3 practical strategies to help with performance anxiety
Performance anxiety is REAL. It’s something that every musician - even seasoned and professional musicians - have to deal with. When we have no way of calming and controlling our anxiety, our nerves cause us to perform at a level lower than we expect and are happy with: we make mistakes, we can’t think straight, our memory goes out the window. When we disappoint ourselves, it can really impact our confidence and enjoyment of music. So, learning to understand and cope with performance anxiety is extremely important. In this post, we share 3 practical strategies to help you manage your performance anxiety.
First of all, why do we even get anxious about performing?
At the core of it, the reason we all get nervous when performing is we are scared of criticism and of disappointing others - scared of being judged and seen as “not good enough”. If we didn’t care what people thought of us, we wouldn’t get so nervous!
In music, there is an additional pressure put upon us - that of performing “perfectly”. When we listen to our favourite artists on the radio, or even musicians performing live, we rarely see them fail. And this makes us think we are not allowed to get anything wrong either.
These two things put together means it’s really quite unsurprising that we get so nervous when we have to perform in front of others.
So what is to be done about it?
Develop a ritual/routine for starting a piece
Try to develop some kind of routine between walking to your instrument and starting to play your piece. Use this short time to take deep breaths, to remind yourself of the piece, to check you are comfortable, and perhaps to run some position affirmations in your mind (see below on mindset).
For me, once I am sitting at my harp, I always check (and even double check): that my music stand is placed exactly how I want it, that my chair is comfortably placed, that my pedals are in the right setting, that all my page corners are turned. Once I have gone through all these checks, I put the harp on my shoulder, look at my music for a few seconds, I listen to it in my mind, and then place my hands on the strings. As you can see, there is a whole process to starting my piece. I don’t just sit and start.
Shift your mindset
If you notice your thoughts spiralling down, take a breath and decide to put these thoughts aside. You might want to think these thoughts instead:
“Let me play the most beautiful music I can …”
“People will love the sound of my music.”
“I release all expectations I have of my performance.”
“I am so lucky to share this song.”
“Let me share this music to the best of my ability.”
“It’s not a huge deal if I get something wrong.”
Practice performing as often as you can
As well as the above two strategies, the best way to really get better at performing is by doing it! Look for performing opportunities that are low in pressure, especially if you are the type of person to get extremely nervous. Busking is a great way to play music in front of people without having everybody staring at you. Play for your friends or family when you get the chance. Join a band or orchestra. Eventually, performing by yourself won’t feel as frightening of a thing as before!
