Musical Performance-why-and-how

by Kathleen Briggs

performance-why-and-how
(excerpted from "Four Habits of Effective Practicing")

Music has a nature, too. It's in its nature to excite. It's in its nature to calm. It's in its nature to effect the listener in hundreds of ways. But none of these things can come to be unless the music is performed. IT IS IN THE NATURE OF MUSIC TO PERFORM. Without a knowledge of the why and how of performance, there is little reason to practice. Without a performance, music is not music; it's silence and has no power at all.

Audiences

1. The Performer

   The performer has a lot of responsibility. If he or she hasn't prepared well enough by practicing the way we have talked about earlier, the music won't even reach the audience.

2. The Audience
   The audience can be anyone who listens to the music. It can be one person or 400 people. It can be in a concert hall, or in a practice room. It can happen before a king and his court or just the performer's best friend.

   You can find audiences in many places. They are in your own home when you play for a family party or meeting. They are in your church when you have prepared a special song for them. They are in your school when there are others performing for each other in a talent show. All of these performances are important and each one can lift you up to a new level of playing.

   But of all the audiences a performer could play for, there is one that is the most important: yourself. The audience that cares most about the performer, that knows the performer best, that spends the most time with the performer and that is the most excited to hear the performance, sits in the best seat in the house: right between your two ears.

   I want to give definition to the phrase performance-why-and-how. I think the first half, the "performance-why," can be defined as the message you want to give your audience, what are the feelings you want your audience to have as you describe it? The last half, the "performance how" can be described as the quality of practicing and preparation you have put into your piece, thus giving yourself the freedom to express the "performance-why."

   If you have prepared your performance well, you can please yourself, and you can please any audience in the world because you as your own audience don't clap unless the performance is really good. And as long as you like what you hear, other audiences will give you everything you need to keep on performing. REMEMBER, YOU ARE YOUR OWN MOST IMPORTANT AUDIENCE!

Preparing for a performance

Before we begin talking about performance why and how, let's make sure we know the difference between a performance and a rehearsal.

This whole process of performance-why-and-how is a wonderful thing. It's exciting to be there, whether you're in the audience or on the stage. There is really nothing to fear, but it's certainly human to be a little nervous. And we are all human, so it's a good thing to talk about being nervous when you perform.

When I was a lot younger, I would get very nervous when I would perform. I remember my legs shaking so badly I didn't think I could walk on them. But now, I hardly ever get nervous. Do you know what made the difference? Two things took away the nervousness I used to have as I performed: (1) performing a lot, and (2) being my own most important audience.

If I were to count how many times I have performed since I started learning to play music, I imagine it would most likely be close to a thousand, and many musicians have performed ten times more than me. Each time I performed I was less nervous than the time before. How many times have you performed? Wasn't the last time you did it easier than the first time? Imagine how easy it will be next year after you have done two or three more performances.

It's rather obvious that as a part of performance you need to look for places to perform? You could ask your friends over for a mini-recital after school, you could ask your Mom to listen to you play while the potatoes are boiling. You could sign up to be in a school talent show. You could go to the nursing home and play for the people there. If you did all of those this year or even this month, by the time you were through, you would be a lot less nervous than you were the last time you tried it. Yes, it gets easier every single time you perform. I promise.

Each mistake you make helps you perform better the next time. That's why before an important performance why and how like a festival or a recital, it is very useful to perform a lot. Look for places to perform and set a goal of how many performances you want to have before the one that's most important. Start out performing for yourself, then for friends and family, then maybe in a small recital. Just like your song needs practice, performance takes practice as well and the more you do it, the better you'll be at it.

Remember that the second thing that has made me less nervous as I have performed is being my own best audience? Let me tell you about a time I was performing on the flute in a church meeting. I was performing the adagio movement of a flute sonata by Johann Sebastien Bach. I love to play Bach like my dog loves to play fetch. This particular piece was one of my favorites and I had practiced it a lot until I felt I could do it pretty well.

So, there I was, up in front of a church full of people, playing Bach. The pianist played the introduction and I began playing. The notes were so beautiful to me - not my playing, but the notes that Bach had written. I wasn't worried about making a mistake because I had practiced so hard not to. I just let the notes out of my flute and into the air one by one the way Bach had written them hundreds of years earlier. I had the piece memorized, so slowly I let my eyes close and let the music take me wherever it wanted to take me. It seemed to carry me away to a higher place where God himself was listening with me.

By then I knew that it wasn't me that was performing - it was the music itself. It had truly come alive! I felt like I was looking up at a sky full of stars! Each note was beautiful all by itself, but as it took it's place among the other notes the beauty took on larger shapes and colors, like stars in a constellation.

Slowly, the piece came to an end and when the echo of the last note had faded away, I opened my eyes. To my amazement, there were people there looking at me. I had completely forgotten that they were there, that I had been performing in front of them. Self-consciously I sat down, confused about what had just happened.

I didn't figure it out until much later, but from that moment on, I knew two things for sure: (1) once music comes alive, it is on its own power and it can do wonderful things; and (2) I was my own most important audience. I hadn't been nervous to play in front of the people because I was so caught up in the music I was hearing. The performance-why-and-how had completely overcome any nervousness. I really hoped that the other people who heard the music loved it as much as I did, but even if they didn't, the music had taken ME to a place that I loved and that was worth all the practice and work.

Remember, remember, remember: it is in the nature of music to perform and you are your own most important audience.



Kathleen Briggs is a contributing composer/arranger for Music House Publications.