A Night On The Town With Justin Tranz
Last week I had the most amazing opportunity, to spend some time in the company of (in my opinion) the best stage hypnotists currently working - Justin Tranz.
Justin Tranz has been performing for a number of years across many countries with many thousands of shows under his belt and many more thousands of subjects that he has hypnotised. He also headlined a venue in Las Vegas for almost 10 years.
Justin was spending some time in the UK pitching some show ideas to television companies whilst also conducting a couple of training courses both here in London and in Liverpool. As it happens, Justin had a bit of free time between them and flying back to perform shows in Las Vegas.
I was gutted that I hadn't been able to book myself onto his 3 day training course in London because, I'd heard really great things about the tips and tricks that he shares with his students on them, so when I saw his post I jumped at the opportunity to spend some time in his company.
We met in Chancery Lane, London and went for Sushi at a local restaurant. It was my first experience of sushi and I really enjoyed it, I never thought that would be an experience that I'd be having. Over dinner we chatted about hypnosis and how Justin came to be interested in it himself and to have the chance to draw on his experience of over 40 years in the business!!
Justin asked what sort of venues I'm performing in and where I wanted to be, when I explained that some of the places were 'difficult' rooms or venues in that there are lot of distractions or that the night isn't always set up to make a hypnosis show work well. Justin said; 'You're blessed' with those places because that's where you're going to learn the most.
We'd then arranged to attend a magic lecture hosted by American magician Ray Kosby at the world famous international magic lecture. A group of about 40 magicians and enthusiasts above an Italian restaurant on Clerkenwell Road. The lecture was really informative but, a lot of the techniques were too quick for me to pick up. It was nice to see how Ray presented different effects and it was also good catching up with some other magicians I have the pleasure of knowing including Tony Nicolades, Girio and Eric.
It was after the lecture that things got really interesting and I got to see Justin work live performing some street hypnosis. Justin's approach was unlike any I've previously seen and I really liked how he built compliance with the volunteer and how he changed the angles to make what, could have been a difficult subject someone who he was able to work with. This was clearly testament to his many years experience within this field.
Justin talked me through the process and his approach when working with people and I picked up some valuable information from that night that I'll be putting into my street and stage performances going forward.
One of the most useful phrases that I picked up was Dare to Fail. Justin believes that you should always accept a challenge and never back down. If someone tells you they can't be hypnotised then you should always do your best to hypnotise them. His philosophy is that you learn the most from the challenges, the 'difficult' rooms so you should never shy away from them because they are the places where you'll really learn your craft and ultimately, they're the places that will make you a better performer.
Going forward, I'll be daring to fail more and enjoying the process that goes along with that and the experiences that open up to me. A valuable lesson I also learnt was that you should take the opportunities that are presented to you because you never know where they're going to lead you.
I've heard that Justin may stop providing training towards the end of the year however, I'm really hoping that he returns to the UK before he does as I'll be first in line for a place on that course :)
Jason Simmons is a Stage Hypnotist, mentalist and magician. Jason is also the author of the forthcoming books: Tranceformation-A mindset for change & The Hypnosis Hand Book