First Performance Fiasco (Jul-10-04)

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Oh yeah!!! I have the utmost hope for you. Just because your experience is normal for classical players does not make it right. And while it is true that my experience with learning guitar is not really the norm doesn't mean that you cannot have it or set your expectations to have the same thing too. It is about taking responsibility for your career exactly as you are doing. I slow my current teacher down too sometimes. That is okay. And it is also about playing for that greater good. If you get those two things there is no reason why your (or anyones') experience with learning the guitar cannot be great beyond our imagination!!

Thanks so much for this thread. You are an awesome soul and a wise one too. I can't wait to follow your path!

-Kfisherx

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Hey CesarVillalobos

Thank you for sharing your experience with us. There is nothing unusual at all about this experience it happens to everyone at some point – especially when you perform SOLO.

I used to play classical guitar and at one point I had to perform a rather complex Bach piece before a large audience. It was the annual big concert that the local music school performs to the public and I had to receive an award (among other people) on the second night of performing.

The first night I played the piece flawless, and I was very satisfied with myself.

On the second night where “it really mattered” I got nervous and got the shakes – and the result being that “it sounded nervous” – and that just doesn’t cut it when you play BACH!
Now… it wasn’t really because I couldn’t play the piece.. It was because I had the fear before performing and it became a self-fulfilling prophesy.

It has happened again recently on 2 occasions when I played solo piano in public.

On the first occasion I played a Chick Corea number called “Children’s song no. 12”.

No doubt this is a complex piece for me because I had only played piano seriously for a year. But I had done serious practice with a metronome and had played this piece earlier that day for my teacher without mistakes. When it became time for me to perform the piece was introduced by my teacher “as not being a childish song, but about children and Corea plays jazz improvisations on top of top of the basic chords, etc..”

After this introduction it appeared to me that this was a advanced piece – and I became nervous. The performs was severely inhibited by my shaky hands! But I got through it, breaking down once but continuing to finish the piece.

After that experience I decided to play again to the next recital and try to conquer this! I mean, this is not something I want to be in my performance so I had to find out what was causing it!

My piece at this recital was a Danish folk traditional, arranged for Jazz piano.

Before I played, I noticed the other students play. Most of them were kids.

There was one little kid who played a boogie-woogie piece. There was not even the slightest suggestion of being nervous. Then there was a teen playing a classical piece who broke down several times complaining to be to nervous. She only completed the piece after being encouraged.

When it became my turn, I did fine, until I got the fear! This time it was only one error – which occurred when it became apparent to me that it was time for “the difficult piece”.

The thing is that I had played it perfectly many times before in practice! So that error should not occur.

The way I see:
Fear is the problem. The fear of not “delivering the goods”, not being good enough, not being perfect. Who put that fear in there? You or others? Who maintains that fear? Do we need to maintain that fear?

Does it have any purpose?

NO! Because nothing is going to happen if you “fail”! Take a look at what Kfisherx wrote:

”What is the worst thing that happened to you up there?" I answered that I had blown the tempo on a measure and he asked me again, "What is the worst thing that can happen up there?" "Oh" I replied with eyes wide, "I could forget my notes and totally stop playing" He smiled and continued, "So if you do that will you then die?" "Will you loose big money or will it really affect any of the important things in life?"”

This is important that you realize that Fear has no place in your head simply because it has no purpose – in the given situation.

Lastly, think about this last sentence;

“There is nothing to Fear but Fear itself”.

Good luck!

-Lilleslayer

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Again, I'm going to mention the book, "The Inner Game of Music". It addresses the "fear", explores it, and comes up with a plan to deal with it. I firmly believe that we need to understand where something comes from before we can conquer it. It is basic psychology. For example, I used to have consistent nightmares about elevators. It would be the same everytime. I would get in an elevator and it would go wacko. Instead of going up and down, it would go side to side, or completely through the roof. I would wake up shaking. Then one day I was talking to my mom, and she said, "oh, remember that time when you got stuck in an elevator?". Huh? Turns out that I was stuck in a subway elevator (one of those huge old fashioned ones) with 80 kids. We were on our way to the zoo (a park field trip). I was about 5. My mom sparked the memory and all the details came back to me. Kids were screaming and crying. One girl passed out. The firemen got us out of the elevator by coming in through the roof. The "passed out" girl was lifted out. I thought she was dead. Well, guess what? After I recalled this, the nightmares were gone.

I'm looking forward to becoming a better performer through reading this book. I want to discover the root cause of the fear and how to conquer it one step at a time. I also want to help my students with this issue.

The performance "fear" issue also raises itself in the recording studio, sometimes even more than on the stage. I have recorded a few times for local singers. The pressure is incredibly intense because the studio fees are really high and charged by the hour. One needs to get in there, lay down the track, and get out. The recording is a permanent record of the performance. At least in a performance, people forget or didn't hear certain parts. Not true with a recording.

more of my .02,

-Donna

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Hola César,

I haven't had time to read all these replies to your message, so I don't know if someone have said this before. Ok

Creo que lo que te pasó es totalmente natural, así que "no le pares", como decimos en Venezuela. Sigue adelante.

The important thing is that you keep practicing and playing.

Some years ago I studied acting for 2 years and one of the things I learned there was self-control while being on the stage in front of an audience. This can be very hard in the beginning and there are several techniques actors use to get such control. I have used the same techniques when I've done presentations (as an assistant) in the companies I've worked with, and for some other situations I've faced during life, and I've found those techniques I learned of great benefit to me, even though I actually never worked as an actress, except for very few plays in my local area and some TV advertisement.

I've played for friends sometimes and I used to be the singer of a band my brother and I had some time ago. Specially my first time(on both situations) I was nervous, but I didn't pay attention to my nervousness and, therefore, I didn't give that "nervousness" the power to be stronger than me. I just thought, "well, if I make mistakes, what the hell!!! but of course, I tried my best to do it as perfect as possible.

The minute you let your nerves to control you, the minute you are lost. Don't give those nerves the power to control you. Now, I must admit it took quite a long time to master this control. And even today, I have to admit it is quite a little difficult. It's a never-ending job!!

I never think that I can play for a while without making any mistakes (what means, I never give it for granted). That is, that I am open minded that maybe I can make a mistake, because this is something that can happen anytime, even to a professional player. Keeping that in mind I can be much more relaxed, and therefore, much less prone to make any mistakes. This way of thinking has helped me very much to gain more and more confidence and control over any nervousness I may be experiencing. Am I explaining myself right?

I recently heared Elton John saying that he still is nervous when he sits on his piano when starting a concert, because on that very minute he still have this thoughts coming to his mind, that he is going to forget the notes!!!

Well, this post is based just on my personal point of view. Actually, what I really mean is to encourage you to keep going, no matter what. Experiences always make us stronger, despite they are good or not-so good.

This is a long way...I guess...so don't let this kind of situations turn you down. Stand up warrior!

Kisses, de una amiga en Venezuela

-Bluestar

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Hi C'sar,

I have many thoughts concerning this. I will try to summarize them, and I would like to be as concrete as possible in terms of the problem and the solution.

Aside from the obvious, here are the root causes of your nervousness....

#1) I strongly believe you have totally inadequate technical foundation. I say this because almost every new player (a few years into it) I have ever seen in my life has been in that condition, with not the vaguest CLUE as to what proper practice was, and possessed of a body filled with nothing but tension during playing. I would bet any amount of money that this is what I would find if you were sitting in front of me.

And that makes me need to ask: do you have The Principles, do you have the DVD's, and have you worked with them. It is your best chance to deal with the situation I have just described.


The plain fact of the matter is, if you have no reason to have confidence in your ability to perform the task in front of you, you have NO CHOICE but to be scared to death walking out in front of an audience to perform that task. If every time I rehearse a speech I stutter and miss words every couple of sentences, there is no way in heaven or hell that I will feel comfortable going on stage and giving that speech UNLESS I have already made peace with my imperfection, which I do not think is the case here.

If I did make peace with it, I would probably give the best speech a stuttering Jamie is capable of, and perhaps stutter the least amount. If you made peace with your inability to render the piece of music perfectly, you may do it to your best level, but as I said, this is rarely the case.

What most often happens with a new and inexperienced practicer and player is that all the tensions they maintain during practice (completely unknown to them) come out 10 times more powerfully on stage, and run the show.


#2) Inadequate preperation of material.

This almost goes without saying, because of the insanity of performing new material after two weeks "study", and it being the first time performing to boot! Eliot Fisk, one of the most technically advanced players in the world has said "when you go out with new material for the first time in front of an audience, you never know where the mistakes are going to be!"

That is the attitude of professionals. The first time out, we are looking for the answer to this question "what is wrong with this piece that I don't know about yet, because it is the kind of thing that will only reveal itself in performance". The first time out with something, for a professional, is more like "research", so we can go back to the practice room and fix it. Of course, the more advanced you are, the less there is to fix, and it is of a more subtle nature.

Why do you think Broadway producers, when debuting a new show, take it on tour first (after months of rehearsal and years of writing and refining) for many months to a bunch of little towns? To find out what is wrong with it, that's why! They sure aren'g going to just go open up on Broadway, and find out what is wrong with it there!

Part of preparation is "testing". This means playing for others, such as family, friends (and even better, enemies!), the dog, a tree, anybody and anything. What you want to do is to create circumstances similar to performing, and different from everyday practice.

Put a chair in another room, walk in like you are walking on stage, and play the piece. Have a tape recorder running. Get ready for a MAJOR reality check. Then, open your toolbox (the Principles), and get to work fixing what is wrong.

Everyone is invited and encouraged to post things to the web, and ask other forum members to critique it. This is a major help in the refining process.

As a general rule, I would never perform something that I did not have memorized and polished in this manner ONE MONTH prior to performance. I would then be playing it (and practicing it) everyday.

So, did you play that piece for others AND record yourself playing it? Did you do tons of no tempo practice on it, and then work it up with the Basic Practice Approach?



LACK OF BECOMING THE MUSIC

I believe you made the mistake I made at my first public performance. I gave a whole classical recital. I only practiced the music, I never really played it as whole pieces, bonding with the music emotionally as an entire statement (level 2 and 3 practice). I didn't know any better, my teacher never talked about how to prepare things, I was on my own, and I didn't know anything except how inadequate I felt.

I was scared to death, but too dumb to let that stop me. My mother still talks about how my leg was shaking up and down as I was playing. Well, you have to start somewhere, might as well start at the bottom!

We must go through all 3 levels of practice as outlined in Chapter 5 of the Principles in our practice preparation.

TIME

Even with all this, it takes time to have a piece mature inside you. Segovia advised Parkening not to record pieces until he had toured with them, playing them over and over in public to "burnish them in". Again, something you learn along the way as a professional.


As far as your teacher, I have a rule "never judge someone from where they are or where they have been, but from where they are going".

Your teacher should have one reaction to this experience, and that is to say "wow, I sure don't know how to prepare a student for performing. Maybe I'd better get a clue". If he does not say that, I share the contemptuous opinions expressed here by others.

How would you feel about a boxing manager/trainer who sends in his fighter with completely inadequate training, and the guy gets knocked out over and over, fight after fight? What if the trainer never asked himself what he might be doing wrong? What if he said to the fighter, "well, I think we should both be very proud that you keep going out there". Yeah, right!


WRONG MATERIAL BEING PERFORMED

The music chosen was absurd, that piece (Vivaldi movement 2) is not easy to do well. That is completely your teachers fault. Lagrima is not an easy piece. It is only an easy piece to play badly, not to play well.

You evidenced a very interesting and harmful attitude in your original post. You said

"Nevertheless I accepted the challenge just thinking about what i have read in this forum, about mediocrity and the likes. I know that when he played it for me it looked like impossible but well, at least i have to give it my best shot and only after that i can judge if it is really that impossible."

So, your attitude and thinking were " I don't want to be mediocre, I want to be good, awesome, impressive perhaps!"

Well, you see what that got you! You were coming from ego, not from music. You were thinking of yourself, and what you wanted to get from the audience ( a good feeling about yourself), and not what you could give the audience (a good musical experience).

Next time, examine your motivations before deciding on your course of action. Karla is completely correct in her advice concerning choosing music you are totally comfortable with.
Concert artists always have certain pieces they could play in their sleep for opening a concert with, when you will be most "shaky". Choosing such a piece helps us be very confident.

Of course, we have all made the same mistakes you have made at one time or another.


LIVE AND LEARN

All of this is very common and ordinary, your experience is shared by most players, it is simply a part of development. I really appreciate you living through it here in such an open and honest manner. THAT is the way to do it, and it will enable you to grow right through this experience very quickly, and soon, you will be creating different experiences for yourself!

I admire your dedicated and passionate approach to your playing, and I am sure everyone here will do their best to help you along!

Best,
Jamie

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Hi Jamie,

I am very grateful that you took the time to post your reply. (That was one missing reply, and i thought that i didn´t deserved it.. )

During the post-recital days, i've been thinking a lot about the reasons that made my first performance a fiasco. Everything you say makes sense to me. This far i have come to these conclusions:

1.- My fundation technique is poor, if non existent. I have the Principles but i made the mistake of taking some things for granted, i skipped the fundation exercises and jumped right to the No Tempo and BPA practice. I have seen the need to correct that situation, and that's what i do first thing in the morning practice, Fundation exercises. I start to note certain things, but i know it is too early to mention them, that will be, in the best of circumstances, some months from now.

2.- Material for the recital. At this point i'd like to tell you i had been "practicing" the pieces since january, and even though i din´t play the Vivaldi, i knew that the other pieces needed more work. I failed to record myself and play for friends, i started doing it one week prior to the performance and i notice the anxiety arising, but i somehow managed to finish the pieces on the ocasions. I knew they were demanding. At this, just yesterday i recorded my first piece ever, and as you might have guesses, "it sucked!". Well, i intend to keep track of my practice by recording and going back to the Principles, at this point i have discovered some interesting things, that again, need more polishing and experience to be mentioned. I will do it when i am more acquainted with the experimenting.

3.- Connection to the music. This is a hard one. I can be emotionally connected during practice with SOME of the music I am playing, there are some music that is, how would i put it, more "esoteric", like brower. It takes time to your ear to get acustomed to the beauty of disonant and in some cases,somber music, let alone to sincerely love it. Besides, some times you feel connected and sometimes you don't, i think it has something to do with our changing center of gravity, not a permanent one, and it doesn´t need to be guitar precisely. I think, and might be wrong, that only years of study and devotion to it helps you to develop a taste for some music that don´t come as naturally as the one you like. At this point i don´t completely like brower, i was listening to Manuel Barrueco playing Brower and just skipped it, i prefer Bach or tárrega or Ponce at this moment.

4.- Ego. This is a thougher one!. If we had a magic wand and could, for example, by its arts dissapear pride and vanity from the world in a... zap! maybe we would find ourselves in a directionless motion. What i mean to say here is that the Ego is a book of many many volumes, like the poet Virgil said in other words that i find difficult to translate at this moment.Well, i don´t want to go very deep in here, but at this point I feel the need to explore those parts of my ego that affect in a negative and a positive manner my playing, both instances are not needed at all, and this quest is not only for a given event, it is something you decide to entirely change your life. I think the first thing i have to explore, not only by reading, but by self-observation, is fear, its causes and the causes of those causes...

Besides all of the above, i want to tell everybody that i am not hiding under my bed, if someone asks me "how did it go" i just tell the truth. Maybe be you will find this absurd, but somehow i enjoyed the show, not the moment i was shaking and scared to death of course, but the wholesome experience, the energy, the stamina, the gathering of people to enjoy music; it is an oportunity to learn and grow, no matter the outcome. My ultimate goal is to enjoy the music under any circumstance...

Thank you Jamie and all the people who took the time to reply, i really feel that this forum is about growing, passion for the guitar and the music, and above all...Friendship!


Saludos,

César Villalobos