THE ASSOCIATED PRESS -- NEW YORK
Extreme demands by mentors or parents are often at the root of stage fright, says Dorothy DeLay, Juilliard's best-known violin teacher. She tells young teachers under her wing to pace demands so students can always achieve them.
But not only young artists suffer. Vladimir Horowitz's nerves were legendary. "The great tenor Franco Corelli, they had to push him on stage," soprano Renata Scotto recalled.
Actually, success can make things worse. "In the beginning of your career, when you're scared to death, nobody knows who you are, and they don't have any expectations," soprano June Anderson said. "There's less to lose. Later on, when you're known, people are coming to see you, and they have certain expectations. You have a lot to lose."
"I never stop being nervous until I've sung my last note," said Anderson, who considers herself a circus performer doing "my tightrope act without the net." Breathing exercises help, she finds. "Years ago, my nerves would force my breath to go high, and I'd be breathing in a shallow way," she said. "Now, even when I'm petrified, I can keep my breath down, and hopefully my lunch, too."
Pianist Louis Lortie can't predict stage fright, he said. "It could happen in the middle of a phrase. You have a silly thought, or you feel the instrument is not responding exactly as you'd like."
Distractions can cause memory slips. In a Mozart concerto recently, Lortie lapsed momentarily into a theme from another concerto in the same key. "It lasted a few seconds and I was back on track," he said, "but it seemed it lasted hours."
Anxiety is heightened, Lortie said, by unrealistic expectations in the age of the CD. Before the development of splicing techniques, recordings often contained wrong notes, and it was standard for live performers to hit them, too. Not now. "We were brought up with the idea that there shouldn't be mistakes," said Lortie, 38. "Technical obsession was a part of the upbringing of my whole generation."
Touring pianists often play in a hall with unfamiliar acoustics and an unfamiliar keyboard. "I try to remember from the rehearsal how the piano reacts, imagine as accurately as possible a performance of that piece and the conditions where you're going to perform,'' Lortie said.
Soprano Barbara Bonney eases anxiety with self-suggestion techniques. "For instance," she said, "you say that your heart is calm and beating regularly and your breath is relaxed and deep, and that your solar plexus is relaxed and warm and your arms are warm, and you breathe gently, sort of a yoga breath. And between each of these suggestions you just say, 'I'm calm, and I feel loved and secure.' I must say I use that an awful lot."
Extreme demands by mentors or parents are often at the root of stage fright, says Dorothy DeLay, Juilliard's best-known violin teacher. She tells young teachers under her wing to pace demands so students can always achieve them.
But not only young artists suffer. Vladimir Horowitz's nerves were legendary. "The great tenor Franco Corelli, they had to push him on stage," soprano Renata Scotto recalled.
Actually, success can make things worse. "In the beginning of your career, when you're scared to death, nobody knows who you are, and they don't have any expectations," soprano June Anderson said. "There's less to lose. Later on, when you're known, people are coming to see you, and they have certain expectations. You have a lot to lose."
"I never stop being nervous until I've sung my last note," said Anderson, who considers herself a circus performer doing "my tightrope act without the net." Breathing exercises help, she finds. "Years ago, my nerves would force my breath to go high, and I'd be breathing in a shallow way," she said. "Now, even when I'm petrified, I can keep my breath down, and hopefully my lunch, too."
Pianist Louis Lortie can't predict stage fright, he said. "It could happen in the middle of a phrase. You have a silly thought, or you feel the instrument is not responding exactly as you'd like."
Distractions can cause memory slips. In a Mozart concerto recently, Lortie lapsed momentarily into a theme from another concerto in the same key. "It lasted a few seconds and I was back on track," he said, "but it seemed it lasted hours."
Anxiety is heightened, Lortie said, by unrealistic expectations in the age of the CD. Before the development of splicing techniques, recordings often contained wrong notes, and it was standard for live performers to hit them, too. Not now. "We were brought up with the idea that there shouldn't be mistakes," said Lortie, 38. "Technical obsession was a part of the upbringing of my whole generation."
Touring pianists often play in a hall with unfamiliar acoustics and an unfamiliar keyboard. "I try to remember from the rehearsal how the piano reacts, imagine as accurately as possible a performance of that piece and the conditions where you're going to perform,'' Lortie said.
Soprano Barbara Bonney eases anxiety with self-suggestion techniques. "For instance," she said, "you say that your heart is calm and beating regularly and your breath is relaxed and deep, and that your solar plexus is relaxed and warm and your arms are warm, and you breathe gently, sort of a yoga breath. And between each of these suggestions you just say, 'I'm calm, and I feel loved and secure.' I must say I use that an awful lot."