Congratulations to Christina who will be performing the Chopin Grand Waltz Brilliant in E-flat, Op. 18, at Orchestra Hall on March 12, 2011. She will be featured with three other Book 6 and 7 piano graduates on the Suzuki Association of Minnesota Recital at 1:00. Upper level cellist and violists will also be featured. This is a lovely honor. She is also in the unique position of having been invited to play twice, upon her Book 6 graduation last year and her Book 7 this year. Last year Anna was also featured upon her Book 7 graduation. All S.A.M. upper level pianists can submit an audition piece with their graduation DVD. The recital is free and everyone is invited.
She and all the other graduates are also working hard to prepare for the S.A.M. piano graduation recitals on March 5, at Westminster Presbyterian in Minneapolis.
I am practicing to prepare a recital piece for the Houston workshop recital, also on March 5.
Practicing right before bed can lead to weird dreams. In my dream last night, I was playing at Orchestra Hall. It took the usual anxiety dream plot. It was the hour of the performance. I wished I hadn't waited until the night before to memorize the piece. I don't know if I will even remember it. I am looking around the backstage for a room to warm up in and all the practice rooms with pianos are filled with instrumentalists. I find a room with a piano but the insides of the dilapidated upright are missing. Oh well. I will have to wing it. I notice that I am wearing sweat pants. This will never do. I start home to change clothes with five minutes to go before the start time. At home I find a black dress. Fine. But as I make my way back to Orchestra Hall I realize that I have grabbed a swim cover smock instead of the dress. (Perhaps since I will be in Hawaii on March 12? ) Oh well. It will have to do. Meanwhile I assume that I have missed the performance completely since it has already been almost an hour since the recital started. . wake up please!
This is not the first time nor the last time I will have such a dream. Even when I am not at all anxious on the outside. For me, the anxiety is usually not about the piece. I only have time to practice reasonable pieces at this point in my motherhood. I'm not tackling any monsters. Instead, the challenge is concentration. Can I concentrate for five full minutes without mental distraction?
Recently one of my advanced students said to me, "Ms. Sara, I learned at the last recital that I shouldn't talk to myself during the piece. I was doing fine until I told myself I was doing fine." Isn't that the story? If our goal is to share beautiful music, why does our head get in the way?
One of the performance anxiety bibles on my shelf is "The Inner Game of Music" by Barry Green. This is a great book. He gives the reader many many tools to work towards increased concentration.
Ultimately, concentration is a skill in itself to practice. Nobody can tell anybody else to concentrate. We have to be drawn in. I perform best and most confidently when I love the piece so much that I can't think of anything else but to listen to the piece go by under my fingers. If I am hearing and enjoying every note, the audience will have the best chance of enjoying it as well.
There are novels to write on this subject, but I'm not going to live out my bad dream. . . I'm going to prepare well, I already have 25 of my 50 perfect repetitions completed, and I am going to work toward listening so deeply that there isn't any room for that nasty inner conversation.
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