Performance: A shared act of community

Most people think they aren’t good enough to perform.

“Leave it to the professionals,” they say.

I hear this a lot from my adult students. They often try to convince me that they shouldn’t play at the concerts I host for my studio. They claim no one wants to hear them anyway. And as the teacher, it’s my job to tell them they’re wrong. 

Music can be a personal hobby we enjoy in our spare time, but when you perform for an audience, you transform music into a shared act of community. It’s also an incredibly brave thing to do. Performance anxiety is rooted in the very common fear that we aren’t worthy of sharing our talent, that we’re going to fail and it’s going to feel terrible. Why put that much pressure on yourself? Instead, change your reasons for performing.

Over the last decade or so, I’ve realized that playing music for others feels better than playing music for just myself. Instead of trying to impress others or seeking validation, I’ve transformed music into an act of altruism. I can now truly express emotion through music, because I’m trying to help someone else feel something. It makes my music an act of service instead of an act of self-aggrandizement.

At my studio, I make performance the centre of study. This can make some of my students uncomfortable. We work together on changing that so that they see their music as a gift rather than something they should be judged on. Music doesn’t need to be a solitary experience. It can be experienced together as a community, no matter the level of the performer.