Putting on a show

[Albert]

As Marko said before, the Chicago Opener is a very powerful and fun opener that really opens up people's curiosity to your show and makes them want more. As suggested before, the opener should be somewhat hard hitting, enough to ignite people's interest, and amusing if possible.

Also, your tricks depend on your setting and the amount of people. I've performed countless times for family parties and such so I have a rough idea of what works and what doesn't. Things like Oil and Water may not be such a good idea if you are planning on performing with children sitting in the front, if you are not too confident in crowd control over kids yet. Also, Oil and Water requires the full attention of the spectators to truly be hard hitting and/or appreciated, so kids can get in the way, especially since younger children may have a harder time understanding the concept behind it and it's boring to them.

Additionally, you want to make sure your routines somewhat flow. It's good to have some sort of natural development between each trick. For example, I have routine set up for a small crowd, where it goes from a 1 person involvement, to a 2 people involvement, to a 3 people involvement. I justify this routine by saying I'm going to make this more impossible to make it work while at the same time, more people can get involved, keeping them interested mean while in the performance. That's the gist of it. It doesn't have to flow completely. Just try to avoid jumping from one style of magic to another too quickly.

Visual tricks like the Triumph, Ambitious Card Routine, 2 Card Monte, 3 Card Monte, Colour Changing Deck, Colour Changing Card (like the Chicago Opener) and so on are good choices for performances. These are easy to understand, fun, and most importantly, they keep interactions with your spectators and are visual.

Just some food for thought

Good luck