It is very common for our level of playing on stage to be lower than what we reach in the rehearsal room. Many musicians I know, myself included, struggle with this. So-called stage fright is associated with the anxiety of making a fool of yourself in public, and it undermines self-esteem and confidence.
Who hasn’t felt fear at some point in their life? Before an exam, in the face of an illness, of failure..., a feeling of awe, anguish, alarm takes hold of us and we can do nothing to avoid it. But what is fear? It is a way human beings experience danger, and it acts as a defense mechanism tied to the survival instinct which, in the face of dangers, makes us react immediately and, in the face of threats, lets us stay awake, vigilant, and focused.
Everyone who has to address an audience, especially performers (actors, musicians, and so on), experiences what is called stage fright. Technically it is known as performance anxiety, and it is a state of anxiety in which our body suffers typical symptoms: worry, fear, increased muscle tension, insomnia, altered breathing, and sometimes even physical distress.
The great majority of the musicians I know, myself among them, suffer from this state to a greater or lesser degree before a concert for which we are responsible. It usually helps to know that great musicians who have been in the profession for years and have a great deal of experience still feel this stage fright and yet it doesn’t affect their performance very much; they have learned to play at a higher-than-normal level of arousal. It is clear that performing is a skill like any other, and it has to be learned. Denying this makes us incomplete musicians. The ability to perform is one thing and the ability to play the instrument is another; one always lags behind the other.
The downside is that we almost never play as well on stage as in the rehearsal room. The upside is that as our ability to play in the rehearsal room increases, our ability to perform on stage increases proportionally. We shouldn’t expect every performance to be the best. It is true that on each occasion we have to make an effort, though not so much to achieve perfection as to achieve consistency.
The reasons that produce this state are varied and sometimes hard to observe: the pressure for perfection, the importance we give to other people’s criticism and, very often, the little experience many musicians have of playing in public can be, among other circumstances, what often makes musicians respond inadequately to a concert, an exam, or an audition. According to L. Orozco and J. Solé in their book Tecnopatías del músico, which studies this subject in detail, “... the onset of anxiety and its significance are conditioned by a multitude of factors, such as the type of performance, the setting, and the level of prominence. For example, a classical solo performer may feel the responsibility more than a member of a band.”
We often try to alleviate these symptoms with drugs, superstitions, and so on, which are most of the time totally ineffective. The right path is the one that faces the situation with a series of guidelines that have to be developed progressively through practice. These are based on common sense, experience, and knowledge of human behavior. Some guidelines will work better for some musicians than others. Everyone should experiment and reach their own conclusions.
The Different Levels of Anxiety
No single cause can explain why a panic attack occurs, although it has been shown that people with a character prone to anxiety and tension are more susceptible to suffering from it. Anxiety attacks are related to the sensation of fear: an individual with an anxious personality who anticipates unpleasant situations will maintain the sensation of fear.
There are different degrees of anxiety: for some it means butterflies in the stomach that disappear when the first note sounds. For others, the sweating and trembling increase as the performance goes on. Obviously, there is a scale between the two extremes, and suffering a higher or lower degree depends on quite a few things: personality, learning, the situation, and so on. In any case, the best approach is not to eliminate these sensations completely but to minimize them and bring them down to the desirable minimum, so that they don’t spoil our work but can even enhance it.
If, before the concert, our nerves are so intense that we feel terror rather than fear about going on stage, it will be impossible to concentrate on the music we have to play; we will sweat and have defeatist thoughts about our imminent performance, in a state of very high anxiety. This anxiety is negative and uncontrollable and increases as the concert goes on, making us go through such a bad time that the mere idea of doing it again produces a very unpleasant feeling of distress.
On the other hand, if before the concert we feel nervous and uneasy but, in spite of that, we go on stage, we will communicate with the audience and be able to concentrate on the music, hopeful that everything will turn out fine in the end, our anxiety will be the normal kind, manageable, and may even be good. A certain degree of tension is always positive and beneficial, since our mind goes on alert, our reflexes are activated, and our senses sharpen. It is what is called “rising to the occasion in front of the audience,” and thanks to this extra degree of tension we may be able to improve our performance with small spontaneous details during the performance itself.
How to Avoid Excess Anxiety
1.- The first and most important thing is to work on the pieces we are going to play until we are very sure of them and feel comfortable playing them. If that isn’t the case, everything we do to control stress will be useless. We have to devote ourselves to enjoying ourselves and focus on the music.
2.- It is excellent to do breathing exercises and mental and bodily relaxation exercises regularly, and especially before the gig. To control the nervous system it is important for breathing to be slow and for oxygen to reach the diaphragm. Getting back to your normal breathing rate helps bring down the other symptoms. It is worth remembering that as soon as the first symptoms appear, it is essential to distract the mind with something that draws attention away from the signals you are experiencing.
3.- You have to keep your concentration on the technical issues to overcome in each piece, but above all focus on the musical result you want to convey. We need to remember that we have to be artists, not athletes, and that technique should only be a means to a musical end. Rehearsing very often, so that everything is anticipated and under control, is highly recommended.
4.- Don’t practice on the day of the concert. At most, play through the repertoire or part of it calmly and serenely. We need not to arrive tired at the time of the concert, since we have to be fresh and clear-headed. It is very important that we take plenty of time to avoid any kind of stress and try to feel in an optimal state. This will undoubtedly be the best way to perform and give our best.
5.- Doing a good soundcheck at the venue to try out and get used to the room’s acoustics and to all the aspects that, although secondary, are essential to avoid surprises and help us adapt to the place in question, takes away a lot of fears and relaxes us psychologically.
6.- Another recommended technique is to learn to accept our own fears, which means starting to tolerate them and making the body not react so intensely to stimuli associated with them. Learning to stay in the present is a very effective weapon against panic attacks, since both anxiety and fears are products of anticipating unpleasant future events. For that reason, focusing attention on the here and now helps eliminate any future worrying thoughts. It is important to identify the harmful, irrational thoughts that may assault us and replace them with healthy, logical ones. Some examples of irrational thoughts that arise from nerves and have no foundation at all might be: “I’m going to make a mistake any moment now,” “this is dreadful!”, “I’m weak!”, “my memory is going to fail me,” “it’s going to be a f... disaster because of the nerves,” “don’t make mistakes, nothing else matters”...
However, if we are able to replace these thoughts with positive and reasonable ideas, we can surely reach an optimistic and promising state of mind. For example: “I have to focus on the music, the sound, and the expression, since that is the only thing that matters,” “nobody likes making mistakes, but sometimes it’s unavoidable since we’re not perfect,” “mistakes don’t matter; what matters is connecting with the audience,”
“I’ve worked hard and I have the songs down,” “I want to enjoy myself and I’M GOING TO ENJOY IT.”
7.- We should look at the audience as friends, not enemies. All they want is to hear music and for us to do well. Consequently, they support our efforts and don’t try to undermine them. People who come to hear nothing but our mistakes deserve pity, since they are missing the music completely.
8.- At the moment of the concert, there is no need to worry about the technical level, complex passages, or possible mistakes. When the concert arrives, it is time to play, not to work, so what really matters is that we make music and feel it. And if we make a mistake, we have to tell ourselves that it’s no big deal. The greats make them live, too. The best thing is to downplay it mentally and never show our displeasure in front of the audience. Instead, we should cover it up physically and musically as best we can, because if we don’t make a big deal of it, the audience surely won’t either. On the other hand, if the mistake affects us to the point that we consider it to have ruined our performance (which is never true), it will surely end up affecting us, making the mistake more noticeable and lowering the quality of our playing. LET’S TRUST IN OUR WORK AND ENJOY MAKING MUSIC.
9.- When everything is over and we are alone with ourselves is when we should honestly evaluate the performance and work on the problems we discovered under the stress of performing. Above all, let’s not punish ourselves for what we have done. The true perspective on a performance lies not in what we hope to do in the future, but in how we did in the past. Let’s focus on what we have achieved and on what we can accomplish at the next performance.