Issue No. 2: How To Manage Performance Anxiety
Introduction - You May Ask Yourself: “Well… How Did I Get Here?”
Throughout high school, I was a good saxophonist. Not great, not bad. Pretty decent. I never had the technical skill to sit first chair or make All-State bands but I routinely placed toward the top of the highest wind ensembles in both of the excellent high school programs I attended. I went into my undergraduate degree energized, loving performing, and wanting to flourish.
I attended the University of Southern Mississippi (…To The Top!) where I received a wonderful education and training in music. The professors were supportive, demanding, and allowed me to grow in directions that reflected my interests.
But along the way, a change happened. Sophomore year I began to dread my lessons. Being on stage during ensemble performances didn’t give me cheerful butterflies but rather made my palms clammy. Opening my saxophone case in the practice room made me anxious: “I sounded bad last time and I’m going to sound bad this time. If I practice so much and still suck, why bother?” I began devising any excuse I could to not practice individually. I would play duets with friends to avoid working on my solo repertoire but still feel like I was putting in the time. I would show up to lessons woefully unprepared which, as you would imagine, only made the disappointment in my lack of progress worse.
By senior year, the thought of going on stage with friends in a chamber ensemble made my intestines scream and I would have to use the restroom multiple times before the concert. But solo performance? Unbearable. I would clench my jaw so tightly my embouchure would be exhausted by the five minute mark. My hands would shake to the point that the trembling was noticeable to the audience when I turned the pages of my sheet music.
I do not really remember my senior recital. I know I secretly drank three shots of cheap bourbon in order to even walk out in front of the modest crowd. I suddenly omitted an entire movement during the performance (much to the surprise of my collaborative pianist) because I felt like I was having a panic attack and simply wanted the experience over and done with. I went to bed that night with tears in my eyes, embarrassed to have forced my friends and family to endure such artistic mediocrity and public self-immolation. The event was recorded but I never listened; I discarded the evidence in a dumpster the week after I received the audio files.
Having fulfilled the individual and ensemble requirements for my undergraduate degree, I put my saxophone in the bedroom closet. I briefly came out of “retirement” the first year of graduate school to help with an album recording project but then promptly walked away from performance again. During the course of my BM and MM, I went from joyously anticipating playing my instrument to letting my horn rot in the case. “I still have composing and writing about music in my life,” I thought. “Best to just focus on that and leave performing to the people who can actually hack it.”
I shifted my energies toward completing my master’s degree and PhD in music theory. Over those five years I played saxophone for - maybe - fifteen minutes total. And certainly not in front of strangers.
Had I actually gotten worse than I was in high school? Ugh. What a failure.
I was done with it.
Nobody needs this kind of stress in their life.
Some Cultural Causes
It is pretty clear I am no longer in the same spiritual place regarding performing as I was in the scenario I described above. I still struggle with flare-ups of performance anxiety occasionally (and these anxieties sometimes have sneaky ways of manifesting) but I am far from the nervous wreck I was toward the end of my undergrad and onset of graduate school. Unfortunately, my tale is not an isolated case. Many classical musicians struggle with performance anxiety. Classical music culture in particular breeds unhealthy attitudes and we place these big rocks of mental disquiet into our hiking backpacks as we journey down the path of becoming classical music performers. Here are three common cultural causes of performance anxiety that I - consciously or not - internalized during my education.
1. Believing perfection is the ultimate goal of performance.
Oh goodness. This is a big one, isn’t it? As classical musicians we place so much emphasis on being “perfect” - whatever that means.
“Don’t miss a note! Don’t mess up a polyrhythm! Why was that microtone twelve cents sharp? I swear I had a little fuzz in my tone on that high A. Chipped that altissimo tone. My right hand didn’t make it to that sixteenth note in time. I didn’t support my opening pitch.” The list goes on and on and with it goes our sanity.
There is nothing wrong with refining our craft. It’s part of what makes what we do so gosh darn extraordinary. But at a certain point we are obsessively sharpening our chef’s blade in the kitchen for seven consecutive hours while restaurant patrons starve in the dining room.
As my good friend and brilliant violist Michael Hall (Twitter: @mhall_viola; Insta: @michaelhallviola) says: “Isn’t ‘perfection’ such a boring goal to have as a performer? I don’t aim for ‘perfection.’ My goal is ‘convincing.’”
Perfection is an accident: we make plans for it, we work toward it, we hope it arrives. If it does then lucky us! If not, there’s nothing wrong with us. And certainly that doesn’t mean our performance was bad or invalid or unmoving.
It’s like desiring the “perfect” first date. We book a reservation at a nice restaurant. Make calls. Brush our teeth. Look sexy. We prepare as best we can. But ultimately the “perfect” first date is the one in which we simply roll with the situation and commit to interacting with our partner - good stuff, weird, or bad - and focus on ensuring that they’re having the best possible evening. Ironically, constantly fretting about creating the “perfect first date” during your first date is precisely what will make your partner give you a polite hug at the end of the night and delete your number from their phone.
Stop worrying about being perfect and completely shift your attention toward treating your audience to the most engaging experience you can give them on that day, month, year, and season of your life as a performer.
Perfectionism is not laudable - it is an anxiety response that all too often prevents us from being healthy, functional, successful artists.
2. Physical and emotional pain as markers of artistic maturity/greatness/integrity.
Our culture tends to revere artists (not just classical musicians) whose lives are rife with various types of pain and suffering.
Think I’m exaggerating?
Consider the biographical films about musicians wherein childhood trauma features prominently in the plot, acting like some perverse superhero origin story. Consider the phenomenon of the “27 Club.” Consider the number of people who know little about van Gogh except that he cut off his own ear or who have never read a page by Hemingway but know of his suicide by shotgun. Consider how frequently classical music is used as a sonic cue for a character who is a sociopath/villain in contemporary media. Consider the saxophonists who took up heroin because Bird was an addict. Consider how obsessed we are with albums released by artists after a messy breakup with their romantic partner. Consider how accepted the trope of the “starving artist” is. Consider the ubiquity of tall tales of musicians who sell their soul to the devil in exchange for virtuosity.
Adversity comes to us all in the form of financial hardship, heartbreak, injuries, abusive relationships, and so on. As artists we are not immune to these slings and arrows. It is fine to push back, ultimately conquering our inner and outer demons. It is okay to applaud others who have done the same.
The problem occurs when we begin to fundamentally confuse “overcoming painful situations is a mundane facet of human existence” with “enduring/chasing painful situations is a requisite for artistic greatness.”
It is when this confusion invades our musical spirits that we continue to play on a reed that is too hard for us despite our facial muscles screaming at us to quit. That we telegraph to the audience our belief that the next composition on the program is almost impossibly difficult. That we decide upon a seventh hour in the practice room even though we haven’t eaten and the notes are blurring together on the page. That we accept throbbing wrists as the price we must pay to master Liszt. That we cloak our personalities with a permanent sullen attitude. That we define our accomplishments not by how we have grown but by the tally of other performers we have vanquished in competitions and auditions - music as war with blood shed on all sides.
When suffering and artistry inseparably intertwine in our already vulnerable psyches, is it any wonder that the act of performance soon becomes associated with immediate anxiety?
Recollections from Carrie: “THEY’RE ALL GOING TO LAUGH AT YOU!”
3. Fearing judgment
Our dog-eat-dog, scarcity-promoting culture can push us toward regarding our peers not as helpful, supportive colleagues but as competitors on the job market who inherently desire our failure. If we accept this insidious lie, when we see their faces in the audience - despite all evidence to the contrary - we can all too easily envision them silently dissecting our performance like gleeful hecklers, making lengthy lists of our flaws that can be used as ammunition against us in the future. The audience becomes an enemy we are simply trying to prove wrong.
“We know you want us to flub this up but ha! We nailed everything!”
Yikes.
The problem here, of course, is that we have constructed a completely false narrative in which there is no victory. Either we perform poorly (in which case we have demonstrated the validity of our imaginary antagonists’ argument) or we perform well (and our accomplishment is tainted by icky indignation).
We unfortunately spend our performance time not making the best music we can, but dwelling on errors we have made and fearing the consequent harsh judgment of others. This is purely emotional self-sabotage because intellectually we absolutely know that 1) mistakes are gonna happen and 2) folks don’t show up to your gig because they want to see you crash and burn.
If the world is out to get you, the stage is a bullseye of anxiety.
“Solutions” That Don’t Actually Help
Three tiny bits of throwaway advice I have received over the years that did not help me at all with performance anxiety:
1. Ignore the feeling
“Eh. Everybody gets nervous. Just ignore it.”
Wait… what? My insides feel like they’re about to erupt out of my nose and I’m just supposed to, like, ignore that sensation? Sure thing, pal.
2. Visualize the impossible
“Pretend the audience isn’t even there. Or, better yet, picture them naked.”
Who decided this was a good method? Seriously.
My eyes aren’t lying to me. There’s a crowd. A big one. And my family is in it. How could I possibly ignore them? Now I have to focus on two things - the performance and tricking my own brain?
You can’t lie to yourself.
3. Have a drink… or four
Those of you who know me know that I’m no stranger to drinking. I love a good cocktail, a bottle of wine, and a craft beer.
But if we need to have beverages in order to get on stage - or truly believe we will perform better if our bloodstream has booze in it - that can be a slippery slope toward exacerbating performance anxiety rather than managing it.
For a long time I believed that I’d “swing better” if I had a beer before playing with a big band. This habit eventually turned into two cocktails before downbeat, one during the first set, and one at set break. I wasn’t groovin’ during the second set, I was just unaware of careless playing on my behalf because I was using alcohol to dull my performance anxiety. The problem is that it was also impairing my ability to successfully accomplish the task at hand.
Healthier Management Tactics
Over the past decade, I have turned the tables on my debilitating performance anxiety. It is definitely still a work in progress, but I am thankful for the transformation. My ability to perform confidently and without waves of fear and apprehension are better now than even a year ago. Healthier management tactics I have employed as part of this beneficial change are as follows:
1. Acknowledgment of Feelings and Reframing
This tactic comes straight from my duo partner, mezzo-soprano and coach Megan Ihnen (Twitter: @mezzoihnen; Insta: @mezzoihnen).
Anxiety and excitement register in the same part of the brain and often trigger similar physiological responses. Therefore, use your body’s natural response to an impending high-pressure situation to your advantage rather than attempting to ignore the sensation (see the number one example of unhelpful advice found above).
Acknowledge your circumstances and environment, pay attention to your emotions, then reframe those emotions into a positive mindset.
For example, try saying to yourself - aloud - before the big moment: “Yes, I am feeling jittery before this important performance/audition/recording session. I am having that feeling and that’s totally okay! Those jitters aren’t necessarily fear - they’re internal sparks of excitement I am encountering because I am incredibly eager to share this powerful music with an audience!”
Suddenly, that wobbly feeling in your gut is your ally, not a saboteur.
2. Remembering the Whole Journey
We tend to lose sight of the larger picture and place far too much gravity on any one performance situation during our careers. Even if our performance is the final round of a tenure-track job interview or an audition for a dream role or an expensive studio recording, seldom is it truly our final shot at artistic success - even if our panicky brains attempt to convince us that catastrophic scenario is reality.
To adjust my attitude and recontextualize an upcoming stage appearance, I internally meditate on the following questions and responses:
“Is this my first performance? No. Is this my last performance? Probably not. Then what is there to worry about? I have a track record of victory and even if disaster strikes I will have another shot someday.”
This reinforces competence and alleviates pressure from the false belief that any one performance is make-or-break. I have found this tactic especially helpful for my students as they go into juries and senior recitals.
Perspective is important, friends.
3. Performance as Inhabiting and Communicating the Present Moment
I believe that in order to successfully perform without anxiety we must fully inhabit and abide in the present moment and communicate that same awareness with our audience. The further our attention and intention strays from the singular present, the more likely our performance anxiety is to grow.
If our thoughts slip toward judgment from others regarding mistakes we have made, we are not aware of the present - we are living in the past. If our minds are more concerned with perfectionism and not making mistakes later in the composition, we are worried about the future. In either case, we are failing to concentrate on the present. Performance anxiety is a poison that thrives in the past and future.
Well then solution found! We will no longer consider the past and future as part of our performance action.
See, that’s where it gets tricky.
In order to grow and develop as performers we must consider both the past and future. It is necessary to examine our prior performances to evaluate what we did that was favorable versus what we did that was less desirable (the process of both self- and external evaluation). We must also bear in mind the future of our performance to effectively shape the entire composition for the listener as well as mentally prepare for tricky spots that may cause unwanted errors (anticipation).
See the diagram below.
My little “X” theory here might also explain why performance anxiety emerges precisely during the years we are maturing most as performers. Namely, that we spend so much time during our educations 1) in the past evaluating and critiquing our previous efforts and 2) in the future attempting to be sophisticated musicians who possess detailed knowledge of the complete score that we forget to minimize our awareness of those temporal zones while we are actually performing.
This is how healthy evaluation turns into a belief that others are harshly judging you (see #3 under Cultural Causes) and how sensitive anticipation turns into neurotic perfectionism (see #1 under Cultural Causes).
We need an active dialogue between inhabiting the present moment and consideration of past/future:
Novice performers know only the present; they lack the consciousness and skill to evaluate and anticipate.
Fine performers can “expand their X” to recall the past and await the future, growing as a result. Learning to “expand the X” is what we spend an incredible amount of time and energy doing during our degree programs. But getting stuck at the fringes of those expansion zones is the path to never feeling settled and comfortable while performing, allowing performance anxiety to become the defining sensation.
Good performers can readily move between present and past/future.
Great performers know how to expand and contract the X at will and in the blink of an eye - before, during, and after performance.
Concluding Remarks
Performance anxiety is, of course, a highly subjective topic to discuss and theorize. Everything I wrote above may ring true for you or none of it might. Both are acceptable cases. By writing this issue I hope that that even one performer who struggles with anxiety gains some insight and acquires new, positive tools for managing this distracting specter.
So… let me know what you think! Does any of this make sense? Did any of what I wrote help? Drop a comment below or shoot me a message on Instagram, Twitter, and/or Facebook.
For further reading/consideration, check out Michelle Lynne’s recent posts on perfectionism on Instagram (@michellelynnepianist and @thefearlessartistmastermind); The Art of Learning by Josh Waitzkin (plenty of great discussions about “flow” states); Striking Thoughts by Bruce Lee, edited by John Little; and Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity by David Lynch.
Be well and happy music making!