Long ago, we published Dream Trick Challenges for readers to attempt. We somehow never published the results of the last two sets of challenges, which is my fault completely. Here are the challenges and the resulting videos.
Dream Tricks Challenge # 5 Results
1. 5 Club 5 Up Front Roll – This is perhaps the most difficult trick on this list, but it has been done before. Evgeni Biljauer was famous for performing a 5 club 3 up front roll in his act and doing the 5 up version in practice, but no video of it exists. To see the three up version, click here to see Biljauer’s version. Below are videos of Vova Galchenko and Chris Hodge doing the three up version as well.
2. 5 club Blind / Scorpion Kick – While a number of jugglers, such as Mike Price and Luke Davies, can drop a club off of a head balance and blind kick the club into a five club cascade, the trick requested here was more difficult and complicated. Here it is. Out of a five club cascade, one club is tossed over the head where it is scorpion kicked back into a cascade, with the other four clubs being juggled (not collected) during the toss, kick, and return. I’ve seen this trick done with 5 rings and have even done it myself with five balls, but I’m unaware of anyone doing it with five clubs.
This was finally accomplished by Kellin Quinn.
3. 1 High 5 Low 6 Club 360 – For this trick, juggle 6 clubs, toss one high, toss the other five low, pirouette, catch the low five, and then catch the high throw back into 6 clubs. No problem!! To see the five club version of this trick, click here to see Benjamin Thompson’s version, here to see Daniel Ledel’s version, here to see Carey Pickford Jr.’s version, here to see Florian Canaval’s version (into 744), and here to see Jack Denger’s version into back crosses.
This trick was finally achieved by Jack Denger. Check it out below and be amazed.
4. Multiplex Pass While Passing 9 Or More Clubs – I couldn’t recall seeing a multiplex pass done while passing more than 8 clubs, so I challenged readers to do so with 9 or more clubs. While no one sent in any new videos, it was pointed out that Peter Kaseman and Stefan Brancel had already posted a video, which you can see by clicking here, of them doing a multiplex pass out of ten clubs back in 2012.
5. Everhart’s Double Arm Roll Through Larger Hoop Trick – William Everhart, the inventor of Hoop Rolling, performed a trick where he balanced a large hoop on his forehead and held smaller hoops in each hand. He then allowed the balanced hoop to roll down his head and back. While this occured, he rolled the two smaller hoops down his arms, across the back, passing through the larger hoop, and up the opposite arms to his hands. You can see this pictured below. Ideally, the large hoop would be caught spinning on the foot or kicked into a juggling pattern with the other hoops, but I’d love to just see the pass through happen.
Callum Baker managed to do this trick, as you can see below.
6. While Juggling, Head A Ball, Blind Kick It, And Return To Heading The Ball – I think that’s fairly self explanatory, but here it is again. Juggle 3 or more clubs or rings while heading a ball. While continuing to juggle, bounce the ball back to a blind kick and catch the ball back into a controlled head bounce.
No one accomplished this one.
7. Kathi Gultini’s Couch Balance – For this trick, we were looking for a forehead balance of a couch / sofa while juggling at least three pillows. I highly recommend using an inflatable couch for this one.
No one submitted any videos of their versions of this trick.
8. E. C. Kert’s 5 Mixed Object Juggle – This trick will be most impressive to see if someone can do it. As you can see in the photo below, I’m looking for a qualifying juggle to a pool cue, plate, ball, bucket, and bottle (or club). It doesn’t have to be done in a cascade. In fact, I might recommend trying to do the cue stick and bucket in one hand and the plate, ball, and bottle in the other.
Again, no one tried this trick, to the best of my knowledge.
9. Billy Tirko’s Two Legged Ring Spin Combination Trick – Some very talented jugglers have learned to do combination tricks that include spinning two rings on one leg. Francis Brunn’s famous Brunn Finish, which you can see by clicking here, is a great example of this. Bob Bramson spun two small hoops on his legs while both were planted firmly on the ground.
However, Vaudeville juggler Billy Tirko managed to combine these two types of leg spins in a way I’ve never seen done. Check out the two photos below.
In both photos, Billy appears to be juggling 4 rings while balancing balls on a mouth stick and head pedestal and, most importantly, spinning one ring on the leg he is standing on and two rings on the other leg. I said that I’d be impressed if someone can just learn to juggle while spinning one ring or hoop on the standing leg and one on an upraised leg. What I got was three young jugglers each spinning a hoop on the standing leg, one on a raised leg, toss juggling three hoops, and balancing one hoop on the head. They are Vlad Naraev, Veronka Histova, and Amelie Bilyk.
10. Frank LeDent’s 9 Plate Flash – Those who attended Albert Lucas’ talk during the 2019 IJA Festival got to see video of Albert qualifying 8 plates with 16 catches. However, I have discovered that Frank Ledent performed a 9 plate flash back in 1908. That is the goal for this challenge. Albert Lucas and Enrico Rastelli each used a holster to hold 2 plates when they did 8, but Scott Sorensen has managed to flash 8 plates from his hands. Scott, you might need a holster for this one!
No videos submitted.
11. 3 Spinning Ball Cascade – Spin a ball on each hand and have someone spin a third ball and toss it into the pattern. Cascade the three balls by catching them still spinning on your fingers. Qualify this trick and meet the challenge.
No videos submitted.
12. Chinko’s 3 Clubs and Stool Juggle – Chinko (1880-1943) would sit on a stool and juggle three clubs. Then he would flash two clubs high while standing up and grab the stool from underneath him, adding it to the pattern. Given the lightness of modern clubs and plastic stools, this should be much easier for us to learn than it was for Chinko.
Louis Cason of South Africa was the first to successfully film this trick, which you can see below.
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Dream Tricks Challenge # 6
1. Head rolls with a raw egg – Joe Taylor was known for doing head rolls with a raw egg in the 1940s and 1950s.
Juggling Joe Taylor
Eddy Bacon was able to not only accomplish this trick, but demonstrate a number of variations of it. Check out his work below.
Raw egg head rolls were also done by Kai Kuutamo, as you can see below.
2. Knife, Fork, Apple Trick – A photo of Salerno shows him balancing a fork (with an impaled apple on its tines) on a knife held in his mouth. I’m not sure exactly what he did with these, but here’s my theory and the trick I’m looking for. Balance a large fork on a mouth stick of some sort. Toss an apple up and catch it on the tines of the fork.
Salerno
No videos submitted.
3. Tangled Strings Duo Diabolo Routine – One of the earliest jugglers to do a full act with diabolo was Ollie Young, whom you can read about by clicking here. Eventually Ollie formed an act with his wife, April. They created a diabolo act where the strings crossed, which allowed them to do a variety of tricks. The following photo clarifies the arrangement, but I’d be interested in seeing a brief video of some tricks done by a duo with two pairs of hand sticks where the strings are looped around each other and one diabolo is shared.
Ollie Young and April
No videos were submitted.
4. Juggle six clubs by doing two in one hand and four in the other – The first person to juggle six clubs was Pat McBann (Pat McGreevey). He juggled four in one hand and two in the other. I’d love to see someone do this, especially for more than a flash.
Pat McBann
No one sent in any attempts at this trick.
5. Bounce juggling tennis balls against a wall using tennis rackets – Eric Philmore performed this trick with up to 6 balls. For the challenge, I asked for four balls using two tennis rackets.
Eric Philmore
No one accomplished this challenge.
6. Passing four balls between two hands and a mouth stick – The Balladinis (Fritz and Willi) were best-known as the inventors of juggling small balls with their mouths, but they also performed a trick where one brother juggled medium sized balls with his hands and the other brother used a mouth stick, together keeping four of the balls going. Find a friend and see if you can do the same.
The Balladinis
No one sent in any videos.
7. Five clubs in one hand multiplex start – I’ve seen several jugglers use two hands to throw all five clubs up into a juggle, but I’ve never seen anyone do it with only one hand. I’m sure there are some jugglers out there who could accomplish this.
It turned out that Sebastien Valade had already accomplished this. You can see it at 1:21 in the following video.
8. Kick up seven rings into a cascade – Gregory Popovich created the routine of setting seven balls in a row and kicking each one up until he was finally juggling all seven balls. I’d like to see someone do this with seven rings. Obviously, placing a beanbag under each ring would make getting the rings onto the foot a ton easier, or you could have each ring start perpendicular to the floor using two several beanbags per ring or blocks of wood with slits in them.
No one tried this challenge.
9. Five-club neck catch and flip back into a cascade – This trick is pretty easy with balls, but have you ever tried to do a neck catch with clubs? The challenge was to juggle five clubs, collect them, catching the last one in a neck catch, then then toss the neck one back up with the head, going straight back into a cascade.
This trick was accomplished by Stefan Brancel in 8 foot ceilings!
10. Juggle two balls, two rings, and two clubs – Qualify those six objects. I thought that someone had probably done this, but I couldn’t recall seeing it.
The first person to send me video was Julius Preu.
This was followed shortly by his fellow Jonglissimo member Luca Pferdmenges doing the trick.
So, many of the challenges were met, but many remain out of reach. Another batch of dream tricks will be coming in the near future. Congrats to all those who were up the challenges.
David Cain
David Cain is a professional juggler, juggling historian, and the owner of the world's only juggling museum, the Museum of Juggling History. He is a Guinness world record holder and 16 time IJA gold medalist. In addition to his juggling pursuits, David is a successful composer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and singer as well as the author of twenty-six books. He and his children live in Middletown, OH (USA).