Stage presence

Once I returned to playing from memory, my on-stage needs changed just as my backstage activities changed. When I performed with music, I was much more concerned with non-musical things, such as lighting, page turns, and bench height. Bench height is still important to me, but now my bench position is not forced by my need to see the music, and, therefore, it's not as important as it used to be. 

When performing from score, I did what I could to focus before playing, but, because playing from score didn't force all of the good habits I've been writing about, I wasn't as concerned with some very basic issues. Believe it or not, those basic issues included optimal tempo, listening to the room, and hearing a piece before playing it. Indeed, I had gotten quite used to just diving into a piece. After all, I had the score to save me from any major accidents.

For me, the score was a barrier to the music. I don't just mean this metaphysically; I mean it in the most concrete terms. I couldn't hear the instrument as well, and in turn, I wasn't listening to the way the music was sounding in the room. Ultimately, this meant that I wasn't listening to the music. 

Imagine: week after week of practice with a score in front of my nose, regularly not hearing the instrument at its best. No matter what you think about memorizing music, you certainly must agree that this is an aural impediment!

(Obviously, I'm writing here specifically to keyboardists, whose scores block direct sound from the vibrating strings. But doesn't a baffle (i.e., a score) in front of other instruments affect the way the sound enters the room? A 'cello, a flute, a violin, a voice? I think so.)

Today, I think before I play. I settle down before the keyboard, and I envision the opening measures of what I'm about to play. I breathe, I calm myself. I pay close attention to finding my starting tempo. I recall my meditation practice in order to be totally present.

For this reason, I think twice before agreeing to a lecture recital. It's very hard to settle into a state of total presence when I'm wondering, "What did I just say?" or "What should I say?" A lot of presenters ask if I would talk about pieces before I play them. I only do this if I'm really comfortable with a program, and I strongly discourage it for anyone who's just becoming comfortable with playing by heart. 

Don't forget: presenters don't often have your best interest in mind. You can easily talk them down by saying that, as a memorizing musician, you need to stay focused. If they don't like it, they can hire the guy who needs a page turner.

Hanging out backstage

I already wrote a bit about what and what not to do just before a performance. Among my suggestions are:

• Don't play entire pieces before a performance. The distraction of nerves can make for lapses, and then those lapses will haunt you when you're playing the actual program. 
• Don't review your entire program backstage. This practice invites self-doubt.
• I also don't advocate creating ritual to your backstage experience. What happens if you don't have enough time for your ritual? Does it mean that things won't go well?

So, don't play, and don't review. What are you supposed to do? Those green rooms can be dark and lonely places!

• I don't think it hurts to check a few things, such as tempi (with a metronome) and landmarks. Just don't become obsessive about it.
• Meditation has a centering effect. Breathe and relax while focusing positively on your upcoming performance. Visualize success.

If you're not an advanced meditator, you can only do so much--and backstage time can be fairly lengthy. With that in mind, it's not a bad idea to get your mind off of the performance itself. Try to read. Play a game on your smartphone. Of course, always be aware of time so that you're not caught off guard when it's time to go. 

I've often found that backstage crew can be very, very poor people to talk to before a performance. They're often not that interested in the concert, and they can be quite silly. Your backstage time should be used to clear your mind and your nerves, so even if you're trying to take your mind off of the performance, be careful with how you do it.

I always bring snacks and water for my time backstage, and I always make sure to have something to eat at intermission. My sense is that digestion takes away some of my nervous energy. At intermission, I usually need some energy, and food helps in that way, too. Bananas are known for their stress-reducing properties, so I tend to bring a couple with me as well. Because the stress of playing seems to dry out my throat, I always make sure that I have plenty of water on hand.

None of these suggestions are, of course, germane to the memorized performance, but, as memorization takes more focus than playing from score, it doesn't hurt to remind yourself of these good habits. In an ideal world, backstage time would be fun and exhilarating. But more often than not, it isn't...so be prepared!

Practice performances redux

I've already discussed practice performances in the context of playing a newly-learned piece or two. But now, with a recital on the horizon, you should be planning one or two practice performances of the entire recital. In the case of a few pieces, it's relatively easy to find a moment when you can play for someone or a small group. But a full recital takes commitment, not just for you but for your practice audience as well.

A tough crowd

Just as I wrote before, you want to make sure that your audience makes you nervous. To that end, your practice recital should not be too casual, and it should strive to replicate the emotions that will be present for the public recital. You can have a lot of fun with this, and you can turn it into a nice event, as opposed to an academic exercise.

I'm a very lucky guy in that I can use my home as a practice venue. I'm even more lucky in that my girlfriend is really into this. Not only can I tap into her guest list as well as my own, she also likes to plan a really great cocktail party for afterwards. What's nice about her guest list is that, inevitably, there are audience members I've never met before, and this keeps me on my toes. Even more so, it's nice to have someone to act as host so that I can focus on what I'm there to do. For my own house recitals, I print programs, set up formal seating (as formal as I can be), and plan an intermission. In other words, I try to make it as real as possible.

If you don't have a home venue, you can always rely on some old standbys: churches, other people's homes, or even nursing homes. Whatever venue you choose, however, it's important to let the audience know that you're playing a practice recital. This isn't to take the edge off of your nerves, but it is to let the audience know exactly why they're there. I mention this because, especially if you're playing in a church or nursing home, it's very easy for some venues to appropriate your practice event into something bigger than what you intend it to be. Just be careful.

It may go without saying, but you need to be thoughtful about your audience. If you're performing locally, be careful that you don't siphon off your local audience by inviting them to your practice recital. In local cases, I tend to invite people whom I know are unable to attend the "real" recital. In addition, develop a rotating list of guests so that you're not always inviting the same people every time. Otherwise, they might get bored with you, and you'll cease to be nervous with them.

Just as I recommended for playing a few pieces, you can always use Google+ or another resource to stream your practice recital to the internet. You might not get a nice cocktail hour out of it, but it is an option when you have trouble coming up with an audience. And who knows? You might even build an internet following!

THE MEMORIZED RECITAL: Recital time!

So far, I've taken you from the early stages of memorization, when you were just learning to put a few notes together, to the middle stages of memorization, where you developed a real discipline for maintaining your memorized piece. Now we're fast-forwarding to that point when you've memorized enough repertoire to play a half or full recital. Congratulations!

This is a big leap. You've already played some practice performances of your individual pieces, but you now should schedule one or two practice performances of your entire recital. (I hope you have a lot of friends!)

From there, or even before then, you'll need to book the real deal: not practice performances, but a real, public recital. But before you book your recital, you need to think about how and where those performances are going to take place. If you're like I was, you haven't done a lot of playing from memory, and recital venue and format will be very important to your success.

Aside from those logistics, you need to think about the logistics of preparing a recital. Sure, you've already memorized and practice-performed each piece on the program, but how are you going to keep the ball in the air for an entire recital? And if you've let some pieces rest for a while, how are you going to bring them back? This is all a matter of pacing and, to some extent, endurance. 

We're almost at the end of this blog journey. Just as writing the final chapters of this blog may make me work a little less carefully than when I started the blog, the weeks before a recital can result in some of the worst, sloppiest practice. We get impatient when we see the finish line, and our minds may already be on other projects.

However, with careful planning, patience, and deliberate work, you can arrive at your recital knowing that you've made your best effort. Even more importantly, you'll arrive at your recital knowing that you'll be playing better than you ever have! This is the confidence that makes for remarkable music making.

Practice performances: You're good to go!

You're almost there. It's time to schedule some practice performances! 

If you've just got one or two pieces, you should begin by playing them for a close friend. It's important that the friend makes you nervous, so be careful about whom you ask. Chances are that you won't be happy with that one performance, so think about playing the same pieces for that friend a week later. Whatever you do, try to replicate the performance experience as much as possible. Be formal, and make sure that your friend is an attentive listener. Value the criticism that the friend gives you, but don't be too hard on yourself.

When you're more confident with your piece or pieces, see if you can schedule them for a relatively low-impact event. Perhaps you could play for friends at a small party, or at a church service, or within the context of a larger chamber music recital. Be careful about some of these choices, however. 

Parties may not be the best place, especially if people don't really want to listen or (gasp!) you've been drinking. If you're playing for a church service--especially with a newly memorized piece--, make sure that it's scheduled as a prelude or early in the service. All of the church service downtime (hymns, readings, sermon, prayers) will build up a whole lot of anxiety, and by the time it's your turn to play, you might be in a very bad place. Be careful as well about playing a solo piece on a chamber music program. It's sometimes very hard to change from reading-music-mind to playing-from-memory-mind. In short, think hard about where and when you're going to perform.

At times, I've used Google+ to create live streams of my practice performances. I've done this for individual works and also for full concerts. With Google+, I don't even need to invite an audience. They just show up when I create a public stream! A few years ago, one of my recitals was cancelled due to snow, so I broadcast the recital via a live stream on blogTV. A local newspaper picked this up, and I had 50 viewers at one point. You can be assured that the pressures of a live stream are about the same as for a performance in front of an audience. (I only missed having audience feedback, but I did hold up applause signs!)

And now what you've been waiting for: Yes, you can put your piece to rest! Congratulations! You've now graduated from the Middle Stages of Memory.

A few latter-day lapses

By the end of 2012, I had become a pretty successful play-from-memory kind of guy. One of my top achievements had been to play Poulenc's Concert champêtre with the New Bedford Symphony Orchestra--from memory, of course. I continued to perform recitals here and there, constantly developing and applying my memorization skills.

I still have lapses, and, I'm afraid, they're still going to happen. But, as I wrote earlier, the nature of the lapse and the recovery are very different from what I first experienced.

Last summer, I was playing three Scarlatti sonatas on a program in which I also accompanied a mezzo-soprano. Before playing the sonatas, I mentioned to the audience that the final one could be played really fast, especially if I got cocky. Unfortunately, I did get cocky after the first two sonatas went really well. I started the third sonata way too fast, got lost, started again--also too fast--, got lost again, and then addressed the audience, saying that I guess I had become cocky. So I started a final time and successfully completed the sonata at a reasonable tempo.

But was this a memory lapse? Had I simply started too fast?

Two months ago, I was playing in a church service the day after an evening recital at the same church. (This was a gratis payback for use of the church the night before.) The evening recital had gone really, really well, but, when playing the postlude for the Sunday service, I got caught in a loop. No one knew that I had done this, but I knew...and I had to play the same piece on a recital program later that day. 

Yes, it was fatigue; it was sitting through a church service and having to play on the spot (something I mentioned earlier); it was lack of concentration; it was...still a lapse.

With all of these lapses and difficulties, WHY in the world do I continue to push for performing from memory? Remember: I'm a harpsichordist. I don't have to. 

This is a blog about how to memorize, but I think it's time for a brief discussion of why. 

Here's my Poulenc performance:

My first lapse

As I already wrote, my first two back-to-memory experiences weren't that good. To get back to memory, I decided to choose a short, binary form movement. Since I was already preparing the complete Bach violin sonatas for a radio appearance with Rachel Barton Pine, I decided to memorize the third movement of the sixth sonata. I had never planned on playing that movement from memory in the performance with Rachel, but I figured that it would serve as an isolated test piece. (The third movement of the sonata is for harpsichord alone.)

I programmed the movement as a postlude for a church service. That was my first mistake. (I'll write more about this later, but, in short, playing from memory at the end of a long morning of rehearsals and accompanying is not the best way to do this--especially the first time!) My second mistake was that I had only prepared the work by repetition. I hadn't even studied the score away from the instrument. I had, in fact, applied none of the memorization techniques I had learned many years ago. 

And so, at the end of the church service (but thankfully after the radio broadcast had ended), I played the first A section...then the second...then the B section...and then, probably owing something to the Inner Game, I lost it in the second B section (or was it the first?). I managed to noodle my way out of the mess, and I think I ended this E minor movement in C Major!

I immediately knew that I should have known better, and I immediately knew that I had only committed this work to tactile memory, a type of memory that will invariably fail when it's all you've got. (Incidentally, the movement was perfect during my own practice.)

Making the situation a little more intimidating was the fact that I had already planned on playing this single movement from memory on a 30' recital less than a week later! (I had originally thought that this was an easy commitment, since the rest of the 30' recital had contemporary works on it, and there's some tradition of playing "new" music from score even if the "old" music on the program is memorized.)

And so, I had about three practice days to figure out how I was going to proceed...