As much fun as it can be to play music you love, performing that music for an audience can be an even more fulfilling experience. Or at least, it can be on those days when you feel prepared, walk on stage with confidence, and have that experience of being completely engaged and immersed in the music.
Then again, there are those other days. The days where you wake up the morning to a nagging feeling of dread deep down, and a voice in your head that says you haven’t given yourself enough time to get comfortable with a certain piece. Or that you started memorizing too late. Or didn’t record yourself enough.
Playing poorly in front of other people is never fun. And the downward spiral of doubts and doom that can kick in after disappointing performances can really drag our confidence down as well.
So given these clear downsides of having negative performance practice experiences in the leadup to the real thing, when is the optimal timing to begin practicing with pressure?
Like, should we hold back on playing for others until the piece or excerpt we’re working on is at a near-performance-ready level?
Or are there benefits to performing even before we feel “ready?”
A golf study
A team of British researchers (Lawrence et al., 2014) recruited 32 non-golfing college students to participate in a putting study.
They were given the simple task of hitting a straight, uphill1 putt as accurately as possible.
Every participant got 300 practice putts, and then it was time for a putting competition, where they could win some prize money.
The timing question
Previous research suggests that practicing performing in advance can reduce the potential for choking in performance. That we can learn to execute complex skills under pressure more effectively if we are exposed to a tiny bit of anxiety during the learning process (kind of like being inoculated to certain strains of seasonal flu with a flu shot).
But the authors note that there aren’t any studies that have looked at when we should introduce performance pressure into our practice. Does pressure need to be present throughout learning? Or is it best to introduce it somewhere in the middle? Or maybe just before we perform?
To tease apart the different effects of pressure training in the different phases of learning, the researchers divided the participants into four groups.
4 different approaches to performance practice
The control group practiced like normal. No pressure.
The anxiety group was told that each practice putt was being recorded for later analysis by a professional golfer. They were also given $60 at the outset of their practice session – but told that they would lose $0.20 for each missed putt.
The anxiety-control group started out their practice just like the anxiety group. With $30 and the first 150 practice putts recorded, and $.20 deducted for each missed putt. Then they did their last 150 practice putts with no pressure.
The control-anxiety group had the order switched – they started out with 150 no-pressure practice putts. And then their next 150 putts were with pressure added.
A putting competition
After completing all 300 practice putts, the participants were given a 15-min break to allow some forgetting to set in.
And then it was time for a 25-putt accuracy competition.
To add a little pressure to the competition, they were given their average score from their last 25 practice putts, and then told that they would be able to win $60 – if they improved their performance by 15% over the next 25 putts, and also had the highest score of all the participants.
So which group did the best under pressure?
Competition results
The researchers used the average distance between the ball and the center of the hole as a measure of putting accuracy (“mean radial error”). And as you might expect, there were some interesting differences between the groups’ performances.
The control group, which practiced without any pressure, performed significantly worse in the competition. Their mean radial error for the last 50 practice putts was 342.21, while their MRE for the putting competition was way worse – 466.20 (lower scores = better performance).
The anxiety-control and control-anxiety groups, which did half of their practice with pressure and half of their practice with no pressure, were significantly more “pressure-proof” than the control group and performed as well under pressure as they did in their practice reps.
The anxiety-control group had an average error score of 341.88 in practice and 335.93 in competition. The control-anxiety group had scores of 323.57 in practice and 302.09 in competition.
And then there’s the anxiety group, that practiced with a bit of pressure thrown in for the entirety of their practice. They were the most resistant to performance pressure, and actually performed significantly better in the competition (300.89) than they did in practice (425.88).
So what are we to make of this?
Takeaways
At first glance, these results suggest that maybe we should always practice with a tiny bit of pressure. Like, videotaping every minute of practice. Or putting a nickel in a “mistakes” jar every time we miss a note.
But I’m not sure that it’s really practical or even desirable to learn with a low level of performance pressure present throughout. Because this might not leave as much room for the kind of creative boundary-pushing experimentation that is also an important aspect of effective practice.
So perhaps the most important takeaway from the study is the idea that we would likely benefit from practicing with a bit of pressure far sooner than we otherwise might.
As the authors explain, “The more participants practiced in non-anxious conditions the more they were dependent on the presence of those conditions for successful performance.”
A good place to begin?
Indeed, legendary violin pedagogue Ivan Galamian once said that when it comes to performance practice, we tend to do too little, too late. I think the results of this study support this sentiment, suggesting that when we wait too long to add performance pressure to our practice, we actually become more vulnerable to the effects of stress and pressure when we ultimately do get in front of an audience.
So it probably wouldn’t be such a bad thing to integrate more tiny doses of performance-like repetitions into practice from Day 1, even if it’s just a 15-second recording of a random challenging passage you worked on that day.
Or, if that’s a little too uncomfortable, the control-anxiety group’s approach to practice could be a gentler place to start. This is where participants started out practicing like normal, with no pressure, but then added performance pressure to their practice putts half-way through.
Beacuse while they did experience a slight drop in performance from practice to performance, it was significantly less than that of the participants in the control group who did no pressure training at all2.
Yes, but…
But how do we get around the crappy feeling of having played below our standards, when we put ourselves out there to perform before our repertoire is totally performance-ready?
Well, many musicians have found it helpful to reframe the way we see these kinds of pressure-proofing performances. To see them as learning activities, as opposed to evaluative activities. As potentially uncomfortable, but ultimately productive opportunities to foster a particular kind of mental and physical capacity that can only be developed with the benefit of some performance pressure. Rather than as tests of our ultimate ability or worthiness as musicians and people.
Easier said than done, perhaps, but this reminds me of the Perlman Music Program’s WIP (“works in progress”) concerts, which give students an opportunity to perform pieces that are very much in the learning stages, but ready to be tested out in front of a supportive group of friends and audience members.
Do students still get nervous? Of course – but I think that’s kind of the point. To manufacture a little bit of pressure – but where the stakes are still very low – so that when the pressure and stakes are much higher, we’ll be better prepared to play up to our full abilities.
References
Lawrence, G. P., Cassell, V. E., Beattie, S., Woodman, T., Khan, M. A., Hardy, L., & Gottwald, V. M. (2013, October 27). Practice with anxiety improves performance, but only when anxious: evidence for the specificity of practice hypothesis. Psychological Research, 78(5), 634–650. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-013-0521-9
A book – and how you could shape it
This is one of the posts I plan to draw on for a book I’m considering. One aimed at addressing those oh-so-frustrating “but it sounded better at home” moments, with research-based guidance on how we can shrink the gap between how we sound in the practice room and how we sound on stage. The idea is short, focused chapters, each addressing a specific frustration, with concrete action steps.
The community is central to this project, as each chapter will close with real-world examples from students, teachers, and professional musicians – showing how the principle plays out in actual practice, performance, or teaching.
If you’ve applied any concepts from this post to your own practicing, performing, or teaching, and found them helpful, I’d love to hear your story. Like, how early on in the process do you start adding pressure? What do you do to create a tiny bit (or a lot) of pressure? What are the little “pro tips” related to this that you’ve discovered over the years? 😁
A short note is totally fine! Because if your story seems like a good fit, I’d love to set up a short conversation to hear more.
👉 Click here to email me your story
📚 Click here to follow the project
Enter your email below to join the Bulletproof Musician newsletter for weekly practice hacks and updates. You’ll also get access to the free 7-day Pressure Proof course, where you’ll learn five essential practice strategies for making more progress in the practice room and playing more like yourself when it counts.
References
Lawrence, G. P., Cassell, V. E., Beattie, S., Woodman, T., Khan, M. A., Hardy, L., & Gottwald, V. M. (2013, October 27). Practice with anxiety improves performance, but only when anxious: evidence for the specificity of practice hypothesis. Psychological Research, 78(5), 634–650. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-013-0521-9
Aha! I thought so!!! I believe this is related to the concept of “state learning”.
Thanks for this one, Noa.
Gary Berlind
Ah……this explains a lot…..maybe. I’ll practice a difficult piece/part for ages before the next band practice, then make the same mistakes all over again. The other week, I started adding in metronome for all my difficult pieces….up to the point where it was difficult to keep up – I was getting annoyed that I couldn’t do it….but band practice has been ?easier and the difficult passages negotiated with a little more success…..
When I studied the piano, my professor was one of the only teachers in faculty who asked us to perform “not-ready” pieces in student recitals regularly, and especially “extra” pieces which were not part of our exam program. His argument was: “you will never have one or two years to prepare a concert” (very true) (which is what the other teachers were doing – letting students play only their exam program pieces in student recitals).
What I learned from that is to step on stage with confidence, no matter what the development phase of the piece is. Is a piece ever “ready” anyway?? Don’t we discover new layers every time we take it up? When do we draw the line between “worthy of presenting” and “unworthy”?
For me, it’s the moment we can touch the emotional content of the piece. And emotion is possible to grasp and enjoy even from the very early stage of development. Not play the notes correctly first, feel the music after. But feeling through the piece as you go and making it your piece.
Indeed! My wife’s teacher in college once told her that it didn’t matter how long she worked on something or how good she became – that there would always be more one could say and do with each piece.
Noa, you read my mind! Now going into my second year of grad school, I decided to work on my recital pieces during the summer. To hold my feet to the fire, I scheduled an informal performance of one of the pieces. In the last few weeks leading up to the concert, I questioned whether I had made the right decision, since the piece still felt very new and not ready… But the performance was last night, and it went pretty well! Now that I’ve gotten the notes under my fingers, I feel I can start going in more deeply on a musical level. Plus, having already performed it in public when it was not fully ready, I feel less anxious about performing it after a few more months of work!
Isn’t a lesson sort of a performance? Sometimes a very not ready for prime time performance. Taking lessons probably builds in a little of that, although I am sure it depends on how comfortable a student is with their teacher.
More of a question really but I wonder how the ability to handle pressure during on task transfers to another task. For example, someone who is a competitor in on arena like sports whether or not that translates to music which is unrelated.
Hi Brian,
Great question. The answer is a little tricky, because people often experience pressure differently in different domains. There are folks who have no trouble speaking to a crowd of thousands, but totally break down when playing an instrument in front of a dozen of their fellow students, for instance.
I do think that the skills we use to handle pressure in one domain do transfer to other domains – but we still have to practice using these skills. So it’s not our ability to handle pressure that is transferrable, so much as the skills we use to handle pressure that are transferrable. Does that make sense?
This is the beauty of what my university called studio class. Once every week, all the vocal students and faculty would convene and students would perform WIP and get feedback from faculty. Low pressure in the sense we weren’t be graded, but enough pressure because performing for peers and other faculty members is always a little daunting.
Really love your blog! Thanks so much for what you do!
Interesting! I often tell my students that even from Day 1 of learning a piece, I start to try to get into the performance mindset even just a teeny bit. So for example, even if the student can only play 8 bars of the music at half tempo in their first practice session, I tell them to still spend a little time closing their eyes, imagining it’s a concert, and then playing those 8 bars at that half tempo. Even if they only do this once a day briefly during their early practice sessions, I feel like it has helped people realize that they shouldn’t just stay in practice/critical mode for weeks/months before they even attempt a “performance” mindset at all.
Wonder what your thoughts are on this!! It can be hard to monitor, and also hard to prevent students from accidentally just playing through pieces when they’re not ready to, so it’s a balance, like everything….!
Hi Jason! Sounds like a terrific idea. And if you’re not already doing this, one additional wrinkle to throw in might be what violinist Catherine Cho has her students do when playing under tempo. She has them aim to play twice as expressively when playing at half tempo, 3x as expressively if playing at 1/3rd tempo, etc.
As an amateur musician, recreational golfer, and competitive youth Volleyball coach I love seeing how the approaches to teaching, learning and practice compare. Volleyball is getting obsessed with Motor Learning principles. And expanding the boundaries to include anticipating and reading as full skill elements of motor skills. Useful but possibly not accurate, or relevant to performances that are not as random and chaotic. (Imagine an ensemble performance where half the musicians were trying to force us to make errors!)
I think a lot about the difference between teaching and introduction mode vs practicing. When it is best to let the kids play and problem solve vs more efficient to master some part skills. My music tends towards improvisational. Blues, jam settings, etc with much lower expectations for where the performance will go than with more structured styles. I suspect that the principles are pretty consistent. But how they are applied to different forms of Performance gets unique.
Great series Noa!
Hi Jim! Indeed – it’s cool to see the overlaps and unique applications of the same principles across different performance domains. With regards to volleyball, I imagine you may already be familiar with this podcast, but it’s specifically for volleyball coaches, so I thought I ought to mention it just in case! It’s called “Coach Your Brains Out” and they cover a lot of interesting topics related to motor learning as well: https://www.blog.goldmedalsquared.com/podcast
And just out of curiosity, do you coach girls or boys volleyball? My son started playing a few years ago, so I wonder if we’ve ever crossed paths at a tournament at some point or another…
Fascinating! Thanks so much for this article! I had wondered about the effect that performances had on my daughters’ piano pieces that they would work on through the year. I knew regular recitals were good to work out nerves, and I always noticed improvement after recitals, but this is wonderful to see this validated. My real question was how the stress hormones might be affecting the brain to facilitate this enhanced learning. Is there any literature that might explain the neuroscience behind why this works?