How to deal with nerves?

[musicluvr49]

I know that this question is asked a lot, and I've seen a lot of answers, but I can never seem to get over my nerves. I had an audition last week and massacred the first minute of my Mozart, because my hands were shaking so badly. I've tried takin deep breaths, praying, an even imagining that audience in their underwear. Anyone have some other advice ?

[megadodd]

I bump this. Need advice badly.
Nothing works for me either :>

[pianoplayjl]

I wouldn't be practicing on the day of the audition if I were you because I think I'd like to be as fresh as possible. Maybe for the last few days or week before an audition or a performance, wind down a little and don't practice as much. Maybe only 1 hour a day at max. Maybe for the last week of lesson before audition try to simulate the audition at your teacher's place. I usually find that helps very much in my exam. Really, in my opinion imagining things does not help really much. I usually find practicing just before the exam usually helps. See if you have a spare piano at the audition place (although it is highly unlkely) and practice on it. Forget that you are at the audition. Pretend you are at home. Hope this helps you a little bit.

JL

[49410enrique]

this might have been said before but good advice is never old and can always be repeated: from a blog post i have under my favorites:

Tame those nerves! Ways to Prepare for a Piano performance or exam
 
Virtuoso Horowitz, also suffered from nerves (pic: lastfm)

How can we prepare ourselves so that we won't be too nervous on the performance day? Performance is not only a mental game, it's a way of life. Therefore to succeed you need to be prepared mentally as well as physically (technically). Remember even the great pianists Glenn Gould and Horowitz got nervous too, and even shied away for years from performing four times according to the New York Times.

Play for friends and family. Use every opportunity you can to play your pieces, see how you cope under pressure. You'll highlight any technical difficulties in your piece. If you can, record it and listen or watch back. Where did I hesitate? Were there any memory slips? What could make it sound better.

Record yourself on Video or Youtube you'd want to get your recording perfect, so this is also another excellent preparation technique. You can also observe your performance - your body language and posture (observe also how tense are your shoulders, arms and hands?) You can also ask piano enthusiasts from the youtube audience, your previous and current teachers,  to evaluate your performance.

On the day: Play through the pieces at least once, this will boost your confidence and reinforce the muscle memory.   

Relax - have a bath the night before, listen to some soothing music and calm the mind, ensure you don't schedule any other stressful event or task during the day or days preceding  the performance.

Practice, practice, practice intensively, but don't burn out. Knowing that you've done the 'donkey work' in advance will boost your confidence. You shouldn't then be too worried about making technical errors, because all the hard work has been done.

Get a good night's sleep. A good night's sleep the night before isn't enough, make sure you have consistent good sleep 3 days before.

Try out the piano and venue! If you are able to, get access to the venue beforehand, either before the performance starts to rehearse through your pieces. If it's a music festival and the competitors and ajudicators haven't arrived, why not try out the piano - as long as this is permitted just to see the touch response of the piano. This will enable you time to get used to the piano and feel more comfortable in the performing environment. 

Visualise success, great athletes do it, so should you. First of all, recall try a successful previous performance that went well, remember how you felt and what made it such a great performance. Apply those memories and imagine you will be giving your next best performance. In your visualisation, implant positive thoughts,  that you're in total control, relaxed and focused.   

When you perform, or are just about to - focus on the musical feeling and mood you wish to convey, just before you perform. Eliminate any doubts, focus on the positive, what you can do well and how you'll communicate with your audience.

[musicluvr49]

Thanks both of you, sounds like some really good advice. I'll definitely use it for my next audition, wish me luck !

[pianoplunker]

I know that this question is asked a lot, and I've seen a lot of answers, but I can never seem to get over my nerves. I had an audition last week and massacred the first minute of my Mozart, because my hands were shaking so badly. I've tried takin deep breaths, praying, an even imagining that audience in their underwear. Anyone have some other advice ?

I dont usually get nervous very often at the beginning but once in a while I will suddenly get nervous in the middle of a performance, even if it is an easy part I could do in my sleep.  what I do when that happens is just give myself a reminder that I am getting nervous because I CARE, it seems to get me through. If you are telling yourself you are nervous because you might make a mistake in front of all those people in their underwear ,  well then you just might talk yourself into it

[jesc]

This happened a long time ago when I was active on the piano before my hiatus.

I was also nervous, always. The effect this had on me was that I relied too much on muscle memory. Thus, I go up the stage and from there, muscle memory kicks in and I leave the stage with almost no recollection of what happened. Strangely I survived piano competitions with this... lol must have been extremely low tier competitions.

Then when the study became serious, I had to be continuously conscious on stage to keep track of the interpretation of the piece. From my experience I overcame my nervousness when I hit a breaking point.

There was a time when my performances on stage became a regularity that my nervousness just vanished. So, my suggestion, perform on public as often as you can and it has to go away at some point.

[benechan]

this might have been said before but good advice is never old and can always be repeated: from a blog post i have under my favorites:

Tame those nerves! Ways to Prepare for a Piano performance or exam
 
Virtuoso Horowitz, also suffered from nerves (pic: lastfm)

How can we prepare ourselves so that we won't be too nervous on the performance day? Performance is not only a mental game, it's a way of life. Therefore to succeed you need to be prepared mentally as well as physically (technically). Remember even the great pianists Glenn Gould and Horowitz got nervous too, and even shied away for years from performing four times according to the New York Times.

Play for friends and family. Use every opportunity you can to play your pieces, see how you cope under pressure. You'll highlight any technical difficulties in your piece. If you can, record it and listen or watch back. Where did I hesitate? Were there any memory slips? What could make it sound better.

Record yourself on Video or Youtube you'd want to get your recording perfect, so this is also another excellent preparation technique. You can also observe your performance - your body language and posture (observe also how tense are your shoulders, arms and hands?) You can also ask piano enthusiasts from the youtube audience, your previous and current teachers,  to evaluate your performance.

On the day: Play through the pieces at least once, this will boost your confidence and reinforce the muscle memory.   

Relax - have a bath the night before, listen to some soothing music and calm the mind, ensure you don't schedule any other stressful event or task during the day or days preceding  the performance.

Practice, practice, practice intensively, but don't burn out. Knowing that you've done the 'donkey work' in advance will boost your confidence. You shouldn't then be too worried about making technical errors, because all the hard work has been done.

Get a good night's sleep. A good night's sleep the night before isn't enough, make sure you have consistent good sleep 3 days before.

Try out the piano and venue! If you are able to, get access to the venue beforehand, either before the performance starts to rehearse through your pieces. If it's a music festival and the competitors and ajudicators haven't arrived, why not try out the piano - as long as this is permitted just to see the touch response of the piano. This will enable you time to get used to the piano and feel more comfortable in the performing environment. 

Visualise success, great athletes do it, so should you. First of all, recall try a successful previous performance that went well, remember how you felt and what made it such a great performance. Apply those memories and imagine you will be giving your next best performance. In your visualisation, implant positive thoughts,  that you're in total control, relaxed and focused.   

When you perform, or are just about to - focus on the musical feeling and mood you wish to convey, just before you perform. Eliminate any doubts, focus on the positive, what you can do well and how you'll communicate with your audience.

Just to clarify this excerpt comes from the Piano Sage Blog -
Tame those nerves! 9 Ways to Prepare for a Piano performance or exam
https://pianosage.blogspot.com/2011/07/tame-those-nerves-9-ways-to-prepare-for.html thanks for quoting it!

[chris30]

I was told just today infact to improve my posture of having a straight back, to tuck my stomach muscles in  and hopefully my fingers will relax, I think its mind over matter of having something else to concentrate on, will try this week.

[cook675]

I once asked a professional player if he still gets nervous before he plays in front of people and he said "Every single time, it never goes away, and it never will"

However, I personally think that if you are ultra-confident, and just have it in your head and say to yourself some (highly egotisitcal, pompous, self-righteous, but not true)stuff like "i own this piano/this piece", "i am the greatest player ever born" that your confidence will be so strong youll have nothing to be nervous about.  It takes some imagination to make yourself temporarily belive it and you shouldn't think this way any other time obviously.

Ive never accually tried this, I came up with this just now, but I feel like it could theoretically work.

[sucom]

I used to to give myself a talking to and say, look, you wouldn't be so nervous if you were playing to only one person! So I would try to imagine that each member of the audience was coming in to listen one at a time, then leaving the room for the next person to walk in.  I'm not saying that this will necessarily work - I was always nervous around  a week before a concert and quite hard to live with the day before!  But saying this to myself DID seem to help.  Worth a try anyway!

[jesc]

you shouldn't think this way any other time obviously.

Quite important. The ego is needed to perform but humility is needed to perfect the piece. The idea that further improvements are needed (almost always) keeps a pianist striving towards perfection.

My breaking point of not being nervous might have reasons that go well beyond piano. I've done crazy things with my car. I'm just thinking about this now and looking back when weighting what's at stake on both cases it gave me some idea on why I'm less nervous on other aspects of my life. My breaking point might go to the point of putting risk on something most consider extremely valuable (lol and I'm not referring to the car, I just thought simply saying "life" would be too cliche.)

But enough about me... what works is good enough. What I'm worried about is I've seen a lot of proud "flawed" pianists.

To the OP: don't become one of those.

[pytheamateur]

I think we pianists are relatively lucky when it comes to nerves.  Nerves seem to have a bigger effect on flautists.  When I play the flute, as soon as I get nervous or feel like laughing, I just can't play.  On the other hand, I can still play the piano when my face is tense or my heart is beating rapidly.

I suppose the other way to look at it is flautists are forced to deal with nerves so they could have more effective strategies.  Once overcome, they don't have to worry about it anymore.

[matmilne]

If there was a simple solution nobody would ever be nervous about anything. 

nerves, along with the other anxiety-related conditions that tend to befall good musicians, are something you have to live with.
I've found it mainly stems from a fear of disappointing yourself, but it's part of your personality and you can't change it.

Firstly practice until you have the piece by memory, and practice until you can't get it wrong from memory.  This will double the amount of time it takes to learn a new piece, but the environment around you will not negatively impact your playing as much.

Practice a few times in the performance space if you can, this will reduce the amount of time your brain has to spend adjusting your technique to suit the instrument.

occasionally gently pressing down on the top of your stomach (just under the rib cage around the center) can help with waves of panic.

Unfortunately, hyper-anxiety is a serious mental condition, and understanding the effects it has on a musician, are important for any reasonable musician and educator alike.  it is not a simple thing that goes away with time and practice, it's a permanent condition.

anxiety affects access to memory, it totally disrupts both playing by rote and reading music, it creates fear and panic, it causes the mind to spend time processing things other than the performance and music.  It renders thousands of hours of practice meaningless. it can make you feel ill, and be ill, and generally give you a miserable time playing any piece, and make you sound like an amateur even if your private practice was the most professional playing ever.  once started, a rolling panic attack is difficult to stop mid performance.
The fact of the matter is, that you're stuck with that, so you have to come to terms with it.

[megadodd]

Thanks for all the info.

[chris215]

A useful contribution which I found helpful. Thank you.  I think one might add 'stiffening up' as a symptom/consequence of nervousness and the lack of control/finesse that follows on from that. Learning to relax, which can be learned like any other skill seems to me to be really important.

[go12_3]

Nerves can be a problem when performing.  It doesn't get easier as time goes by for me to have steady hands.  Although, it's something each of us personally has to deal with...our nerves.  I used to play in the class for all the music majors in college and I had to play a piece by Beethoven, a Sonata, and it about killed me.  My fingers flew all over the keyboard and I don't know how I ever got through that piece.  However, the next time I had to perform in that class, I skipped out because I couldn't handle it.  I played the pieces well and in memory but performing in front of people.... I lost it.  Not an easy thing to admit. 

[musicluvr49]

Wow, a lot of great replies ! I'll try to take then all in. I mean my nerves aren't so bad where I completely lose everything I learned, but they definitely bring down my performance. Hope some of these tips can help me to deal with them, thanks

[fleetfingers]

Thanks for this thread and all of the ideas.

The most important thing is that you have to really know the piece and have an intimate understanding of it when you play. If that part of the preparation is solid, then you can worry about dealing with the nerves more than the piece itself, as it's already taken care of.

I used to tremble and get VERY sweaty hands, but lately, I struggle most with keeping my mind focused and keeping from feeling self-conscious. What helps me is to tell myself, "It does not matter what anyone thinks of this music. This is MY music (not that I composed it, but it's my interpretation. And when I play it, it is mine) and I play it for me because I love it." Then I imagine that I'm in a courtyard by a fountain or somewhere where the audience is not necessarily "watching" me. They can listen if they want to; but, it's not for them. It's for me. If I can get myself to a point where I am truly playing for myself, rather than trying to convince myself of it, that is when I play my best.

[megadodd]

Then I imagine that I'm in a courtyard by a fountain or somewhere where the audience is not necessarily "watching" me.

I really wish I could do this, think myself into the practice room instead of being aware of all the people. That would be a breakthrough, unfortunately. Havn't worked yet.

[jozzilee]

To be honest it is hard for me to give you any advice because I suffer extreme stage-fright as well. I can't even remember the last time I made a good recital. But I think the most important thing is to practise really hard! I know this sounds like a bad advice, but there is no short cut to hard work, sometimes the more you know the piece, the less nervous you are. I remember back in conservatoire, I tended to do bad on recitals with pieces that I did not have enough time to prepare and those I prepared well I felt much better. Once you start get into a momentum of really getting yourself prepared, then you eventually become fearless because you know that nobody knows as well as you do, so you are basically performing to teach rather than to feel stress! It is a long journey and even the greatest suffers from it and at least this shows a relief sign.

Good methods for memorizing is the key to reduce memory slips. You should aim to analyse your piece rather than playing them thousands times (although you need to do that too)! I am sure you have done that too. But you need to memorise hand separately, section by section, parts by parts, harmonies, melodic shapes and internalize rhythms (say when you play Bartok).

Hope this helps!

[relativepitch]

Connect with the music emotionally, and you'll forget completely about the nerves.

[schubert_21]

I highly recommend Don Green's book, Performance Success.

[skibickay]

I recently asked a piano professor this question.  He said to actively seek out opportunities to perform practice recitals in as many different venues and on as many different pianos as possible.  Play for family, friends, church, coworkers, retirement homes, etc.  Immediately prior to performing engage in mind calming activities. For example slow deep breathing is very simple but works.

[bartoge]

I find this video to be extremely helpful. Its long, but I think only the first 15 minutes are to your question.

[thaicheow]

this might have been said before but good advice is never old and can always be repeated: from a blog post i have under my favorites:

Tame those nerves! Ways to Prepare for a Piano performance or exam
 
Virtuoso Horowitz, also suffered from nerves (pic: lastfm)

How can we prepare ourselves so that we won't be too nervous on the performance day? Performance is not only a mental game, it's a way of life. Therefore to succeed you need to be prepared mentally as well as physically (technically). Remember even the great pianists Glenn Gould and Horowitz got nervous too, and even shied away for years from performing four times according to the New York Times.

Play for friends and family. Use every opportunity you can to play your pieces, see how you cope under pressure. You'll highlight any technical difficulties in your piece. If you can, record it and listen or watch back. Where did I hesitate? Were there any memory slips? What could make it sound better.

Record yourself on Video or Youtube you'd want to get your recording perfect, so this is also another excellent preparation technique. You can also observe your performance - your body language and posture (observe also how tense are your shoulders, arms and hands?) You can also ask piano enthusiasts from the youtube audience, your previous and current teachers,  to evaluate your performance.

On the day: Play through the pieces at least once, this will boost your confidence and reinforce the muscle memory.   

Relax - have a bath the night before, listen to some soothing music and calm the mind, ensure you don't schedule any other stressful event or task during the day or days preceding  the performance.

Practice, practice, practice intensively, but don't burn out. Knowing that you've done the 'donkey work' in advance will boost your confidence. You shouldn't then be too worried about making technical errors, because all the hard work has been done.

Get a good night's sleep. A good night's sleep the night before isn't enough, make sure you have consistent good sleep 3 days before.

Try out the piano and venue! If you are able to, get access to the venue beforehand, either before the performance starts to rehearse through your pieces. If it's a music festival and the competitors and ajudicators haven't arrived, why not try out the piano - as long as this is permitted just to see the touch response of the piano. This will enable you time to get used to the piano and feel more comfortable in the performing environment. 

Visualise success, great athletes do it, so should you. First of all, recall try a successful previous performance that went well, remember how you felt and what made it such a great performance. Apply those memories and imagine you will be giving your next best performance. In your visualisation, implant positive thoughts,  that you're in total control, relaxed and focused.   

When you perform, or are just about to - focus on the musical feeling and mood you wish to convey, just before you perform. Eliminate any doubts, focus on the positive, what you can do well and how you'll communicate with your audience.

I couldn't agree more. But I think I can help elaborate a bit on the issue of "Visualizing success".

This is the thing I did when I was preparing my licentiate exam, after many failures, I finally made it though.

I do actually think that if you take your upcoming performance/exam seriously, a "mind practice" is equally important as physical practice on the piano. What I did is to go through the entire programme, in my mind solely, many many times. To do that I need an absolutely quite place, sometimes I locked myself in my own room, sometimes I went to the garden, with my scores etc.

EVERY (I really do mean EVERY) single detail of the performance I will think through carefully. That helps especially after rehearsal in the venue where I am going to perform. Details includes way before I walk in the premise, my attire, how I am going to address the examiner/audiences etc, to the musical details of my programme: numbers by numbers, notes details, harmony progressions, dynamic markings etc.

It may sound easy in say, but I find it pretty hard to actually do it. As you start to do this "visualizing"/mind practice,  constantly funny thing will want to pop into your mind. Here is where you train your focus, and it needs constant and frequent practice.

More to often, most people train more physically, including athlete. But I personally think that human's mind can be strong too, if we pay attention and train it like we train our muscle, etc. I am advocating this idea to my students, especially higher grades students, but sadly not many really do take my advice.

Well, hope this can you through your next auditions/exams/performance. Good luck. 

[ade16]

Lots of excellent advice here. A really difficult one this, but let's not forget that nerves are a natural thing, part of our 'fight and flight' mechanism. So shaking, sweating hands, heart racing, butterflies in stomach are extremely common. I have been performing for over forty years and still get hellishly nervous before and during performances. Anyone who says they never do get nervous is a liar!
Same goes for actors, dancers and other performers, also sports practitioners.... tennis, soccer, golf etc Anything where there is a fear of 'messing up very publicly' or in an important audition/exam.

I can recommend an excellent book called 'The Inner Game of Music' which teaches you how to switch off that inner nagging voice of self-doubt. Too detailed to explain here, but it really helped me.

The Inner Game of Music By Barry Green and Timothy Gallwey

"The Inner Game of music is that which takes place in the mind, played against such elusive opponents as nervousness, self doubt, and fear of failure. Using the same principles of 'natural learning' Timothy Gallwey developed so successfully for tennis, golf and skiing and applying them to his own field, noted musician Barry Green shows how to acknowledge and overcome these internal obstacles in order to bring a new quality to the experience and learning of music."

Also, the Alexander Technique is worth a go, all about disciplining body and mind, relaxed concentration, breathing techniques etc.

Good luck, and always remember that you are not alone in battling with performance nerves!