Monday, November 29, 2010

Stage Fright

Ok, so I didn't know this was something you could develop!!! Ok so a little bit of background first.... I have been playing piano since like..... before I was in grade school. A VERY long time. And performing never used to bug me!!! When I was like 8-12 years old, I could play an entire concert by myself. But now do you think I could?!?!?! NO! Of course not. Ok, so it has been progressively getting worse over time.... it would be like my hands would sweat before I would perform... and then last year when I was accompanying a singer... (yikes!! don't mess up!) my hands would shake a tad. And then I did something really stupid like let myself play a song for this musical theatre that I couldn't really play that well and BAM. There went all my self confidence. Ok, so then at the end of last year, there was a school talent show. Now I know that your probably thinking "how much did she mess this up". Well, I rocked it. Just kidding I blew it. Well I decided to play my sonatina (the one I was playing for my exam in like 3 weeks) because it was worth the most marks and I KNEW I was having trouble with playing in front of people. Worst mistake, because it has a lot of really fast runs and stuff and it's hard to play that with your hands shaking. And to make it worse, later, this guy that was younger than me played a piece about the same level and kicked butt. (cough cough, a certain someones BROTHER!!!) Anyways, I don't think experiences like that help with stage fright. Now, my most recent episode (well duh, why else would I bring it up?) was at the school coffee house (it's like a thing where lots of people do lots of stuff and yeah...) and..... well I didn't do THAT terribly bad.... But it is extremely hard to play with your hands shaking!!! If you don't believe me, the video tapes me for this cat corner thing (I will explain later) and it will probably be on Youtube. Just fantastic. But I had the hardest time (it didn't help that I went first!)! Ok, if you have never felt it, I will explain it to you. Before you play, you get this really jittery feeling and your hands start to sweat. And I mean REALLY sweat. Then you should never ever announce your piece (I tried it once, doesn't help). Once you sit down, your hands start to shake. Even before you play. Then, as you're playing, you feel your face going red and your ears started burning (like REALLY burning!) And it is extremely difficult to play when your hands are shaking!!! You stumble through your piece and then finally finish and run back to your seat. This symptoms go on for about 4 minutes, then start to calm down. So, now you know that stage fright isn't something you can get over immediately, it just takes a while. And if you develop it, don't worry. It is probably just a stage in your career as a performer.

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