This past month, I’ve been practising the sleight-of-hand techniques that form the basis of the Erdnase System of Blind Riffles and Cuts (pages 33 to 44 in the original edition of The Expert at the Card Table). This section of the book contains two blind riffle shuffles and four blind cuts.
When performing magic, I usually favour an overhand or Hindu-style shuffle because I typically perform standing. For this reason, I’ve never spent a long time practising tabled riffle shuffles and running cuts. However, I’d like to improve in this area because I firmly believe that the best, most elegant card magic happens when the performer is seated at a table.
I also have plans to develop a parlour show in the style of Viennese magician Johann Nepomuk Hofzinser. In his show, called Eine Stunde der Täuschung (which translates to “An Hour of Deception” in English), Hofzinser presented small, close-up illusions to a handful of people at a time in the apartment he shared with his wife, Wilhemine. In this way, he entertained an elite audience of guests three or four times a week and became famous, particularly for his novel card magic. I’m hoping to take a leaf out of Steve Cohen’s book, whose Chamber Magic show is also heavily influenced by the work of Hofzinser, and perform in a private suite at a local hotel. For me, at least, this more intimate environment is the perfect setting for close-up card magic and enables the performance of card tricks, such as Dai Vernon’s “Triumph”, that require a table.
Riffle I and II
In this part of the book, Erdnase begins by describing two blind shuffles:
Riffle I retains the cards on the top of the pack while adding another card to the original top stock (this card can be removed by using Cut I, which is explained a few pages later). Interestingly, Erdnase suggests blind shuffles retaining top stock are less popular with gamblers than those protecting the bottom stock. When performing magic, the opposite is true. Far more tricks require a secret arrangement to be on the top of the pack rather than the bottom. But both blind shuffles are still very useful to the modern conjurer when performing tricks that rely on pre-arrangement.
In brief, both of these blind shuffles mix only part of the pack. Your thumbs carefully control the way the cards interlace during the riffle. In the first shuffle, the left-hand cards are allowed to fall more quickly, which leaves the original top stock in place. The additional cover card is needed to conceal the fact that only the lower portion of the pack has been fairly shuffled. The second technique involves releasing the left-hand cards first, in a block, and only mixing the top portion of the pack. Thus, the bottom stock is retained.
With the first shuffle, paying particular attention to your hand positioning is essential. Otherwise, the incomplete nature of the riffle might be noticed. The shuffle looks the same as a genuine riffle shuffle. However, it doesn’t sound the same due to the uneven way your thumbs release the cards. This issue can be minimised with sufficient practice.
The second shuffle, however, is more forgiving, enabling you to adopt a more “open” handling in which more cards are visible during the process. And, of course, both top and bottom stock can be retained simultaneously by allowing the first few cards to fall from your left thumb and then the last few cards to drop from your right. This deception is very difficult to detect if you only need to retain a handful of cards. You can also combine Riffle I and II to maintain top and bottom stock while adding an extra card to the top stock.
Blind Cuts I to IV
After providing a detailed explanation of these two blind riffle shuffles, Erdnase then describes four blind cuts to use in conjunction with them:
The first cut is a tabled slip cut (I usually perform this kind of cut in the hands). While Erdnase describes that it is used to retain bottom stock, you can also use it to retain top stock as well. All the action accomplishes is to displace the top card somewhere in the middle of the pack. Therefore, you can keep the top and bottom stock in place, as follows: start by performing Riffle II, but finish the shuffle by completing Riffle I, adding one card to the top stock. Finally, perform Cut I to lose the indifferent card on top.
Cut II is a bold bluff that retains the pack's entire order. This cut is surprisingly effective when done nonchalantly without looking at your hands. The move's deceptiveness depends on the motion of the packets and the sound they make. I like to produce a loud slapping noise when completing the cut.
Cuts III and IV rely on the break and use an up-the-ladder stripping action. As a result, they’re a little more challenging to learn. Still, when performed as described by Erdnase, these two cuts are very fooling because they’re reminiscent of the genuine running cuts that many professional card players are fond of using. Erdnase believed these were two of the best false cuts and considered them among the “most subtle and undetectable manoeuvres in card handling”—I agree. The angles are also excellent; you must be seated directly behind the operator to see the secret breaks in the pack.
Shuffle-Cut Combination
The final item in this section is a shuffle-cut combination that illustrates how the riffles and cuts work in harmony to create the illusion that the cards have been thoroughly mixed: V. To Retain Bottom Stock (Riffle II and Cut IV).
Where to Begin?
There’s a lot to learn in this section of the book. If you have no prior experience, I suggest starting with Riffle II and Cut II because they’re the easiest to learn. Also, the technique used in Riffle II is the same action you perform when completing a genuine riffle shuffle. Erdnase points out that very few card players can perform a neat riffle shuffle (the same holds true of many magicians, too):
Just here we are reminded that comparatively few card players can make an ordinary riffle with any degree of grace or smoothness, and especially few understand how to square up properly.
It is best to first forget about retaining the top or bottom stock and concentrate on acquiring the “grace” and “smoothness” that the author mentions are so often lacking. Erdnase also notes that the position illustrated in Fig. 8 is the correct handling for an ordinary riffle shuffle.
A critical point that Erdnase doesn’t mention is the V-shape formed by the two packets (from the performer’s point of view). This greatly facilitates the riffle and makes it easier to interlace the cards.
Once you can perform a well-executed ordinary riffle shuffle, you can move on to Riffle II (to retain bottom stock) and Riffle I (to maintain top stock). You can then attempt to learn the blind cuts that work with the blind riffles to form Erdnase’s comprehensive system of false shuffling and cutting. Good luck!