As I stated at the onset of Part 1 of this article, “The show must go on” is an old show business adage that originated in the circus. It still applies today for most professionals. We prepare and train in order to present the very best performances we can, but things often don’t go according to plan. In my thirty …
The Pastels: Amateurs Triumphant
The four guys who won the Teams Competition at the 2013 IJA festival are not really jugglers. That seems a harsh thing to say about a team, the Pastels, dressed in pastels, who blew away the audience with an intricate, energetic club passing routine covering all of the stage and including complex four-person patterns and some acrobatics, passing from atop …
Juggling Helps Kids Stay in School
Juggling has been part of the Fayetteville, Arkansas, ALLPS program (Agee-Lierly Life Preparations Services Center) for the past 20 years. ALLPS is an alternative learning high school program for kids who have not necessarily been successful in other high school settings, and it has been helping kids stay in school since 1972. Recently I enjoyed a conversation about juggling with …
Kyle Driggs, Individuals Champion: from Local Philly Phenom to the International Stage
The winning act in the 2013 IJA Individuals Championships looked foreign: New Age music; ethereal, plain background; slow, perfect choreography, and for props, only rings and an umbrella. But the winner was 22-year-old Philadelphia local boy Kyle Driggs, a product of the juggling hotbed that the City of Brotherly Love and the Philly Fest have become. But the foreign exoticism …
The 2013 IJA Festival Review
The 66th annual International Jugglers’ Association Festival took place from July 15th-21st, 2013. The event featured everything from busking, vaudeville, stage championships, a cascade of stars, and juggling 27/7 in two spacious gymnasia at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio. This year marked the return of the IJA to a collegiate setting, and brought together jugglers from all …
Tricks of the month August by Conejo Lunar
En este mes Jorge y Jafet trabajaron secuencias rápidas con rebotes y equilibrios en espalda, codos, cara y brazos. Tambien hay un pase en alimentador de 12 clavas en ultimates y un passing prechac con Chema Esperamos que lo disfruten. This month Jorge and Jafet worked in fast sequences with bounces and balance in the back, elbows, face and arms. …
The Show Must Go On: Anecdotes of Mid-Show Mishaps – Part 1
“The show must go on” is an old show business adage that originated in the circus. It still applies today for most professionals. We prepare and train in order to present the very best performances we can, but things often don’t go according to plan. In my thirty years as a professional juggler, I’ve encountered a wide array of unexpected …
Be Funnier With Scotty Meltzer: You Punch Like a Girl
For the past two months I’ve been writing about three methods to write lead away jokes: forward from the front, out from the middle, and backwards from the end. If you haven’t already read those introductory articles, Nice Structure and Structure? Genius!, now would be a good time. I’ll wait … Tall and tan and young and lovely, the girl from …
Video: Aventuras en Chile
In 2012, Erin Stephens traveled to Chile to organize the first ever IJA Regional Competition in South America. She was highly impressed with the skill level of the juggling and circus scene, and thinks you will be, too. This footage is from throughout her two week stay in Chile, and includes clips from the 14th Annual Chilean Circus and Street …