Let’s just get one thing out of the way first – there is no cure for piano performance anxiety. Instead, when it comes to performance anxiety, it’s best to focus on two things:
- Diminishing your performance anxiety as much as possible
- Strengthening your ability to play well EVEN when you have anxiety or distractions
You want to be able to increase your confidence as well as your ability to play well regardless of the situation. These two things will guide your pursuit of dominating performance anxiety and next I’m going to tell you three specific exercises you can do as well to help you.
Key 1 – Have your piece PERFORMANCE ready
This may be obvious, but you need your piece to be PERFORMANCE ready and rock solid if you want to reduce your performance anxiety. I’m not talking about just going through your piece a few times, I’m talking about learning it forwards and backwards, so well that you feel confident you could play it right now if you needed to.
This is honestly the most important step. Without this step, none of the other steps even matter. I go through a 7 day step-by-step method for what you can do to have your piece performance ready and dominate your performance anxiety in this post. It takes you through day by day what you should do including 5 different gauntlet exercises I use when I’m preparing for a performance.
The other two concepts I’m going to talk about are only supplemental – they won’t be of much use if you don’t already have your piece performance ready.
Key 2 – Progressive Desensitization
Progressive or systematic desensitization is a type of behavioral therapy that basically means the more you expose yourself to fear the lower your fear levels will be.
What people don’t understand or get frustrated with is that your piano performance anxiety can go back up as well. It doesn’t just go down every time you perform.
How I like to think of it is this – if you perform, let’s say you start at a level 10 anxiety. As you play more songs, maybe by the third song, when you’re getting more into the flow, your anxiety may eventually drop to a 5 by the end of your performance.
Now, if you perform again within a 2 week span, instead of your anxiety starting at a level 10, now your anxiety starts at a level 9 and you can bring it all the way down to a level 4 by the end of your performance. If you perform again 2 weeks later, this time you’ll start at a level 8 anxiety and bring it all the way down to a 3. Once you keep doing that, you’ll be able to bring your anxiety down to about a 5 or 6.
For me, if I’m doing a solo piano performance, I’ve never got it down below a 5 or a 6. At that point you accept that your anxiety will start at that level and you learn to play through it so that when you play a few songs you bring it down to that 2 or 1 level.
Here’s the thing though, if you don’t perform within about a two week span, your anxiety will go back up instead of progressively going down each time. It’s important to know that because a lot of us don’t perform frequently. Especially if you’re just starting out, you might only perform once every 3 months and your anxiety is going to start at that level 10 every time. So what you want to do is get as many performance opportunities as possible so you can progressively lower that anxiety.
Just remember, you’ll never be at a “zero” anxiety, so the biggest key is what I mentioned first – learn your pieces so they are ROCK SOLID. And this video has some great tips for helping you do just that.
Key 3 – Attitude and Mental State
Most people think this is the most important part of overcoming performance anxiety, but no! Attitude and your mental state is number three, the cherry on top after having your piece performance ready and then utilizing progressive desensitization.
I used to HATE when people would say “just be confident” or “don’t worry about the audience, they don’t care if you mess up” but the point is that is not a practical step! You can’t say “just be confident” a hundred times in your mind and expect to reduce your performance anxiety.
What you need instead is to focus on ACTIONS, actual activities you can do that can put you in a more positive mental state. Next, I’m going to share with you what I do and what a few other people do before they get on stage to put themselves in a better mental state.
How I Reduce My Piano Performance Anxiety
Here’s what I do when I’m about to go on stage:
First, I take three deep breaths.
Then, I get SUPER HYPE!
I get arrogant, I get cocky, and I’m not saying you should do this in your everyday life, but playing sports growing up I learned something about the best athletes, the people who could perform under pressure – they all had that air of cockiness or arrogance.
When I go into a performance, I’m thinking I’m going to BLOW THE PERFORMANCE AWAY! I go in thinking I’m going to dominate the piece I’m about to play. And I really get hype, start jumping around, do some shadowboxing, and I know it looks weird, but it works for me because I’ll go out on stage and it supplants that fear with arrogance, cockiness, and fearlessness. Again, FOR ME, that works, but I know for other people that doesn’t work at all.
I know a guy who literally sits down cross-legged and meditates before he performs, just following his breath and sitting in his stance for 10 minutes before he goes on stage. That’s great, it works for HIM, but I’ve tried that and it doesn’t work for ME.
I also know another woman who is just really chatty before she goes on stage. She’ll talk to everyone backstage, ask the stagehands how their day is going, and then just go on stage.
The funniest to me is one guy I know who will literally have his headphones on listening to heavy metal music, air drumming or air guitaring, and then walk on stage and go play beautiful Beethoven. But it works for him. He’s figured out his best system.
What I’m saying is this, don’t just try to think your way out of your performance anxiety – you need action. You need body movement or taking deep breaths or some type of kinesthetic thing. You can also use music as well, but I don’t suggest listening to your own piece. Try different things out and eventually you’ll find that system that works for you.
Don’t make this mistake…
This next thing I hesitate to even tell you about, but I think it’s important that you have this information.
You want to avoid taking beta blockers. These are drugs that essentially turn you into a zombie.
I’ve never taken them before, but my piano professor in college mentioned how when he was starting out as a professional piano player early in his career, touring around the nation, he got so nervous that he would take beta blockers and they had a couple dangerous effects.
First, they lead to very emotionless playing. You’re sitting there like a zombie. You’re not getting into your pieces. You’re not captivating people. You’re not doing anything that will push you to the next level.
Second, remember how I mentioned progressive desensitization? When you’re taking beta blockers you’re never learning how to deal with that anxiety in a natural way. You’re not actually improving your ability to perform live. That’s even more dangerous because you might think you’re playing great, but you aren’t improving at all, you’re just plateauing at the same level.
It’s really important that you actually build that experience in. So, whatever you do, do not take beta blockers.
Finally, remember that 7 day step-by-step system I mentioned for reducing performance anxiety? You can take a look at that here.