Did you ever notice...

...that there is no "rule" for laypeople how to applaud during a magic act? With songs it's easy. After each song there is applause. Same goes for speeches.

But magic? Sometimes it is clear when to applaud. But a multi phased rope routine?

Take a look at the following aspirant of magic. I'm not commenting on the act at all. Just listen to the audience. You can feel their desperation to have some indicator on when to clap and when not.



See the dilemma? Good! Now there are a few ways to get around this.

The first way would be not to care about applause. That way you don't need to indicate anything. But this let's the audience in a weird state. Like in a sitcom without the canned laughter. "The Office" is a good example. It forces people to make up their mind, if the scene is funny or not. In magic this would translate the same. The audience would be forced to think for themselves if the trick deserves applause or not. And therein lies a flaw. Most often the audience has no frame of reference to evaluate the seen magic.

The second way is the obvious applause cue. Usually spread arms and a slight indication to a bow. That works well in any stage setting. A good routine is constructed to end up in applause cue. However in a close up setting this is not advised. A mere "Thank You!" will suffice. However this could become tiresome after only a short while. So the audience needs to be conditioned. So by all means, tell your audience when to react in the beginning. Not with words. Maybe do a certain small gesture along with your initial "Thank You!". And then later you just do that gesture.

Hopefully, this has been a constructive post.