You’ve heard of stupid people tricks? This man studies, collects and teaches them

At the Oly Old Time Festival, kicking off Thursday, people go not just to listen to music, but also to play it and to learn to play it better.

And this year — whether you’re musical or not — you can go to learn new tricks, thanks to Sam Bartlett, the guitarist for featured band The Humdingers.

Bartlett is a stuntologist — a person who’s made a science out of collecting, learning and documenting stunts. In fact, he might be the world’s only stuntologist.

Stunts, as Bartlett defines them, are silly and even dumb tricks that pretty much anyone can do, although some do require a fair amount of dexterity or flexibility.

“This is a workshop for anybody,” Bartlett, of Bloomington, Indiana, told The Olympian. “Stuntology is not magic, because I’m going to show people how to do everything I do. Nobody gets left out. That’s why it’s better than magic.”

That focus on shared knowledge is one of the things that stunts — such as writing your name in the air with your butt, flipping a fork into a cup and temporarily stopping your pulse to startle a medical professional — have in common with playing old-time music.

“These are things that people are passing on one to another,” said festival organizer Emily Teachout. “It fits the old-time model of learning and trading skills.”

Also like old-time music, stuntology is about making your own fun.

“It’s basically how to entertain yourself or how to entertain kids with whatever you have on hand,” said Bartlett, who will teach a free stuntology workshop Saturday and will play with The Humdingers at both Friday’s concert and Saturday’s square dance.

He’s spent several decades collecting stunts and estimates that he knows about 1,000. He’s made illustrations of how to perform about 500 of those and published four books on the subject. (He’ll have two of them with him at the festival, for those who want more.)

His study of stunts — learned in person because, he pointed out, “it was before YouTube” — was so thorough as to be virtually exhaustive.

“Literally, no one could ever tell me a stunt that I hadn’t seen before,” he said.

He grew up in Vermonth, and began learning stunts at home. “My parents were kind of practical jokers,” he said. “Their entertainment was hilarious, ridiculous, geeky humor. My dad would go around balancing things or doing tricks with ping pong balls.”

His studies really took off in college — though not during classes.

“I had a lot of tricks that I could do, and so I attracted other people who could do tricks,” he said. “I formed a group with some friends of mine. We called it the Burlington Mutual Amusement Society, and we would entertain ourselves with whatever was in the room.

“You couldn’t bring anything,” he added. “If there was a Scrabble game in the room, you couldn’t play Scrabble. You had to invent new rules.”

While he and his friends were always inventing new pastimes, most stunts are the kinds of things grandparents teach their grandchildren, he said.

Ironically, though, he does credit a television show — and an often-ridiculed television show at that — for helping to inspire his childhood fascination with silly tricks.

“I used to watch ‘Heehaw’ when I was little,” he said. “It was basically the worst television show that’s ever been invented, but on ‘Heehaw,’ there were people who were doing some of the stunts that I had collected.

“ ‘Heehaw’ really got inside my head.”

Stuntology

• What: This year’s Oly Old Time Festival includes a workshop/demo that could appeal to anyone. Presented by musician/artist/stuntologist Sam Bartlett, it’s about how to do such old-fashioned stunts as straw popping or, if you’re limber, tying your head in a knot (or at least making it look like you did).
• When: 1-2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 15
• Where: South Bay Grange, 3918 Sleater Kinney Road NE, Olympia
• More information: stuntology.com
• See it: Watch Bartlett demonstrate such feats as straw popping and tying his head in a knot at stuntology.com/videos/.

Oly Old Time Festival

• What: The 12th annual weekend of concerts, dances, jams and workshops celebrates and spreads the word about the joys of old-time music — and old-fashioned stunts.
• When: Through Sunday, Feb. 16
• Where: South Bay Grange, 3918 Sleater Kinney Road NE, Olympia, and Arbutus Folk School, 600 Fourth Ave. E, Olympia
• Tickets: $5 for Thursday night’s kickoff dance, $20 each for Friday night’s concert and Saturday night’s dance; free for ages 12 and younger; free for workshops and Sunday’s cabaret
• More information: 360-350-0187, olyoldtime.org

Schedule

Thursday

• 7-10 p.m. Kickoff dance with Piney Gals & Pals

Friday

• 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Workshops
• 5-7 p.m. Lounge acts: Briar (featuring Joe Seamon) and The Sassafras Sisters
• 7-10 p.m. Concert with Ella Korth, Evie Ladin & Keith Terry and Brad Leftwich & The Humdingers
• 10 p.m.-midnight. Square dance with Atlas Stringboard

Saturday

• Noon-1 p.m. Kid Jam
• Noon-5 p.m. Workshops
• 2-3 p.m. Community discussion about making old-time music more inclusive
• 2-3 p.m. All-ages dance with River, Sage & Friends
• 5-7 p.m. Lounge acts: Brograss and Yodelady
• 7-10 p.m. Square dance with The Humdingers
• 10 p.m.-midnight. Cajun dance with Les Coeurs Criminels

Sunday

• 1-3 p.m. Cabaret, with all invited to perform