Prepping for an audition or performance, or even playing for an esteemed teacher or colleague, can be really stressful and anxiety-provoking.
Most musicians don’t exactly think of audition prepping as something to look forward to… a grand learning adventure… or FUN!
Mostly, it’s a fearful, risky, competitive, and repetitive process that feels too unpredictable to enjoy.
But that’s because most musicians don’t know that audition prep is 80% mental and only 20% actual practicing, and if you know how to do the mental prepping, your entire experience of the process can be radically different in the best ways.
In addition, the actual practicing is 80% mental and 20% knowing how to get out of our own way so the body can carry out our mind’s intentions with accuracy and ease.
Of course, those percentages aren’t exact. But in my own experience and from working with hundreds of musicians, I’ve come to realize that most of our nervousness, stress, fear, and tension issues come from having our mind-body priorities backward:
We put 80% of our time and attention on practicing, and 20% (or much less, actually) on our mental attitude; and when we practice, we put 80% of our attention on the activities of the body and 20% on working with the mind.
In reality, EVERYTHING we do starts in the mind, and that’s where ALL of our work needs to be done, while including and using the body as part of the whole SELF, our Primary Instrument.
The body simply carries out the instructions of the mind, and the quality of our movements and creative endeavors reflects the quality of our mind-body coordination.
What if you knew how to optimize the power of your mind, how to clarify your intentions and coordinate your thoughts with your body, how to practice with super-efficient effectiveness, how to make much faster progress with far less effort, and how to put aside the thoughts that create tension and block the free expression of your musical intentions?
What if you could thoroughly enjoy the audition process, regardless of the outcome (which is mostly out of your control, anyway)?
I just met with one of my private coaching clients today and she said it was AMAZING to get back into practicing her excerpts for an upcoming audition after a long time away from them. It was thrilling to her because it took her just TWO DAYS to get the hard spots back into shape, when it normally would have taken at least TWO WEEKS to be able to get them up to speed before working with me.
Since she’s been consistently practicing the simple Awareness Etudes and mind-body processes I’ve been teaching her over the last months (mostly without her musical instrument), she is now feeling motivated, excited about her upcoming audition, and ready to approach the whole process with curiosity, ease, and enjoyment!!
Email me at Jennifer@ArtofFreedom.me if you’d like to learn more about The Art of Freedom® and hands-free Alexander Technique and how you can practice and prepare better for auditions and performances… with less stress/pain/tension, and more joy!