertainment value you give to them.

Most of us here are hobbyist and perform maybe magic part-time or when there's a show we show up.

Very few of us here have contracts to those companys hiring entertainer/magicians.

Im sure most of us here cari our makan doing other things as well.

You are right. There's not much big market for pro magicians here compared to the countries u mentioned Forrest.

IMHO,
I got to disagree with those opinions

Cyril is so successful because he is so good at what he is doing.
You wanna earn a living in magic at this land?
Be as good or even better than him.

Demand and supply .. ?
A good business person
Follow the law of demand and supply
A SUCCESSFUL and Great business person
Create the demand and he supply.

And even among MMF members.
I can see few of them are really potential to be great magician.
I can see Cyril, Blaine, and Copperfield junior popping up.

We got to believe in ourselves before we can sell to the world.
If we do not even trust we can,
If we continue the attitude of we can't we can't,
Who on earth will willing to pay us 5digit for a show?

Is just my little personal point of view,
Peace :) :) :)
Isaac

In Malaysia, in nearly everything from banking, credit card, online transaction to dvds, we are one of the popular country to be blacklisted for frauds and piracy.

Even in magic, we do not respect other people Intellectual Property Rights, how can we expect to be recognized as a professional magician?

Magic can become great in Malaysia, take a look at 25 years ago, Malaysia has a lot of professional magicians coming down to perform, for example David Copperfield and a few Japanese magicians. Why is the standard of magic now seems stagnant?

Some magicians uses pirated props and low quality props for their performance, how can magic in Malaysia achieve greater heights? Poor showmanship and pirated props, this will badly effect a show where none would want to get a magician for any entertainment engagement. Even some manufacture pirated props and claim them as original.

There were some issues about pirated magic props that are sold in Malaysia that was widely discussed in the international magic forum, which I believe some of the members here knew about it. How can we earn other magician's respect where we cannot even learn to respect their creation of magic props and items?

Even if magic wanted to go to a greater height in Malaysia, we as magician must respect the art of magic first. Not only in terms of using original magic props and original learning materials, but also to practice your technique when performing so you would not expose a magic effect.

I don't meant to direct this at anyone but it is just an humble opinion from me for your own personal reflection as a magician, whether beginner, semi-pro or professionals.

And one last word, magic is a very deep and meaingful art, when performing, it is a gesture of self-expression from deep within you to the audience that you are performing too. Just like an artist drawing a beautiful picture is a way of expressing themselves. Go deep into magic, learn its history well and you would be suprise to know that the history of magic has been around in the early days of mankind. Learn to appreciate magic and it will can help you live a very good, meaningful and luxurious life.

Without doubt, yes! ^_^

Yeah, it's indeed my purpose for you all to agree and disagree me. This is what I called as brainstorming.

THough, as Adam Smith said:" Demand and supply is controled by invisible hand." NO one can interrupt it.

We must face the reality. Optimistic is a good thing but we must be rational as well.

I've got a lot of things on my mind which I wanna say about this.
I don't have the time right now. Maybe later.

In this context what's your defination for rich..? 5 figure a month..?

Some magicians are rich but not famous;
some are famous but never been rich before.
Some are famous but they aren't good;
Some are good but they aren't famous.
Some thought that they are good but ...;
some are good but they don't have the confidence to perform in public.
Macam-macam ada ......

Me too. Need to accomplish all of them now.

what's the statistics for actors or singers?

Singers? oh yeah 1 in million, I think. Haha...finally I can find a topic that arouse interest of you all. No one will always right and no one will always wrong as well. Maybe with this discussion, I may get some insights. Who knows?

i'd say it possible, but not probable.

every magician needs an audience. hence, back to demand and supply.

cyril may be good, but do you really see bukit jalil stadium being packed up for his performance? it's a niche market. sure, as magicians, we'd pay to go to cyril's show, just because IT'S CYRIL! how many NON-magician friends would pay to see his show. Even if it's rm100. To us, it's a good price to pay to see Cyril, but to the laymen, only the "rich folks" would actually pay to see him. if he was a magician in malaysia, odds are, he wouldn't be that well known, unless he went overseas to perform professionally.

i respect anslem roy a great deal, don't get me wrong, but he's an internationally known magician from malaysia. Ideally, he should be well known in malaysia, don't you think? but how many of you knew him before you personally became a magician. i'd think only a small handful.

sure, if you're wondering if you can make a living out of magic, it's POSSIBLE. Anslem Roy has done it, and i'm sure there are many more who have as well. Notice one thing about them; they all had to do it internationally. As a professional magician, malaysia just isn't the place to be. Your audience is too limited.

i feel i've ranted on enough(although it's not much), but you guys get what i'm saying, right?

id like to give my 2 cents as well.. couple of observations I've made and personal opinions...

Couple of reasons that Magic is not popular in Malaysia [I]yet...

1. people in Malaysia are not very exposed to magic, heck, i bet most have never even seen a magic trick. so they are not aware how enjoyable magic can be. I remember the 1st time i seen someone produce a dove from silks.. :o What the....??! how the..?!?! where the...?!?!!

I went to Genting with a couple of friends recently (non magicians), Tim Kole was performing there then.. i remembered nobody wanted to go watch it with me.. no one was interested.. and i didnt know y..

or maybe illusions are not that enjoyable, compared to closeup... :)

2. They think magic are only for kids.. birthday parties, children's day etc..which are where you'd find most magicians making an appreance anyways..

3. They've been embarassed by magicians on stage in fromt of a crowd. so they dun like magic anymore.

4. some might still associate magic to spiritual stuff... bomoh etc.


guess what im trying to get at is, we as magicians are responsible to make the public aware of this wonderful art called magic.. practice, then go perform good quality magic.. leave audiences wanting more.. as issac said.. 'create the demand!'

V nicely said... and its very true.

So.. now the question is, how do we create the demand?

by working hard to be the best performer we can be.
Change the mindset of the Malaysian audience.

Magic IS not cheesy. Magic CAN be entertaining, mysterious, mindblowing. Its cheesy magicians that make magic cheesy.

So true, i remmber reading somewhere that: There are no bad Magic tricks, only bad performers".. or something to that effect.. ^_^

Magic performed by David Copperfield, David Blaine, Cyril Takayama, Tommy Wonder, Edward Marlo is not cheesy, but the majority of everybody else IS. I'm sorry to say that, but let's be frank, (absolutely no offense to anyone here) I don't think wearing golden spandex with mullet while posing like a member of 80s hair metal band and holding numerous card fans is really 'in' with today's standard. While I'm sure a great deal of magic out there is awesome, there's also a significant amount of fillers, tricks that were created half assed without much thought into it. That, in addition to "magicians" being stereotype by typical public as "mere entertainer", can't help us getting the same amount of payment as, say, musicians or singers. While it's (like how Sukyi put it) possible, it's not probable.

But I agree that it's actually the performance itself that sells. It's about being a performer. It's about creating that kinda raport with your audience that leaves them wanting for more. Like in music: a band that just plays music and get off the stage will be remembered as a band who just play music and that's it. But the band that could get people to sing along and dance and clap, and would stay back to chat with their fans, would last longer than just "another band", because it puts a FACE to their music. Just like how every entertainment out there should be. Don't just be another magician, be LAI, be JEFF GAN, be BRENDAN, be DAVID LAI, ya know. Be yourself. James Tong has reminded us about this over and over before, and this is something that I believe we should look more into.

In the end, it wouldn't matter what you do, as long as your name means something. I bet you people would pay thousands of dollars for Copperfield to speak or just attend a party without even having to perform a single magic.