How to help the Nervous Performer

[jenilyn]

I have a student who is extremely talented, but when she performs, she makes so many little mistakes.  We do a lot of drilling and small group practice, but it doesn't seem to be helping.  Any ideas on how to help her get a clean performance?

[Bob]

There are more threads on this here. 

Practice performing.

Have realistic expectations, as the performer.  If it goes as practiced, it's a success.

Just make the "real" performance one more run through... which happens to be the real one, but if you've done it several times before, it's not that big of a deal.

[jgallag]

Make sure her last practice run through before the performance is somewhere between 1/2 to 3/4 tempo and contains all of the correct notes. You want to give her brain a very accurate picture of the piece as the last instance it encounters, and it is safe to sacrifice tempo to do so. Does she play from memory? Is she ready to learn mental practice? That would help. Also, as Bob said, she needs to perform more. The problem with the way most lessons are constructed is that the piece is "learned", performed once, and then set aside. You must perform a piece at least three times before you can think about performing it well. This is a fantastic use of family and friends, too. Playing for you is not enough. She needs to play for other people, *before* the big day.

[mcdiddy1]

I think the best way you can help the student is to address the cause not the symptoms. Find out what is going through her head as she plays. No performance is truly perfect...the imperfections are just to small for most people to catch. Many times the nerves come from when the performer is concerned with what every one eles is thinking about you and not on simply projecting the music. See if you can help her mind to focus on the intent of the music rather than feeling like she is on displayed and being judged. Also make sure she plays memorized because not only do you learn the music more deeply but you can rely on muscle memory whenever the other kinds of memory begin to fail.  Oh and teach your student to BREATH!!!! It is surprising how many students forget to do that. Help her find place to take a breath because the body needs air and the music need to breath too. It can become easier to concentrate on what comes next when you can do that

[lostinidlewonder]

The best way is to practice performing for people. Find places she can play for groups of people, social clubs, retirement villiages, churches etc. Even get some strangers to come sit in your lessons and tell her she has to play for them.

[gyzzzmo]

As lostinwonder mentioned above, let her play in those non-formal occasions like clubs, grand-cafe's, restaurants whatever. Just music she's very comfortable with. And the more often she plays there, the more relaxed she'll be. Then (if the occasion allows) she could start harder pieces and try imagine she's giving a concert instead of anything non-formal.

[sr_ludwig]

Bléé
I do not believe in it.
I just take some propranolol and I can play without get nervous.
But sometimes it makes me think slowly...
hahahahhaaaa

[dan101]

During a performance, your student's mind should focus on relaxing (technical), the intent of the composer (dynamics...), and emoting (personality). Of course, the more one practices, the more automatic this becomes.

The main thing is to have your student concentrating on what's important in a performance, thus leaving little room for the mind to think about the audience or other distractions.

Good luck.