Doors to last dance. One team, one contract.
Most companies build an evening out of four vendors and hope the handoffs work. Mike Oulton and I run the whole night as one act — hosting, magic, hosted games, karaoke and the dance floor. We've been working the same rooms together since 2017.
Plan my nightTrusted by
- McCarthy Tétrault
- Teck Resources
- TELUS
- HSBC
- lululemon
- Amazon
- Chanel
- Nintendo
- Mazda
- Huawei
- A&W
- FortisBC
- JW Marriott Parq Vancouver
- Boston Pizza
- Vancouver Aquarium
- Xenon Pharmaceuticals
- Beedie
- Mosaic Homes
- Metrie
- Scanline VFX
- NETCO
- CanSure
- HollisWealth
- Keystone Environmental
- ALS Global
- BC Dairy
- CPHR BC & Yukon
- Blenz Coffee
- Tacofino
150+ five-star Google reviews. PCAM 2026 Gold Medal winner, Comedy Magic.
Four vendors, or two people who have done this together for years
Kel Modern Magic is close-up and stage magic — twenty-five years of it, three PCAM golds in 2026, and a client list that runs from McCarthy Tétrault to RBC to Teck Resources. Mike Oulton runs Vancouver MC: sixteen years of hosting, game shows and crowd work for corporate Canada.
Separately we are two good vendors. Together we are Party Pros, and the difference is that neither of us is waiting for the other to finish. One of us is always holding the room. Two minutes of what that looks like, from McDonald's Canada at the Hilton:
One contract, one phone call
An MC from one company, a magician from another, a DJ from a third, a photo booth from a fourth. Four contracts, four invoices, four people with four different ideas of what the night should feel like. This is one number, one run sheet and one person you call when the venue moves your dinner service by forty minutes.
Nobody has to win the room twice
When the host and the entertainment are the same team, attention never resets. The people your guests warmed up to during cocktails are the people running the awards, the games and the last hour. That continuity is the product.
The gaps are the job
Nothing kills a room like the ninety seconds while AV resets or the award recipient is found. That is where an evening actually lives or dies, and it is the part nobody sells you. It is most of what we do.
The philosophy is the host, not the gear
Anyone can rent a cold spark machine. What you are buying is two people who have read a few hundred rooms and know when to push and when to get off the microphone. The equipment is punctuation.
How the evening actually runs
Cocktail hour
The coldest room of the night. Close-up magic in guests' hands, table to table, so strangers have something to talk about before they sit down.
The open
Mike takes the microphone and sets the tone in the first two minutes. Comedy, crowd work, and a room that arrives warm instead of stiff.
Calling the buffet
Fifteen of the most tedious minutes at any banquet, usually spent reading table numbers off a card. We turn it into a game the whole room plays, and the line moves the same speed.
Dinner, speeches, awards
Names pronounced right, VIPs on and off cleanly, prizes handed out with energy instead of a spreadsheet. Five-minute interactions between segments so the program never sags.
The stage show
Forty-five to sixty minutes after the meal, never during it. Sleight of hand, mind reading and volunteers who get made into the stars of the show rather than the punchline.
Games, karaoke, dance floor
Speed Feud, buzzer battles table against table, and forty-odd rapid-fire rounds we pick from live depending on the room. Then hosted karaoke — we curate the singalongs, so the last hour lifts instead of emptying.
Two nights we ran end to end
Endeavour Silver
Christmas party at the Hyatt Regency Vancouver. Elimination games, close-up through cocktails, a book test after dinner, and audience voting on the prizes so the room stayed in it all night.
McDonald's Canada
Two consecutive years at the Hilton. Close-up on arrival, hosting through dinner and the formalities, the stage show, then Speed Feud, buzzer games, DJ and the karaoke jukebox to close.
$8,000 for the evening
Booked separately, we are $5,000 each. Booked as one team, the whole evening is $8,000 — and that is not a discount for the sake of one. Two performers working off a shared run sheet do things in an evening that two separately-booked vendors spend the night negotiating around each other.
That covers the full night: close-up magic through cocktails and dinner, MC hosting from the welcome to the last announcement, the after-dinner stage show, the hosted game show block, karaoke, and a DJ we bring and direct. Prices are in Canadian dollars, plus GST. Travel across Greater Vancouver is built into the number, never added as a line item.
November and December fill first, usually six to nine months out. If you are holding a December Friday or Saturday, the entertainment is worth locking the same week you sign the venue.
“Kelvin managed the evening's agenda with professional precision while simultaneously captivating our VIPs and guests. The night concluded with a truly fantastic magic show that left everyone mesmerized.”
CHECK
YOUR
DATE / Check your date
Tell me about the night.
One team, one number.
Date, venue, headcount, and what the evening has to accomplish. I'll come back with a run of show and one all-in number — not a menu you have to assemble yourself.
You probably don't need a DJ. You need a host.
Almost every brief we get asks for a DJ, and a DJ is included — we source a good local one and direct them on the night, so the music lands where the program needs it. But it is the least valuable thing in the package, and it is worth being honest about that.
A DJ plays music. What most companies are actually asking for when they say "we need a DJ" is someone to hold the room: to call the buffet, keep the awards moving, read when the energy is dropping and do something about it before anyone notices. That is a host's job. Hire the host, and the music sorts itself out.
Think about where an evening actually goes wrong. It is never the playlist. It is the twenty minutes after dinner when the plates are cleared and nobody has told anyone what happens next, so half the room checks their phones and the other half decides to leave early. It is the award winner who is in the washroom when their name is called. It is the prize draw that turns into a spreadsheet being read aloud. A DJ cannot fix any of that, because a DJ is behind a table watching the room the same way your guests are.
Someone running the entire room is a different job. It means one person is tracking the kitchen, the AV tech, the executive who wants to add a thank-you, and the energy in the back corner where the table has gone quiet, and adjusting the night in real time so none of it shows. It is why we sell the evening rather than the hours: the value is not in how long we are there, it is in the fact that from the moment doors open to the last song, nobody in your organisation has to wonder who is in charge of what happens next.
The toys, if the night calls for them
None of these sell an evening on their own, and none of them are the reason to book us. They are punctuation on moments that are already working.
Roaming selfie booth
A selfie booth during the reception that detaches and roams the dance floor later in the night. Every photo goes out by QR code afterwards, so your team has the gallery on Monday.
T-shirt bazooka
If you are giving away branded shirts as prizes, they can be fired into the room instead of handed across a table.
Club cannon
CO2 foam cannon for the dance floor, once the night is genuinely going.
Cold sparks
Indoor-safe spark fountains for an entrance, an award reveal or the first dance.
Related pages
- Kel on his own, hosting and performing the same night
- Corporate magic, close-up and stage shows in Vancouver
- Holiday and Christmas party entertainment
- What entertainment actually costs in Vancouver
- Corporate events in Surrey and the Fraser Valley
- Corporate events in Burnaby and the Tri-Cities
- The people behind a Kel Modern Magic booking
Straight answers
Because you are booking one evening, not two performances. Booked separately we are $5,000 each and you get two acts that have to be coordinated around one another. Booked together we share a run sheet, split the room and cover the whole night, and the price reflects the team rather than the sum of two calendars.
Two of us. The whole night.