Club Obi Wan

Hey fellas!

I'm looking to come up with a routine that I can practice and work on for a talent show next year, the current one is just going on now so I've got loads of time, but I'd like to get some ideas so that I have this amount of time to work on it and polish it up. Maybe do some targeting or just a couple loud cracks and then some quick short ones... I'll probably do it in gear... or would that be bad on stage in front of a couple hundred peers?

I've never come up with a routine though... do you just throw some cracks togther and hope it goes smoothly? Should I use an existing routine? I'm thinking about 3-5 minutes long.

Any ideas are welcome.

Thanks!

In Christ,
Shane

Call Western Stage Props (1-800-858-5568) or go to their website at http://www.westernstageprops.com, and get "Learn the art of Whipcracking", starring Alex Green.

There's a part 1 & 2 - if you can only get one of them, get part 2. In that one, he teaches 2 routines step by step, and if you are interested in this, also shows some 2-handed routines. Alex has been a whipcracking coach to Hollywood stars, and has been in movies himself. If you can learn from anyone, he's definitely the one!!

The one I am trying to get down is quite impressive when you nail it.

You go from sidearm, to overhead, to reverse, to forward. I think. I've gotten it to work like, twice. It's great.

Hi Shane,

I'd like to suggest a couple things...

Are you going to do any target cutting?

If not, then I would suggest to try to keep the cracking routine pretty short. 3 minutes is kinda long as it is, and 5 is way too long. You don't want your audience to get bored. Even if your doing something really difficult like hassett's four corners your average audience won't know the difference between that and a regular volley, so to them it looks like almost the same thing.

I think the average performer will agree that at the very most you would want to do with continuous fancy cracking routines is about a minute, which is still on the long side.

Now if you include some target cutting that will help you streatch the time if there is a time limit, and it can build up audience attention.

I'm not sure how your school would be if you were cracking targets out of another students hand, because of liability reasons, and I'm not sure how proficient you are with target cutting.

But there are some great target cutting "tricks" you can do with you holding the target that look very impressive to an audience. And you can use up some time in the build up and set up of it that will build your audience.

there are some shown in the video the art of the bullwhip, and I believe there are some in the alex green video's too.

some of my favorite's are:

cutting a target out from between your fingers of the same hand that your holding the whip.

You can also hold a target behind your back, where it sticks out the side that your cracking the whip on.

You can also cut a target out of your own mouth the same way

All three of these can be done easily with a regular circus crack(cattleman's crack)

You can use the overhead crack to cut one off of the top of your head.

and you can get creative and come up with others very easily.

Probobly the best thing to use for this is styrofoam sticks, and some performers use a hollow straw with a plastic flower stuck in the end, so even if they don't cut the straw the flower still gets knocked out. It's kinda a safety for if you screw up in the performance the audience doesnt' know and the show goes on.

Also, to use up some time, I believe it was vince bruce that purposefully misses the first couple times on some tricks so it looks hard and the audience gets with it and he gets them cheering for him to get it by the third try. Vince is one of my favorite performers and he really knows how to work a crowd.

And Our own Chris Camp(canasta), may be able to help you out as he is also one of the best performers and whipcrackers that I have ever seen. He is right up there with Vince in my book.

I hope this helps.

Regards,

Paul Nolan
MidWestWhips

Hi Shane,

I agree with Cathy about getting some videos. I have 'Whipcracking made Easy, part 2' and it has several good tricks that you can use.

I strongly suggest that you do some target work. Even if you aren't confident enough to take a target from someone's hand come show time, use a stand to hold a target or have a table to set targets upon. Use stuff that breaks easy or goes flying. As an example, you could take a single sheet of newspaper, roll it up, and clamp it to the back of a chair so it's sticking up or out to the side. As Paul said, stryrofoam works well and breaks easily. A plastic pop bottle set on a table will go flying, but be carefull not to hit it into the audience.

Doing the wrap-around is fairly easy, and will make use of an assistant. In case you don't know, the wrap-around is a trick where you crack the whip past/behind the assistant and allow the whip to continue it's natural motion letting it wrap around the person. This is roughly what Indy does to 'Willie' at the end of 'TOD'. The assistant isn't hurt at all, but to some people it looks like the person really gets hit by the whip. I'm not sure if you're in high school, but if you are, do this trick with the principal or a least-favorite teacher. That will get a good reaction from the audience, provided they are students.

I'd also recommend being very comfortable with all three basic cracks: the circus crack, over-head crack, and the flick. To me the flick is one of the best cracks to use for targeting with longer Indy-style whip. The flick is done by throwing the whip forward like a baseball. By stopping your hand (not jerking it back at you) you can get the whip to crack.

-Adam, www.winrichwhips.com

Shane, So far you have gotten top-notch advice, Whip Cracking made easy part one and two would be a good source for ideas. It will help you to get the fundamentals to build your skills up and show you some tricks and techniques to putting on a good show, as well as show you some basic multi cracking routines that are easy enough to master once you have the basics down. If you are going to showcase your ability with a whip I highly recommend target work and wraps, with multiple cracking in the mix too. You want a build a well balance of showmanship and skill and keep the audiences interest. Start with your second best trick, Play up the “danger” of the whip and the “he makes that look so easy” factors, and throw in a little comedy to make them laugh.

To the average person today a 3 to 5 minute of just multiple cracking routines are going to be too long and they are going to get board. Multiple cracking routines are fun to do and are a great way to show off your skills, but keep it short. Depending on your skill level at the time, you may want to use basic and or advance cracking techniques to show off a lil to the crowd. A helpful tip I received was, when planning a specific routine, label each crack with a letter, A = over head crack B = reverse forward crack, C = forward crack and so forth . So when you practice, start with A then follow thought to B and then to C which done in secession will give ABC which makes up Alex Greens version of the Queensland flash. Or a rapid succession of B followed to C back to B then again to C, BCBCBCBC for simple figure 8s. It makes it easier to memorize them in patterns like A B A C A C and count them out in your head while your performing the routine. I am trying to keep this simple, but, as there are many more cracks and with timing variations and differnt planes, as you can imagine it can get more complicated. If your feeling brave tackle Mike Murphy’s fundamentals of whip cracking and No Bull Whip cracking videos, they goes into the Australian routines of sport cracking in much greater detail’s, but keep in mind some things are harder to do with a short handled bullwhip like the Indystyle whip, and the wristy action needed to pull some of the things off can be overly stressful on the handle thong transition of short handled bullwhips causing some problems over time. If you have long handled bullwhips or stock whips, they work better for this kind of work. Also as impressive as single whip routines are, doubles handed routines are even more so, something to think about if you have more then one whip, its best if they are equal length but they don't have to be for the kinda show your intrested in doing.

Target cutting is a great idea, it gets peoples attention and it shows that you’re accurate and “good” with a whip. Targets can be lots of things, Styrofoam strips work nice because one it cut clean and two you can cut them long and take them down inch by inch with the whip. Styrofoam cups are another popular target often used. Newspapers make another great target material, Paul mentioned a straw with fake or real flower inserted into it, those work well too. Another idea, I haven’t tried myself though was to use long hollow dried pasta in place of straws. It can be painted what ever color you want and it breaks easily, I imagine straws make for faster clean up though. Either way you can also fill the straws with colored chalk powder, for a nice visual effect when you cut the flower from the stem. A lot of people uses painted dry spaghetti pasta with a little paper attached to the end for a target. Cutting Playing cards are another old time favorite. Placeing a hankerchif on the stage flooor and using the whip to scoop it up with a crack is a nice trick. If you get good enough in the next year where you can have some one hold a target for you, all the better. Find a “target girl” if you can. I hate to say it, as I know it sounds very shallow but get a really attractive one (Like Chris Camp used in his Online clips) it will help the act and keep the audiences interest. Don’t over do your confidence level though and Keep in mind you might be nervous on stage especially if it’s a first time, so that could throw you off a little too. Safety first, the last thing you want to do is screw up and hit someone on stage. If your not comfortable with having some one else hold your targets, make a target stand and have an assistant to refill it once your cut all your targets. There is no shame in that and the audience will still be impressed. If you can snuff candles, that’s always a classic trick too, but the fire on a school stage might be a issue.

Wraps work great for public shows, it really emphasized the danger and the allure of the of the whip, but also shows the skill of the handler who is able to gently wrap an assistant with no harm done. It’s another one of those things is relatively easy to do, but to the audience looks stunning with an loud crack and you “make it look so easy”. I really like Adams suggestion of wrapping the principal or another “disliked” character if you can do that in a school setting I imagine that would go over really well.

As your going to be performing on stage make sure you have room to use the whip your going to want to use, it’s going to be difficult to use that 14 foot bullwhip on a small stage for example. You need to have these skills engrained so that they are second nature to you, especially if you’re working with some one else. If you’re not sure you can pull it off every time, leave it out of the act for now. You have a year, so you should be able to learn many of these things, if you do your homework and practice, practice, practice! Always remember to end with your best trick, and leave the audience wanting more.

All the best.

Dan

cutting a target out from between your fingers of the same hand that your holding the whip.

You can also hold a target behind your back, where it sticks out the side that your cracking the whip on.

You can also cut a target out of your own mouth the same way

How the heck is that done :

Best regards

JAN

Hi Jan,

Those are all really simple "tricks", that anyone who can do a circus crack could learn in a few minutes, and with a little bit of practice could do it blindfolded. Unfortunately it's harder to explain in typeing, but I'll give it a shot.

all of those tricks work the same way, it's a circus crack, all you have to do is put the target in the way of the whip.

to keep it standard lets say the person doing this is right handed and cracking with the right hand, and using long styrofoam sticks.

for the first one you start with the whip in your hand with it laying out ready for a circus crack, with your palm facing in towards your leg, this is how all three of these cracks will start.

Now you put the target in between your fingers of the hand holding the whip, I usually use my pinky and ring finger, and you put it there facing away from your leg and parallell to the ground.

Then all you do is a circus crack and as the loop in the whip is travelleing forward, it naturally passes by the side of your body and cuts the target. It's a little bit more difficult with a shorter target, or a target that is harder to break. I learned this trick with a regular cigarrette, which is pretty short target, about 3 inches long, and with a target that short you really need to be able to control how close the whip travelles to your body to get it to cut without clipping your shoulder or hitting your hand. I'd suggest using a fairly long styrofoam stick at least 6 inches or longer untill you can control where it cuts the target.

This is probobly the best one to learn first, or the next one where you cut it out of your left hand behind your back.

you start the same way, ready to do a circus crack, but this time you take the target in your left hand and you lay your left hand across your back so the target is sticking out the same direction that it was with the previous trick, and when you do the circus crack the stick is in the path of the travelling loop of the whip and it cuts it. This one you will want a longer target, and it will take a little more control than the between the fingers one.

Now the one out of your mouth, it's a bit more dangerous, and I suggest you get a lot of practice with the other two tricks first and make sure you can really control the crack, and definitely use a long target until your are comfortable useing a target smaller than 6 inches.

It is in the same vein of the other two tricks, just putting the target in the way of the whip. You start out again with the whip at your side ready for a circus crack. You put the target in your mouth, and you turn your head to the right so the target is sticking out in line with your shoulder and the target should be level and paralell to the ground, then do the circus crack.

And voi-la!

I hope this makes sense. Let me know if you want me to try to explain any of it better or if you have questions.

By the way, the circus crack is also known as the cattlemans crack, gypsie crack, and I think the forward crack, there's probobly a couple other names for it that I can't remember right now, I've even heard it called the up and down crack.

Regards,

Paul Nolan
MidWestWhips

All these things are great advice, and you'll do well by it Shane. But one more thing I really want to add to this, is TALK TO YOUR AUDIENCE. ENGAGE YOUR AUDIENCE! Educate them in a fun, exciting way. Talk about the tip of that whip travelling at Mach 1, and how the whip has been around for about 3000 years, and was the first ever Man-Made supersonic device.

Keep things moving. The most boring thing in the world is to just stand up in front of an audience and throw the whip around making noise. Exciting and fun to you, but it get's really old for the audience fast.

Mix it up. Do some fancy cracking routines, (and you can come up with some REALLY impressive stuff building off just the 4 basics, as my esteemed colleague, the OTHER Dan, said!) follow it with some target cutting, and then do some audience participation, save something big for last, and leave them with a bang!

Adam had some great suggestions, but you might want to play down the "Principal or Nasty Teacher being whacked." There's enough garbage about the whips being deadly weapons as it is. Yeah they are, but we don't need to revisit the problems that Strider has had! I'm not saying don't do it, but tread cautiously. All it takes is for someone to take it wrong, and you get in trouble, and you don't get to share your enthusiasm for whip arts in your school any more, (was there about 15 years ago myself when I brought in a sword to talk about. Cleared it with the teacher, but someone freaked out, and I got in trouble. The road to you-know-where is paved with good intentions!)

Something else you could also do, (which could get you some brownie points on the contest if the judges are teachers,) is to talk about how whips work. You've essentially got a REALLY ENTERTAINING science fair project packed up in that hunk of braided leather. Whips are big, floppy, levers, wave propagators, energy funnels, and examples of the Law of Conservation Energy all rolled into a nifty leather strip!

When I teach people how to use a whip, I use the example that whips work like a Tsunami, the energy from the wide end flows out toward the narrow end. The energy has less space to move in, so it has to go faster and faster, until it hairpins at the end and accelerates past Mach1.

Get the physics teacher to come up and hold some stuff to target, or wrap him, or whatever. If he's hesitant, make a joke like, "come on! Where's your scientific curiosity! You should encourage your students!" Play with it. Have fun. Let your audience have fun with you.

Practice in front of people. Do it for fellow whip crackers who can offer you ideas for cracking routines, and help you polish their appearance, and also do it for other folks who will be able to tell you how it looks. Tell them to be brutal, and don't take anything personally, and don't get defensive. Constructive criticism is how we improve. Videotape yourself. You might think you know what your audience is seeing, but you don't. Work in front of a mirror if you can. I work out in the back yard and stand in front of a window. The reflection isn't great, but I can at least get some idea of if I look ridiculous or not ;-)

Paul said to keep the performance short, under 3 minutes or so. But I can tell you that you can keep an audience entranced for upwards of 20-30 minutes if you keep them involved in what is going on. I've got a whip trick that I do in a comedy act that takes about 3-5 minutes of setup before the actual trick is performed, and the audience loves it! (sorry, won't share. Trade secret. It's a gag, anyway.)

If you ever get a chance to see Chris Camp perform, you'll see exactly what I mean. He's a brilliant whip cracker, but he's also a fantastic performer who can keep the audience eating out of his hand. It's all in the packaging, (if it didn't sound so incredibly self-serving, I'd say pick up a copy of my recently released WWAC Ohio Convention Highlights DVD so you could see Chris and Adam Winrich perform in the Sunday Showcase: Funny, entertaining, and paced so the audience doesn't get bored! I took a lot away for my act just watching them!)

You don't need to do complex, dangerous things with the whip. Keep it simple, (because Murphy's law is SO VERY True when you're performing. Things will go smoothly in rehearsals, but will fall apart on stage, so the easier you make it on yourself, the better,) keep it moving, and keep your audience involved, and you'll be fantastic!

So, good luck, start practicing, and remember that you've got a great wealth of knowledge, experience, and advice right here on COW to draw from. Take what you need, ignore what you don't, (including this, ;-)
) and practice, practice, practice.

All the best,

-Dan

Dan,

Excellent post!!!

When I said keep it short, I meant the fancy cracking routine, and you explained what I meant better than I did, ) thanks.

And you are so very right about keeping the audience involved. Chis is extreemely good at this! One of my favorite bits that chris does is his show closer. It takes less than a second to actually do the trick, but when chris does it it takes 5 or 6 mintues. He tells a whole story, and actually uses people out of the audience as the characters of his parents, and has the audience respond throughout the story, and interact, and this whole thing goes on for 6 mintues with the audience laughing and doing callbacks in unison, and he only cracks the whip one time, and that's it. One of my favorite performance bit's I've ever seen.

And Dan is absolutely right about using the education angle, because not only is your audience learning something, but as they learn how dangerouse the whip is it adds to the effect of what you're doing with it, and makes everything you do afterwards seem that much more dangerous.

And that is a great Idea about using your physics teacher in the act! Brilliant! if you do a wrap on him, you could even ask him if he knows why it didn't hurt him, and weather he knows why or you catch him off guard and he doesn't, you still can say that you deserve an A'!!! There's a multitude of things you can pull from with the physics teacher angle. Absolutely great idea!

And Even though that was a shameless plug from Dan for the WWAC Ohio Video, I will definitely endorse it, I was there and it was a blast, it's worth just seeing the performers and the competitions, but above all it's worth getting the video just to see chris's hot pants, and my first time of ever using a fire extinguisher!!! Absolutely priceless!!! But I warn you, after you see this video and the shenanagins that go on, it'll be almost impossible for you not to attend the next one!

Let us know how your coming along Shane, I hope the advice is helping.

Regards,

Paul Nolan
MidWestWhips

midwestwhips wrote: ...but above all it's worth getting the video just to see chris's hot pants, and my first time of ever using a fire extinguisher!!! Absolutely priceless!!!

Disk 2: Blooper Reel. 2 minutes and 30 seconds in... Didn't even have to look it up!

Now THERE'S a commercial for MasterCard! And they're having a contest for fill in the blank right now.

- Twin 6' kevlar fire whips by Riz: $350

- All Cotton Old West Reenactor Trousers from Wah Maker: $70

- Having your friends put you out with a fire extinguisher when you set your @$$ on fire in front of a live audience: PRICELESS



Chris, can I submit this? If I win, I'll split the money with you ;-)

-Dan

SUBMIT IT!!! SUBMIT IT!!!

Do I get a cut for being the one who saved his @$$?!!!

Regards,

Paul Nolan
MidWestWhips

You know, I haven't lit myself on fire with my pair of fire whips yet, I'll have to ask Chris how he did it. Afterall, that was the most entertaining part.

Another note about using a teacher or principal as an assistant: The Fish is right about being careful with that one, set up is key. Doing this trick might be helped if you're an honor student and on good terms with the principal or teacher that you might use; people will know that you aren't going to hurt anybody. It's meant to be more light comedy, as opposed to dark. With the wrap around, it would be in your best interest to explain exactly how it works, so the audience will know that nobody is getting hurt.

I myself am going to be in a local production of 'Jesus Christ Superstar' with a very small part as the henchman who flogs Jesus during the song '39 lashes'. I'm excited to be on stage and contribute my talents, but it gets me a little bit that I'll be the bad guy with the whip and not putting whipcracking in a positive light.

Dan Trout,

Are you doing my 'whip as a pet' routine? If you aren't, you probably should. I know I stole it from a whipcracker here in Wisconsin. I wish I knew where he got it from.

Right now I'm thinking of what I should do for my routine for the showcase at the WWAC convention. Paul Nolan told me to do something that would illuminate fancy multiple whip cracking, and I put together a routine like that, but now I'm thinking I should just pick 5 or 6 whip tricks and just do them, with a little explanation, of course. 'Whip as a pet' would probably be pretty good, though it will depend on what kind of sound system they have set up and if the people can hear me.

-Adam

Ahhhh, NUTS! I just went and checked out the contest, (at "priceless.com") and it's just fill in the blanks based on the commercials you've already seen! You can't submit your own video stuff.

SOOOOOO! video.google.com OR one of those stupid home video shows, here we come ;-)

Anyway, the trick that I was referring to was not the "whip as a pet" routine, but yeah, Adam, I did steal that ;-)

The one I'm talking about is one I stole from Travis Fessler, whip cracker and professional side show freak, (no...really...that's his job description. He swallows swords, breathes fire, eats broken lightbulbs, and he'll let you staple a dollar to his back if he gets to keep the dollar!)

It's a gag he uses on hecklers, and I've adapted it into "Daniel the Fishmonger's, (one of my two stage names,) Sure-Fire-One-Step-Quit-Smoking-Program." I milk it for about 3 - 5 minutes, depending on the "feel" of the audience. I could explain it, but it's much more painful...err...better in person.

If you make it to Annie Oakley this year, (and Travis, who's from Cincinnati, isn't there to see me rip him off,) I'll adapt it from it's Renn Fair trappings to Wild West and do it for "Most Unique Trick." It won't win, but it's sure funny!

Something I'm currently developing, based on your "Mary Had a Little Lamb," and Chris's rhythmic two-handed stockwhip routine, (and I'll say it again. I'm not joking! That routine produces cracks in a cadance that is IDENTICAL to a drum warm up I learned in high school!) is a drum/whip duet that works in a call/response thing similar to "Duelling Banjos." Theres a buddy of mine who is a brilliant Middle Eastern style drummer, and I want to work out a short act with him, (sort of Blue Man Group with whips.) I need a LOT of work before I get there, and I'm working with Gery on the routine.

Now, just need to sell enough DVD's to buy a matched pair of stockwhips from Janine ;-)

-Dan

The Fish brought up several very important points. First, though it may seem like common sense, be sure to clear this whip act well ahead of time with the talent show producers and/or the school administrators. In this day and age people are much more sensitive to the display of what can be considered “weapons” in a public setting especially in a educational institution like a high school. Don’t use the whip in a threatening manner; but rather keep it light hearted, fun, energetic and informative and most importantly entertaining.

I agree with using the informative aspect in the show. It’s important to involve your audience and teach them as you go along with your act. (The educational component is also a great way to help promote a good image on the use of the whip.) Depending on the circumstances, however; keep in mind you are performing in a talent show, not teaching a physics or whip cracking class. You’re there to show off a bit so have fun with it, don’t give away all your secrets. Keep it exciting and interesting and don’t just lecture on how or why the whip cracks. All that scientific mumbo jumbo so to speak is fascinating to us, but to the general public you need to be careful with how much detail you go into otherwise you may loose the audience.

As far as costuming goes, most people who are familiar with Indian Jones will associate him with the bullwhip, in that respect you’re probably fine wearing your gear as a “costume”. If not, consider throwing on a cowboy hat and play up the western persona. Some performers choose to incorporate music into their act. I always think it’s neat to see a well rehearsed multiple cracking routine done to John Williams Raiders march or Devos “Whip It” or even the theme to Raw Hide, depending on the act. Your act can be as complex or as simple as you want to make it providing you have the skills to pull it off. Remember, its one thing to be a great whip handler and another thing altogether to be a great performer. Find a good balance between the two and work the audience. (Btw If at any point you screw up, make a joke of it and make it look like you did it on purpose, always sell the trick)

You might want to visit www.whipboy.com Brett is a whip performer who goes by the stage name “Whipboy” and works a lot of the renaissance festival circuits. He has a few videos clips of his show available at his web site, they are large files but are rather amusing and worth looking at. They show some of the things you can achieve on stage with a lil charisma, creativity and practice, you might get some ideas from them.

BTW Dan, with all your shameless commercial plugs you might want to apply for vendor status here!

Dan


P.S. For more information on Murphy’s law visit www.murphywhips.com Oh wait that might be the wrong Murphy!