Description
Conrad “Connie” Bush’s Color Isolation
by Joseph K. Schmidt
1988, published by Jeff Busby Magic, Inc.
Mint condition!
Please note: While this item is new and unused, it has been sitting in storage for decades, so issues such as rusted staples or bowed pages may be present.
From Jeff Busby Magic, Inc. advertisement, 1988:
Connie Bush is well-known to the “close-up underground”. As an insider for so many years, Connie has been a friend and confident of such legends as Vernon, Charlie Miller, John Scarne, Faucett Ross, and the elusive Moe. Karl Fulves’ assessment of Connie is fact: “Connie is one of the most knowledgeable men in magic.” Yet little of his material has seen print — this incredibly good card routine has been kept under wraps for several years. Joe Schmidt pried it out of Connie, wrote a detailed explanation, and accompanied the whole writeup with over 50 of his fabulous illustrations to meticulously explain this fine piece of magic.
What is Color Isolation? It’s a complete card act where the two colors of the deck — red and black — continually separate, each time under quite different and more mysterious conditions. The deck is handled and shuffled by the spectator throughout the routine, yet the colors seem to instantly obey the magician’s every whim.
Color Isolation is an interlocking series of effects, each building on the next. You can borrow a deck, have it thoroughly shuffled by the spectator and proceed. After shuffling the deck, the spectator simply cuts off a portion and counts them face down. Immediately you tell the spectator how many red and blacks he holds!
The spectator shuffles again and deals cards onto indicator cards, only to discover he’s separated the dealt portion into reds and blacks! Sure, it’s a quickie version of Out of This World, but what a version!
Apparently demonstrating how it works, you show that the reds and blacks separate without fail, no matter how much they are moved around, with a quick and clear-cut Follow the Leader that is interlinked beautifully with the theme of the routine.
The deck is shuffled again, yet you instantly produce red and black Aces in a startling sequence as you move into the finale: Placing aside a w ritten prediction, you have the spectator shuffle and reshuffle the deck. Separating the deck into three piles, the spectator opens the paper to find that you have predicted exactly the number of reds and blacks in the selected pile. But the real climax comes when the remaining two piles are turned face up . . . once again, the deck has separated into individual piles of reds and blacks!
The routining is brilliant. No cards are selected, everything seems so fair at all times, and the spectator seems to have unlimited freedom in handling the cards.
Difficult sleight of hand? Not really. Because of its structure, Color Isolation can be done as an almost self-working routine, or you can put in as much “ heavy work” as you wish. The effect is the same! You are given an exact description of the way Connie Bush performs it, and then given a choice of simplified and non-skill handlings that are equally as effective.
The worker with sleight of hand ability will find plenty to interest him in the detailed descriptions Joe Schmidt gives of the moves Connie uses. Included are explanations of Connie’s handlings of the Red/Black Shuffle, his False Riffle Shuffle, his Up the Ladder sequence, how he does the Tabled Faro Shuffle, and his handlings of various versions o f the False Cut, all aided by Joe Schmidt’s crystal clear line drawings.
You will delight in the thinking that Connie has put into the various sequences — the methods are subtle, full of new twists and turns, and flow from one effect to the next. Color Isolation is a highly entertaining routine with vast audience appeal — a stunning example of what card magic should be.
Everything is thoroughly explained in a book of 33 attractively typeset pages, 5 1/2 by 8 1/2 in size, and saddle stitched in two-color illustrated art board covers. Featured are 56 expert line drawings by Joseph K. Schmidt to show you how.
