For those of you who don’t know (only if you’ve been hiding under a bushel), I am a performer. I also deem myself an ‘artist’, but unfortunately for the masses, many think that is a person who pictures up a paintbrush and paints. That is called a painter, people. I don’t fret however, for I know my loosely labeled guidelines allow me to be fluid with myself and fluid with my day to day motions to create what I deem to be art, whether it’s writing here on the Blog, or actually performing somewhere else.
I’ve been asked many times before (throughout my whole life, even) about performing in front of people and tips. Of course, many people would eventually interject their own questioning with the whole “I could never do it, ” or “You’re an extrovert, so of course you can do things like that”, counting themselves out LONG before I can even make suggestions. Well, the reality is you CAN do it if you want to, and even introverts may have to get in front of people and speak (hello weekly company meetings). So in an effort to help my fellow Misfits out there trying to conquer their fright, I’ll share some things I’ve learned along the way.
Rehearse. Easiest solution that I think quickly gets looked over. A dance instructor I had years ago used to make us go full-out during rehearsal. I think only once or twice we could actually just ‘mark’ our choreography, which meant walking through the motions instead of the actual leaps and jumps and how it would be for the show. She taught us very young that the secret was practicing how you would do it eventually on stage for two main reasons. 1) If you practice lazy, you can’t logically expect yourself to get on stage and be a roaring success, and 2) If you make your rehearsals like the performance, it makes the actual performance less scary, because, well you’ve done this before.
Rehearsing comes in many stages, and I suggest using them all. First of all, you need to practice posture and movement. How I am in a musical is different than I am for spoken word, because I’m not moving as much. Nevertheless, your presence still needs to be there in order to captive your audience. Look at yourself in a mirror ad
