I recently had a disasterous performance on the flute. Cotton mouth, cold sweats, total loss of tone (as in NO sound coming out!). Does anyone else ever have these problems? What can be done? While I have never had this happen to such a degree before, I often have problems with losing my embouchure when nervous. Any tips there?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Tanks!
I heartily recommend an excellent book: “The Inner Game of Music”.
Every muso should have a copy, imho.
I’ve been told by pros, and my own experience confirms,
that the chief cause of ‘stage fright’ is being insufficiently
prepared, insufficient practice, not enough rehearsal, etc.
So there is something to do about this.
Above all, I find that the longer I play the flute (the more
months/years), the less
likely I am to lose my embouchure, etc. These things
don’t happen to me anymore, my body just plays
the flute (not necessarily well, I’m afraid), almost
as it walks.
So if you are at all newish, time is definitely on your
side. Just stay with it, be well prepared, and these difficulties
will fall away.
One thing that have helped me a lot in terms of stage freight, especially on a new instrument, is busking. It is a great way to get to play in front of a public, but in a situation more relaxed than an actual concert. This helped me a lot when I started with bagpipes after several years of fiddle playing. For me i guess the problem is to be used to be nervous togeather with my instrument, so it doen’t come as a surprice how I (we (me and my instrument)) react when under stress. With this training I can perform almost as well in front of a public as I can do during practise at home. One extra advantage with this kind of “public rehearsal” is that you stay extra focused on your playing and care of your playing.
Still I havn’t got out in public with my Tipple though…
/Anders
Some of the best musicians in the world suffer from performance anxiety. While it may be some relief to know that you have practiced well, learned the material, and played frequently in front of small audiences, that, in itself, is not enough to escape from performance anxiety if you are prone to it. A tranquilizing drug, such as diazapam (Valium), is other prescribed by doctors to help alleviate the symptoms of performance anxiety.
Last night I played the mandolin for a backyard dinner party, and other than forgetting some of the tunes that I was going to play, I did pretty well and wasn’t too nervous. However, on occasions in the past I have become so nervous that I was hardly able to play. Performing with the flute tends to cause tension in my neck, and I begin to get cramps. I seem to be more relaxed playing the mandolin. I have given up trying to perform with the violin.
Definitely true.
Feels like this:
This is impossible! In 30 seconds I’m going to take out my
flute/whistle/pipes…rt here on this busy street and
play as loud as I can. My God! I can’t do this.
It’s madness… 29, 28, 27, 26…
Geez, I can’t play at all! No sound, no tone, my
fingers won’t function, wrong notes. Aaaargh!
Hey, nobody notices…
This lady just thanked me for my music!
Gave me a dollar…
I just utterly mangled ‘Foggy Dew,’ what’s
with these people?
I’ve been at it halfan hour and I’m
oxygen drunk, high as a kite.
No fear, in the groove, fingering
accurately, projecting, playing with
feeling. However I’m making less
money than when I was screwing
everything up. What’s going on here?
Etc.
I try to play in public parks as often as possible. It helps that the weather just cooled off this weekend so that it’s actually comfortable again. Not exactly busking but it’s still more of a performance than noodling in my living room. I find I play a lot more tunes this way, rather than just repeating my current faves.
I came across some good advice on this topic while browsing the web. It was from the perspective of gigging harp players. They have it worse than we do because
and
Anyway, the gist of this guys advice was to practice playing a piece perfectly from a dead cold start. So, the first time we pick up a flute, the thing to do is immediately charge through a tune playing well as possible, no matter how bad it sounds. With time, this becomes much easier to do. Most importantly, dont lose the rhythm. An audience usually won’t notice mistakes unless they disrupt the flow of the tune. . . ie screw up the beat.
The other thing was to try starting off pieces in very weird places - like the middle of a measure. That way, when getting thrown off duing an actual performance, it becomes much easier to pick up the thread. Unfotunately I didn;t bookmark this infomation 
Methinks we have it easier than some musicians because our tunes are pretty durned short, and the preferred style for learning is though listening, rather than dots, which apparently confers benefits in terms of memory.
I used to have terrible problems with performance anxiety.
I no longer do.
The more you play in public, the easier it gets, and the less nervous you’ll become each time.
You will have some performances go very badly in this process of becoming comfortable with it. That has happened to all of us and is a necessary part of learning to become comfortable with performing.
Keep playing! Time and experience will make it better.
–James
Here’s something else to think about. That feeling is not necessarily fear or anxiety. I’ve spent a lot of time performing as a magician and get the butterfly feeling, shakes, and sometimes cold sweats pretty often before I go on. I don’t have stage fright however, it’s just the energy and excitement that comes with performing. I’m always fine once I go on. I worry more when I don’t have that level when I walk out on stage.
Mark
PS If you can’t get yourself in this frame of mind, then here are the words of a friend of mine, musician and magician Abbi Spinner, that might help: “It’s okay to have butterflies, the secret is to get them to fly in formation.”
Hmm…yes, I think it’s excitement more than fear. I have no problem singing in front of people. I guess it’s because I have done it almost all of my life. But I had exactly that (nothing came out of the flute) happen. It was a hometown crowd and I played fine after a few tries, but I made a verbal blunder. It was between homes, when I was staying with my parents. When nothing came out of the flute, I blurted out, “I’m really good at home in the bedroom!” Everyone laughed.
It’s really crippling! I wonder if I’ll ever feel totally comfortable playing flute in public.
I have been performing for years, so rarely have “anxiety”. Like others have written, there is always the pre-performace excitment - and there should be, or why bother.
I have always tried to focus on The Music, whatever it is and not on me, or my instrument, or the audience or anything else. As musicans, we sort of “channel” the music from where ever to the listener. I feel the need to reach a high level of relaxed concentration and just let it flow. Almost like listening to the music as your playing instead of focusing on the playing.
I think you have to practice this way to.
The first time I played in front of an audience I almost died mostly because I sucked at the time and I knew it (unfortunately so did the audience) 
Seriously what happened to you is natural and is most likely reflective of 2 factors: experience and confidence. Both will improve greatly with time, just keep doing it. Also try to see the humour in it. My philosophy is that once you’ve embarrassed yourself to the bone it doesn’;t matter anymore, so then why not just relax?
It maybe that it will take you a couple years to get over the butterflies, some never get over it, i can fortunately say that i’m as relaxed as I am in my livicng room when i play in front of a crowd.
One other thought: Don’t worry what other people think, focus on your playing and listen and enjoy the music…
Also you may try a pint and a whiskey prior to the performance…
Thanks for the help. Practice is always a good idea I suppose. I’ve been playing for a long time so lack of experience wasn’t the problem. I perused some of the older threads and discovered one about an all-Ireland champion who lost it on stage. That made me feel better! Misery loves company and all that.
That which doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. . . . . . . right???
Amen to that, brother! 
I wrote this in 02.
Eddy, a professional boxer, is now
training with my wife’s trainer, Davy,
who, as I related in an earlier post,
is now my trainer because I need to
protect myself from my wife.
Eddy is about 5, 6’', 130 pounds,
and lightening fast. He hits the
bag with terrific force almost faster
than I can see–lots of combinations.
Looking at him it seems completely
daft to let professionals boxers fight one another. Eddy has
scars on his forehead from cuts.
At 32, Davy’s speech is slurred.
But Davy moves like a panther–a beautiful
relaxed lethal smoothness. You can
see why people get hooked on boxing.
There’s nothing else like it,
fortunately.
My wife has been talking to Eddy about
philosophy, in which he is interested,
so yesterday he asked me
to say something philosophical.
‘That which does not kill me makes me
stronger. Nietzsche said that.’
‘Hey, I LIKE that!’ Davy said.
Eddy looked dubious.
‘Suppose I get run over by a truck
or something, and they glue me back
together and I live. How’s that gonna
make me stronger?’
‘Nietzsche’s a bit over the top,’ I admitted.
Davy picked up the medicine ball, pointed to the sit-up mat and smiled at me:
‘Common Mr. KO. I’m gonna make yo
stronger!’
Nice thread. If you play all the time you will naturally seque from playing alone to playing in front of people. The more you play the more natural it will be to continue playing.
My huge – and totally infallible – piece of advice is as follows: start so slowly that you have no fear of missing a note. Start so slowly that you know there will be no problem. If you stay within your comfort level at the beginning you will find that as you relax you speed up a bit-- and that’s fine because you will still be relaxed. There is no such thing as starting too slowly.
I play in noisy Irish pubs with world-class, major league players. Nobody ever says that so and so plays too slowly. But you often hear one player commenting that somebody else is nervous and playing too fast for their own comfort. If you play slowly and comfortably when you start to the tune it will sound better and you won’t be so nervous.
Just think of how slowly Martin Hayes starts out on some tunes. When you play slowly you sound better and you will come to respect your own playing more. It is self-doubt that is the killer.
Great advice, as always. Deep too; ‘slow is good’ increases
the pleasure and the beauty of playing ITM, IMO.
It is easy to forget.
To which I add, repetitiously–
rehearse the tunes you will play so that you can play
them standing on your head. To put it together,
rehearse the tunes slowly, a whole lot.
I just want to add: there is a session I sometimes go to,
it’s been happening for years, the musicians struggling
to learn and play the tunes. Over the years they’ve
actually succeeded–they can play the tunes well enough–
and they have devoted their new chops to playing
the tunes FAST. Thereby obliterating much of
the beauty of the music. Rats!
Lovely, lovely advice. And very well-timed. Thank you!
P.S. Jim, I so know what you mean. There’s a difference between energetic and fast – and darned if it isn’t hard to get people (and I’m not leaving myself out of that group! :roll:) to see it.
Before playing in crowdy pubs, try to play in your family or with friends, but not alone; you should (that’s what I did) find somebody who can attract people attention (better player, funny player), so you can slowly enter the performance. You will get confidence.
Always remember that people don’t want to evaluate your performance, they just appreciate it!
And do it as often as possible. After 12-15 sessions (more or less), you’ll be ready.
Best
Forget it.