Former Ryerson student Bill Abbott wants to read your psychic vibrations, reports Meghan Hurley.
Bill Abbott knows what you are thinking.
Abbott, magician and previous Ryerson student, performs a night of mystery and magic tricks every Thursday at the Torch Lounge on Victoria Street.
The top floor of the Senator Jazz Club might be packed with skepticism, but Abbott is able to win over the crowd with his remarkable mind reading and magical talents.
“There are initially a lot of skeptics trying not to enjoy the show, but who are trying to figure it out,” Abbott said.
The show began with Abbott’s ‘magic of the hands’ routine, in which he proves that the hand is certainly quicker than the eye.
The tricks included transporting a twenty-dollar bill from inside a wine glass, to the centre of an orange showing the audience that money really does grow on trees. The ‘2mysteries of the mind’ was the most incredible part of the show, where Abbott reads with inconceivable detail the mind of an audience member.
“It’s a powerful selling tool because not many people are doing it,” Abbott says about mind reading.
An audience member was asked to think of a person’s name, someone Abbott could have never known.
Simply by looking at the volunteer and asking a few general questions, Abbott determined with uncanny accuracy the name of the person she was thinking of.
Abbott says that he gets karma and ‘psychic vibrations’ from the people whose minds he is reading. Through university psychology classes, and years or practice, Abbott has perfected the techniques of psychic phenomena. No other explanation is possible.
The show finale included a wine glass, a deck of cards and Abbott’s musical talents on the violin. Abbott was able to make three cards chosen by audience members rise to the occasion out of a wine glass by playing his violin.
A jazz club as a venue for magic and mind reading is certainly a new idea, but Abbott thinks it is a great way to entertain.
“The Torch Lounge is so amazing because it is a relaxed venue. There’s not a stage, it’s almost like a large house party with people getting to know each other. That’s half the fun of it.”
Abbott considers his magic and mind routine to be ‘jazz magic’ in the sense that it is ‘very off the cuff’.” He recently started a regular Thursday night show at the Torch Lounge, and is interested in rescuing magic to give it a more distinguished atmosphere.
“Magic has be relegated to the variety pf arts and pushed to the sidelines for so long,” he says. “We’re one step above a clown and perhaps one step above a mime. That’s why it’s so important to me to be able to perform at a venue like the Senator. It’s a legitimate place and it’s an age-of-majority event,”
Abbott is not only a magician, but also a performer whose interaction and witty humour makes for a very entertaining evening. You can catch him any Thursday night at the Senator.
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