When a girl froze in a recital…..
What to do when a jr. high girl FREEZES in a recital, and can't even remember where to put her hands?
Yup, this happened to me. In 2003, this horrifying thing happened to one of my students. If she were 5 or 6, maybe I could have gone to the stage to help her. As it was - she was 13 going on 16, and she just left the stage, humiliated.
That's when I promised myself I would do my best to NEVER let that happen again. I developed a system of preparing students for memorized performances that has not failed (as long as they apply themselves to the process.)
First up, back up the deadline.
I backed up my deadline to one month before the performance. Here is the plan for five weeks prior to a memorized event:
1. student memorizes piece. Notes and rhythms accurate. During lesson, student selects places at the beginning, middle(s), and end of piece where they feel they can begin by memory. During at-home practice, they are encouraged to change landmarks if they make more sense in other places.
2. student plays piece, starting at each landmark. If we have time, we start from each landmark and go to the end. At lesson, we determine the optimal tempo for the piece. Where is it comfortable, and where does it sound good? We note that as "full tempo". THEN - I assign the student to practice playing the piece - HALF TEMPO - by memory, with the metronome. For really young or beginning students, I might say, "play it turtle slow this week."
3. Half tempo is demonstrated by student. This is critical, because it eliminates muscle memory and forces the student to think ahead. It's boring, and it won't sound musical at this point. At lesson, we go back to putting in dynamics, and talk about phrasing, and all the fun things.
4. Student plays musically (hopefully) by memory at full tempo. I ask them to have a sibling distract them while playing this week. Rules for siblings: no touching the pianist or yelling in the ear. Stay at least 3 feet away. No touching the piano. Make as much of a distratction as possible!
5. I provide the distractions and test the student. Then, we make a video of a fine-tuned performance, and see how much we have accomplished!
All this seems like a lot, and it is. Maybe all of it isn't applicable to your students. When my students recently made videos to upload to an online festival, I didn't go through all of these steps.
What works for you?
Let me know what you do for recital or festival prep. Do you have any tricks that help your students perform memorized music with confidence?