The following ideas are by no means original. However, you may find these
    tips quite helpful while preparing your next performance:

    Classical musicians are entertainers
    Yes, classical music is art; but it's also entertainment. When you perform,
    you are providing entertainment, albeit of a high quality. See yourself as an
    entertainer, not only a musician, and your performance will improve
    greatly. The reason? Entertainers focus on the needs of their audience; this
    audience-centric view demands that a performer place themselves in the
    shoes of the public. How much, how little you practiced, whether you broke
    up with your significant other last week, or if you feel an upset stomach mean
    very little to an audience that is giving you the privilege of their time and
    attention.

    By all means practice as diligently as possible to give a near-flawless
    performance. However, at performance time, stop focusing on minutiae
    which probably means little to your audience. Instead, make it your mission
    to ENTERTAIN them with your performance. Or as my former piano teacher,
    Milton Kaye used to say, “I don’t care how perfect you play…just don’t be
    boring!”  

    Understand Stage Fright
    Barbra Streisand, Laurence Olivier, and Van Cliburn are experienced,
    universally acclaimed entertainers. Yet they each suffer from strong,
    sometimes crippling stage fright. In an interview with Connie Chung,
    Andrea Bocelli was asked, “When you perform on stage, are you nervous? “
    Bocelli responded, “Oh, it's difficult to explain how much. I have big, big
    stage fright.”

    Stage fright is a frequent condition of performance, and even very
    seasoned celebrities are stricken from time to time. A host of factors,
    including negative or irrational self-statements, contribute to performance
    anxiety.

    You’ve only got 10 seconds
    George M. Cohen, seasoned singer and dancer once said, "The most
    important part of any act is the first ten seconds and the last ten seconds...
    what happens in between isn't that important." This is the great challenge
    for any performer: how to gain, and hold, an audience’s attention?
  • Engage the audience visually: Before you play a single note,
    introduce yourself to the audience, and SMILE. Establish eye contact
    with a few friendly faces in the crowd while smiling. If you speak, use
                a warm, relaxed tone. Taken together, this shows confidence, and a  
                willingness to perform.
  • Start out strong: Like any good speaker knows, the first moments
    of a speech must provide a “hook”, some attraction point to draw in
    the audience. A speech that lacks a hook quickly loses its audience.
    Does your piece open with a “hook”? The all-important opening must
    establish a certain mood and tone that listeners find compelling.
    Otherwise, you risk losing your audience as their attention wanders to
    other thoughts.
  • Are you “attracted” to your piece? An essential component of any
    effective performance, musical or otherwise, is passion. If you want to
    engage your audience, your piece must have a strong intrinsic
    meaning to you. Before your next performance, ask yourself: what
    does this piece mean to me? Always look to perform pieces that you
    truly enjoy, even love.

    Bottom line: Be proud of yourself! As a performer, it takes a lot of guts to
    stand in front of strangers and bare your creative soul.
Copyright: Amateur Classical Musician's Association, 2007  Questions or comments? Please contact us.
Performance
Tips