- You've been practicing your technique,
you've learned your lyrics,
and you've tamed most of the melody.
Now it's time to perform.
Just one last hurdle to leap over, nerves.
We all get them, but for some of us butterflies
in the stomach can feel like stampeding elephants.
And if we don't learn to manage our performance anxiety
our presentation runs the risk of being aborted
even before we've stepped on the stage.
Never fear, Doctor Dan is here with a range
of easy to do activities that will help you
to calm your farm and get on with the show.
- [Woman] Sound check. Check one, check two.
(upbeat music)
- Hey there, my name is Dr. Dan.
Welcome to Voice Essentials where we develop your voice
and improve your sound.
In the world of performance singing
there is one universal, human experience, nerves.
We've all felt them, and if you haven't then allow me
to warn you, nerves can sneak up on you
when you least expect them.
(scream)
I've had to deal with my fair share of nervous responses
to many of my performances over the years.
With over 25 years of professional performance experience,
I've learned a thing or two about how to manage my nerves
so that they don't disrupt my performance.
So, over the next few minutes I'm going to give you
some tried and true methods for calming
your pre-performance anxiety.
The first thing we are going to learn to do is
to embrace your nerves as your friend.
Many singers see their nerves as the ultimate enemy
that needs to be defeated and dismissed.
Actually, nerves are a part
of your flight or fight response.
Your body's physical reaction to perceived threat.
When your adrenaline gland activates
flooding your bloodstream with the hormone adrenaline,
your body is supercharged with an increased
heart rate and breath rate.
I like to think that that adrenaline is preparing
my body to do superhuman things.
In this case, a vocal performance.
For every upside there is often a downside, in this case,
if your body is allowed to overstimulate
with too much adrenaline studies have shown that our sense
of fear can intensify and render us incapacitated.
You can literally become frozen with fear,
but it doesn't need to be that way.
Let's now look at a few practical tools that will help you
to take advantage of the adrenaline without succumbing
to its potentially adverse side effects.
(audience cheers)
Before we discuss strategies for controlling nerves
immediately before a performance, let's first consider
a couple of activities that you can employ
days and weeks out from any presentation.
It might go without saying, but the number one thing
that will serve to manage your nerves
is thorough preparation.
Nothing heightens a nervous response like being unprepared.
If you put the work into your pre-performance routine,
your technique, lyric, and melody you'll go a long way
to keeping your nerves in check.
Part of your pre-performance routine
should include some visualization work.
The visualization activity is easy to do,
simply sit down in a comfortable chair and close your eyes.
Now, focus in on your breathing and ensure
that your breath rate is even and steady.
Now picture yourself standing on the stage in front
of the size audience that you expect
to be performing in front of.
Imagine a warm and receptive audience
who are eager to watch your performance.
And if you feel your breath rate increase
due to the imagined stimulus focus once again
on your breathing and bring it back to a steady rate.
With your eyes still closed, play a backing track
or a prerecorded accompaniment and sing along silently.
Again, imagining yourself performing
in front of the engaged audience.
As before, if you start to feel your body responding
with an increased breath flow respond by
actively interrupting the anxious response.
Slowing the breath rate, once again, all while
you continue with your visualized performance.
Visualization works, I've been using this technique
for years with my private students and it really does help
you to manage your nerves in the lead up to performance.
But that's not to say that visualization
or any other activity for that matter
will eliminate your anxiety altogether.
No, you'll still have a nervous response
to the unfamiliar performance experiences
so don't let your nerves surprise you
when they arrive the day of the gig.
(scream)
The pre-performance strategies are designed to put you
in control and help you better manage your adrenaline.
(audience cheering)
As I just stated earlier, one of the number one things
to be stimulated by a nervous release
of adrenaline is your breath rate.
This can frustrating for the singer who needs
their breath flow to be even and consistent.
Remember, breath fuels the voice, so if your breath stream
is going into overdrive you'll really struggle
to maintain even regular notes.
Interestingly, as I demonstrated with the visualization
activity, it's your breathing that can also
disrupt the release of adrenaline.
If you feel your performance anxiety levels starting
to rise immediately before showtime, find a quiet spot,
sit down, and focus in on your breathing.
You may notice that your breath rate is similar
to when you do exercise, fast and shallow.
If this is the case, slow down your breath rate
by taking long, deep breaths.
For those of you who own my singing exercise CD,
Dr. Dan's Voice Essentials, try using exercise 12.
The inhale, suspend, exhale activity.
The intentionally rhythmic nature
of this breathing exercise will help to disrupt,
I'm sorry, interrupt the release of adrenaline
and put you back in control.
Now, I've got three more things
that you can do to manage your nerves.
But before we go through them, leave me a thumbs up
if you're getting something out of today's video.
(audience cheering)
Learning to manage your breath is really the best strategy
for keeping your body's nervous response in check.
This being said, there are a few other things
that will really help when the nerves seek
to overturn your performance.
Personally, I find that nerves cause my mouth to go dry.
One minute, I've got a comfortably moist vocal tract
and the next minute it's a desert.
I've learned to always carry a water bottle
with me even onto stage.
The moment I feel my mouth starting to dry out,
I will swill some water around in my mouth.
At times when I don't have a water bottle handy,
I use a little trick I learned about 15 years ago.
Let's try it together.
Place the sides of your tongue between your upper
and lower molars, towards the back of your mouth.
It looks like that.
Now, bite down really hard for 10 seconds.
I'll count, you ready?
And bite, two, three, four,
fuve, six, seven,
eight, nine, 10.
And release, any moment now you should feel
a rush of saliva through your mouth.
The biting stimulates your saliva glands
and floods your mouth with saliva.
This little trick has gotten me out of trouble
more times than I care to remember.
The other thing I always carry with me
is a physical print out of my lyrics.
My nerves have always interrupted my short term memory.
In the early days of my performance career
I'd be standing offstage and suddenly
my mind would be completely blank.
This would send me into a panic,
escalating my performance anxiety.
Nowadays, the moment I can't mentally recall the lyrics
backstage I simply go to my hard copy and refresh my recall.
This in turn, ensures that my anxiety
can't spiral out of control.
Finally, many of us sweat profusely before we perform.
Sweaty palms have never been an issue for me,
but if it's a part of your performance anxiety response
I recommend always having a hanky or a tissue within reach.
Being able to wipe your face and hands dry
can serve to calm your physical awareness of your nerves,
thus empowering you to keep them in check.
(audience cheering)
Each of the strategies we've discussed so far,
targets the performance anxiety before you sing.
But even when you've employed each
of the suggested exercises you may still experience
a heightened sense of nervousness during the performance.
In many respects, the main way we learn to manage
our performance anxiety on stage is by,
you guessed it, spending even more time on stage.
There is a certain level of desensitization
that needs to take place.
Singers who are new to the stage need to devote more time
to performing so that they become familiar
with the sensations and experiences
that live performance affords us.
Without seeking to trivialize the singer's
physical experience, I often remind my beginner performers
that what they're feeling on stage is more often than not
completely unobservable to the audience.
So for example, shaking knees and a racing heart
might feel unbearable for the singer but the audience
is typically blissfully unaware of what
the singer is experiencing.
The very knowledge that your audience can't see your nerves
helps in part to quell your nerves.
If my audience can't see or hear my nerves
then maybe I don't need to be as nervous.
Look, it's a small mental game but it can be helpful.
Finally, for a small group of people,
performance anxiety is a completely immobilizing condition.
For this small group, all the strategies I've described
in the video, while helpful, will not serve
to manage the body's fight and flight response.
Typically there are greater mental
and or emotional concerns at play
requiring professional care and psychological therapy.
If you think you might fall into this category
then I eagerly encourage you to seek out the assistance
of a psychologist or a professional counselor.
I urge you to not let your performance anxiety
destroy your desire to sing and perform.
Well I hope today's video has been helpful.
Please leave me any comments or questions below,
I'll be happy to answer your queries
to the best of my ability.
And if you've got a friend who struggles
to manage their performance anxiety,
then allow me to suggest sharing this video with them
via your social network like Facebook or Twitter.
For now, I'll sign off.
I'm Dr. Dan, sing well.
(scream)
(audience cheering)