Vocalist.org archive


From:  Greypins@a...
Date:  Thu Feb 7, 2002  3:35 am
Subject:  Re: [vocalist] Panic attack during audition


> The classic example is of golfers envisioning
> the hole the size of a canyon.

the only problem with this thought is, if you miss the hole, you feel
like a complete idiot. when i play golf, i always realize the hole is
really small. it is. outside of six feet, most of the time, if the ball
goes in, you were lucky. we can't really control luck very much but, we can
control skill. it takes skill to get the ball close enough so that the next
putt is guaranteed. (gary player once said "the more i practice, the
luckier i get.")

aside from preparing well and not singing something you can't, there
are two things i have found that are most helpful in situations that would
make me nervous. the first one is to reduce your expectations. expecting
more than you can do is silly. if you intend to do something that you know
you can do, the only challenge is to make sure you're paying attention enough
to do it. the other thing has to do with energy. it takes energy to
panic. get rid of it. go running the day you have to do something. do
200 jumping jacks before you warm up. you'll blow off some extra steam.

as to karen's suggestion of beta blockers: i had a student, she was in
her teens at the time, who had horrible nerves when she performed. she was
pretty jumpy anyway so, i wondered if she had any idea what being calm was
like. her doctor gave her some beta blockers and finally, she had an idea
what singing calmly was like. she got rid of the beta blockers and just
aimed for that same feeling when ever she performed from then on. in the
long run, beta blockers are bad. for, while they block the bad 'nerves',
they also block the good ones.

one last thing: singing is still safer than tailgating.

mike






emusic.com