Tag Archives: musical performance

The Psychology of Performing Music – Part 2: Forgive Yourself

Welcome back to our multi-part series on the psychology of performance. Last week we covered How to Balance your Emotions, this week we will be covering something that a lot of performers struggle with; forgiving yourself.

If you’ve ever performed you know that the element of chance always permeates a live performance. You can practice developing consistency, but sometimes things happen and circumstances can immediately change. You could walk into the performance hall and realize the piano is completely different than you anticipated, the room could be filled with people changing the acoustics. Any number of things can present themselves and completely alter your performance.

The worst thing you can do to yourself is starting to think in a cyclical pattern. If you make a mistake and you dwell on it during your performance you are more likely to make another mistake. Once you take your mind off the performance and start thinking about yourself performing your mind will start to play tricks on you. The best thing you can do is simply move on with the performance and never look back (until after the performance when you can reflect in practice).

This might seem easier said than done but it’s possible to achieve. If you put yourself into the right state of mind you can avoid these negative thoughts from creeping in. You have to remember, this is a musical performance, it’s not a life or death situation!

You must train yourself to stay in the moment. You can’t think ahead or behind when it comes to playing, just stay in the moment and get through it like you know you can. You can’t let doubt creep into your performances – that is when things can go wrong. Forgive yourself for not being perfect and enjoy the music!

Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729

The Psychology of Musical Performances – Part 1: Balancing Your Emotions

Welcome to Part 1 in our ongoing series of the Psychology of Musical Performance. This is a very important and in-depth subject so today we are only going to scratch the surface. Today we’re going to discuss the mental stability necessary for performing and how to create a balanced state of mind for yourself.

Performing music is something that utilizes both sides of your brain. Before a performance you spend so much time practicing and making sure you’re playing technically correct. At the same time, you must let yourself go and be able to be creative with each performance. The trick is finding the right balance so that your performance is not too dry yet not self indulgent in your expression.

Sometimes emotions can completely control your performance in unexpected ways. Allowing yourself to delve into free expression can make you lose sight of where you’re going. For example, if you’re not careful you might take a tempo to a speed you can’t possibly handle! You have to be able to control your performance and reign yourself in.

While you definitely have to control your expressive side, you can’t let the technical side of you overwhelm your performance either. The last thing you want to present is a sterile performance. Musical expression is a completely different form of art from painting or photography in that it involves performance and there is a random element to that. No matter how hard you try, you can never replicate a performance again; each one is inherently unique.

We all have these conflicting aspects of our personalities and they collide with each other when it comes to musical performances. Finding this balance isn’t something you can teach easily; it’s something you must find within yourself through the experience of many performances finding the balance of emotion and reason.

Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729