“In my pocket, I have an invisible deck of cards,” says Satvik Balakrishnan to several teenagers enjoying a sunny day in the park. Balakrishnan asks one to pick a card, and the participant shows off an imaginary seven of spades.
From his pocket, the magician reveals a real deck, fanning them out to reveal one card face down — the seven of spades. The crowd goes wild.
That trick is a go-to for Balakrishnan, better known by his stage name Satvik the Magician. In just a few years of performing professionally, 17-year-old Satvik has made a name for himself across the Bay Area. The teen has booked more than 50 gigs, performing at birthday parties, a restaurant and even a wedding.
He’s taken his tricks to the small screen, too. Satvik’s TikTok page — @satvikmagic — where he shares short tricks like the invisible card gag, boasts more than 1 million likes.
Satvik fell for magic when he was just 8 years old, but he started taking his magic more seriously at the beginning of the pandemic. At a Zoom meeting of international magicians, Satvik connected with Palo Alto-based magician Robert Strong, who had been looking for a young magician to mentor.
“He was just so excited about it that it was very easy to want to make time for him,” Strong said. “Of all the people I’ve mentored over the years, I think his passion and potential far surpasses everybody else I’ve ever worked with.”
Last year, Strong suggested Satvik attend the week-long Tennan’s Magic Camp on the idyllic Bryn Mawr College campus in Pennsylvania, where more than 100 young magicians attend workshops, lectures and performances. The camp has been raising industry stars since the 1970s, with former campers including David Blaine and Michael Carbonaro.
Camp director Terri Cook said magic is popular as ever among Gen-Z. Magicians often start young, and online platforms like YouTube have made learning magic more accessible to young people around the world.
“They’re trying to find an outlet to put their creativity,” Cook said. “It helps kids come out of their shell.”
Satvik works on his craft with scientific precision, using a process of “testing and reiterating,” he said. He repeats it 50 to 100 times to gain “muscle memory,” before introducing it to the public, careful to note how it performs among his tried and true.
Satvik practices on family members, on the street and even at school for teachers and classmates.
“I think a lot of them find it really cool that I do magic,” Balakrishnan said. “When I share tricks where they can’t figure it out, I think they’re like, ‘Oh yeah, this guy’s legit.’”
This fall, Satvik will be attempting his most daring trick yet — college applications. As one of his most prominent extracurriculars, Satvik’s magic business will certainly be included. Cook said many of her campers discuss magic in their college essays and interviews and go on to use it with clients in their future careers.
“It’s a way to break the ice,” Cook said. “They let their guard down, because they’re entertained.”
Satvik plans to study computer science and business while continuing to perform on the side. He’s put those skills to use in his magic business, designing his own website and business cards, managing bookings and communicating with clients. He invests much of his profits back into the business, buying audio equipment, his website domain and props that include more than 100 decks of cards.
He applied the same business savvy to social media, posting daily magic videos to figure out what worked. Satvik achieved an impressive, sharing eye-catching tricks in snappy, high-energy format.
As a minor, he isn’t able to monetize his social media accounts, but the pages help him gain awareness for his in-person gigs, which range from a regular stint at a Burlingame restaurant to a steady schedule of kids’ birthday parties. Kids are much harder to fool than adults, he said, and they have shorter attention spans. But Satvik seems to be a natural, and he’s honed his kids’ act over the years to make kids feel like “they’re also the star of the show.”
“It’s always, how can I make sure they feel comfortable?” Satvik said. How can I make sure they’re excited? How can I make sure they want to keep seeing magic?”
