I am performing in my school’s talent quest on the 20th of this month. I purchased 3 DX Photon 68 balls and a UV blub. I am planning on glow juggling for around 5 minutes to the Fatboy Slim song That Old Pair of Jeans (like all the juggling videos on youtube).
I am fairly good at juggling and i still have time to learn some new tricks. I would rather not list the tricks i can do so it doesn’t influence you.
Does anybody have any experience with glow juggling? What tricks look good?
Is it like unicycle performing where simpler tricks look better to an uneducated audience?
To some extent.
With glow juggling it does seem that ‘bigger’ tricks look better.
The simple shower, for example, looks amazing.
If you can go both directions, so much the better.
Same for the box and the extended box.
Something that also works well are tricks based around the arm-waving of Rubinstein’s Revenge.
Wearing UV gloves or at least sleeves might also add an interesting dimention to your glow-juggling. Something like Eric’s Extension is completely lost in glow-juggling simply because you can’t see what the arms are doing.
You may also want to look at UV facepaint or -wig to add to the whole effect.
You can get a black bodysuit with a UV skeleton on the front.
That will look pretty wicked but I don’t know how much money you want to spend on this.
Suggestion: work out your routine very carefully to make musical sense.
Don’t just do and redo tricks till the track runs out.
Plan your changes from trick to trick to fall on certain changes in the music.
That will mean more work, and probably counting reps of a particular trick before you do the change, but it makes a world of difference to the final product.
Even with that said, 5 minutes is still a very long time to watch glow juggling.
See if you can’t find a shorter version of the song.
Failing that, make one yourself.
Take the song into an audio-editor and chop it to where you want it.
Make very sure people don’t get bored with it.
You have to be off stage before people start wondering about who/what is up next.
Make very sure that you can get the hall as dark as you need it.
It might be a good idea to close the curtains behind you if you’re doing it on stage. There’s normally enough space between the curtain and the front of the stage for such a juggling act.
i’d agree with gild for the most part. tricks where the balls move a lot or in weird patterns are great. anything where your arm/body moves is out. ex: mills mess. it looks a little odd but not very hard with the lights off. moving from cascade to full shower and back can be impressive.
5 minutes is a really long time for solo 3 ball juggling. even moreso glow juggling. find a way to fill more time, either a lights on intro, shorter song, some light on juggling, anything really.
The tricks that look the best, are the ones you can do. The only thing the audience remebers is how many times you drop the balls. So make sure you can do whatever routine you choose to perform.
Good work. 2:40 is still going to be a long time to keep your audience interested though. I was going to recommend 2:00. Good is better than long!
Then the trick recommendations are good. Flowy moves, or moves that show interesting patterns. No arms or behind-the-back type tricks. And stick with tricks you’re solid at, as drops are more noticeable than patterns!
If the place is gonna be like pitch black, then have a table set up with some glow clubs under a dark blanket, then in the middle of the routine do a huge flash and switch to club by letting all the ball make a big thud to the floor. But don’t pull the clubs out till the balls all thud to the floor.
Well actually i tied, but it was with a group of big stong footballers who took the piss out of them selves by singing and dancing to Human Nature songs :D.
I had a routine worked out were i changed from simpler tricks to my harder tricks with changes in the song but that went out the door when i was on stage. I wasn’t nervous before but once i was up there in front of everyone my knee started to shake, but i just relaxed a bit and it was all good (i only dropped it 2-3 times).
I won $50 plus a $20 gift voucher (thats US$50) not too shabby for 2 mins work.
The CD player skipped a bit and my song went from 2:40 to about 2min, but hey i’m not complaining i won $70 :D.
I will track down some footage of it this week and put it into my gallery. (give me a couple of days)
Sam
P.S. I’m going to spend my money on pool toys and a super soaker , my friends and i are going camping for schoolies :D. It’s gonna be good fun
Congrats.
Sounds like you had a good initiation into the wonderfull world of performing.
You can never get rid of the butterflies in your stomach, but if you practise a routine enough, you can get them to fly in formation.
The old performing rule is that you should be able to pull it off ten times in a row before you can take it out in public.
Keep up the good work.
Now try n find some more paying gigs so your props can pay for themselves.
Yo-Yo, satelite and the clock might look good too.
but hey i still won $70