The Power of Perception

Confidence is an important part of being a performing musician. I've recently been thinking about the things that can build or diminish our confidence as performers and the effect that can have on our playing.

Unless you're a complete beginner, chances are you've experienced a day where you really felt you could do no wrong on the piano; you were 'in the zone'.

On days like this, everything seems to fall easily under our fingers, we're full of ideas and we manage to nail everything we attempt. These are the days we live for!

Unfortunately, for most of us, days like this seem to be the exception rather than the rule. It's not that we play terribly on other occasions, but from time to time we experience a gig or a session where we really feel like you're flying.

The question is, if this can happen sometimes, why doesn't it happen all the time?

Unfortunately, I don't know the answer but I have been becoming increasingly aware that the differences in quality in musical performances are noticed far more by the performer than the audience.

Bill Evans once described professional playing as having a minimum performance level. Through practice and dedication, you reach the stage where, even if you are having an off night, the music never sinks below this, perfectly acceptable, minimum level.

This is a great attitude to have, and if you're at the stage where you're good enough to gig regularly, you've probably developed an acceptable minimum level in your playing. This means that it's always going to sound OK. Sometimes, an audience won't even be able to tell the difference between your minimum level and when you're 'in the zone'.

This isn't because audiences are intrinsically uneducated or ignorant, but because the difference between your worst and best performance probably isn't anywhere near as extreme as you might think.

I was at a gig last played by a couple of local musicians I know. Afterwards, I was chatting to a couple of the players and I mentioned to the sax player that I had enjoyed a solo she had played on 'Night & Day'. She looked surprised and asked 'Really?' It was clear that she didn't think much of it herself.

I went on to explain that it was her tone that I had really appreciated on this song as she had produced a really nice 'Stan Getz' tone. At this she broke into a smile and said 'Oh yes, I love Stan Getz's sound'.

So why was she so surprised by my compliment? Presumably it was because she was thinking about some of the mistakes she had made in the solo or the couple of moments where things hadn't gone quite as she intended. She hadn't even thought about the quality of her tone as it was an intrinsic part of her 'minimum level' playing that she took for granted.

The thing is, it wasn't that I didn't notice any mistakes in the solo; I did, but I just didn't care. Overall, through a combination her sound and the good lines that she did nail, the solo was an enjoyable one.

As musicians, many of us somehow automatically focus on what goes wrong in a performance and not what goes right. It's easy to take so much of our ability for granted and to focus on the negatives.

The reality is that music without mistakes is not jazz. Sometimes those mistakes will be obvious to the audience, sometimes they won't, but I'll guarantee there isn't a jazz musician who has ever lived who has played a gig without making a single mistake – even the greats. That's part of the nature of improvisation.

When a musician is feeling particularly on form, he or she probably doesn't play too differently from when they're a bit nervous or lacking confidence. They'll probably attempt more things and take a few more risks but it's my contention that the key difference between whether they think of their performance as good or bad is one of attitude rather than a dramatic difference in the quality of playing.

Put simply, when musicians are playing confidently they're focusing less on mistakes.

If we can accept that mistakes are inevitable in improvised music and learn to focus on the overall picture created by our playing, we can start to quiet that nagging inner voice that judges us and bring us down when anything isn't executed perfectly.

It's important to recognise all the skills and attributes we have developed that make up our minimum performance level and it's also important to recognise that the audience appreciates a performance on an overall impression, not note by note.

I've never heard anyone say "What an incredible solo, so full of passion, originality and technical excellence. What a pity it was ruined by those couple of bum notes in the second chorus".

Equally, I've never heard anyone say "That was a great gig but when the bass player got lost in the third tune of the second set, it just ruined my whole evening".

Focusing on the minutae of your playing is like concentrating on grains of sand on a beach and ignoring the sea, and the sky and the general beauty of the natural landscape.

So, if you would to play with more confidence, you need to assess your musicality as a whole and give yourself credit for the things that you can do – after all, so many of them were only made possible through hours and hours of practice.

Try and keep the big picture in mind and experience the music like the audience does. Think about the solo, or the tune or even the gig as whole and don't get bogged down with judging every single phrase that you play – because nobody else is.

Confidence is simply a state of mind and whilst it's not always easy to control, it helps enormously to remember that if you have developed an acceptable minimum level of performance then you have earned the right to step on to that stage secure in the knowledge that even if you don't have a great night, it's still going to be fine.

Play with confidence, play with passion, play music you believe in and you'll never go wrong. Until next time…