He had the magic touch at a young age

When he was 14, Kevin Nicholas of Oceanside walked into a Rockville Centre restaurant, told them he was a magician and asked if he could perform for the customers.

"It was my first paying job," Nicholas, now 22, said.

Nicholas, sometimes referred to as "the Justin Beiber of magic," because of his youth, now performs for business groups, charities, hotel openings and recently, at Ivanka Trump's jewelry party in Manhattan. And yes, Nicholas said, magicians can make money even in these days when the only magic people seem to believe in is technology.

Nicholas, in the grand old tradition of magicians, does card tricks, mind-reading and what he calls "pure sleight-of-hand tricks."

Nicholas performed at the opening a few months ago of the Allegria Hotel & Spa in Long Beach and also at a party for the New York Rangers hockey team.

The magician earns between $800 and $3,000 per performance, the higher amount if he is the whole show. Magicians seem to be part of another, more gentle, era, not of the 21st century.

Nicholas agrees. "Before television, magicians were the rock stars of their era."

And, he said, his career goal was never to be a nine-to-fiver. "I always wanted to entertain," he said. "I always wanted to make people smile."