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Nerves before a Performance

Do you get nervous before a performance?

  • Yes

    Votes: 92 50.5%

  • No

    Votes: 90 49.5%
  • Total voters
    182
#141
NoBlackTShirts said:
Is it nervous when you feel fine, perfectly confident, but your hands don't work? That's what I get and there doesn't seem to be any remedy for it.
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I have noted that my hands get slightly sluggish/jittery/off with too much caffeine. Caffeine works by forcing you to release adrenaline, which a performance also does. So try cutting your caffeine consumption before a gig, bearing in mind caffein has a biological halflife of 5 hours.
Otherwise, I think calming techniques can help. But unfortunately if adrenaline is too high, theres nothing I know of you can do but wait it out.
 
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#143
NoBlackTShirts said:
Is it nervous when you feel fine, perfectly confident, but your hands don't work? That's what I get and there doesn't seem to be any remedy for it.
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So you're nailing it in practice no problems? Then in a live setting your hands don't want to cooperate?

Like are we talking about in general (like just the root/backbone) or about like tuff tight licks?

I used to go to my friends college recitals for classical guitar. And sometimes there would be somebody that would have the "Picking hand shakes" so bad, I would have to get up and leave it would make me so nervous. But that is a super sterile environment and you are all alone and you know all eyes are on you.

But in a bar with a group of people also playing with you, should certainly take that kind of edge off.
 
#144
electracoyote said:
Sorry for your loss, but good point. Somber, profound occasions can be extremely difficult even for the most stout among us.

I also don't recommend soloing at your own wedding. Nerve-racking. I barely got through it and nearly forgot lyrics several times.
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I had many people say to me, "I don't know how you could have done that. I would have lost it." But, like I said, sometimes the imagination is worse than the reality. As much as I treat music as the business of entertainment, I still believe music is first and foremost a way to express yourself and connect with others. I had a great need to express, and that overshadowed any desire to perform. And I guess that's what really carried me through. If you have something meaningful to express, sometimes that can help you overcome your fears. It doesn't have to be a somber emotion either.

I did a wedding where we backed up the father of the bride for a song. When I rehearsed with him, I told that no one is going to throw eggs at him for singing a song to his daughter off key or if he cried. He did tear up at the reception, but it was absolutely OK. It wasn't about the performance. It was about the expression.
 
#147
Lownote38 said:
Never had problems with being nervous on a stage at all. I think I would be nervous if I didn't have a bass strapped on me, though. I channel any nervous energy into my playing the best that I can.
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Like radio or TV, I need an instrument in my hands to poke that nervous energy into. Without a guitar or bass in my hands in an interview I feel "naked and afraid".
 
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