Whether you are in a 5-piece band, the lead role in a play or you want to hit up that open mic next week, how do you really know if you’re ready to perform? In this blog post I’m going to be covering the Top 3 ways to know if you are ready to perform.
You’ve probably asked yourself this question frequently but the answer isn’t obvious and you find yourself in limbo. To enable you to understand if you are ready to perform, I have covered the top three ways for you to know and understand if you are.
Professional or Hobby Singer?
Firstly, I’m going to approach this from the mindset of someone who’s never performed before. You may be unsure whether you want to actually perform in front of an audience or to keep it as a hobby where you just sing in your room, the shower, or to your dog!
Either of these options are perfectly fine to continue with. If you’re strictly a hobby singer, you do you. Maybe though you’re someone who has that little inkling to perform and so you should encourage these thoughts and forge ahead.
Am I Ready Yet?
“Am I ready yet?” is always going to be a continuous question running through your mind. First of all, you are never going to think that you are ready!
Even as a professional singer, sometimes my brain has a way of convincing me that I’m not ready to perform. This can happen even when I’m about to step onto the stage for a performance. It’s just our body’s way of making sure that we’re not in any danger. Back in the dark ages, this is what kept us alive and safe. Today, stepping onto the stage or in front of an open mic is, hopefully, not something that’s going to kill us!
You just have to keep reminding yourself that you’re safe. So keeping in mind that you’re never going to feel like you’re ready, here are some ways that you know you’re ready to perform.
1 – You Can Successfully Make It Through The Song
You know you are ready to perform when you can get through your song without forgetting the words, without messing up the accompaniment or without stopping and starting again. You want to make sure that you’re able to sing the song from start to finish. When you’re up on stage you’re going to be nervous. If the song is already in a shaky state, it could be even worse when you get on stage because of your nervousness.
This is not meant to come across as a negative comment, but you need to understand that you WILL be nervous your first time performing. So make room for it, accept that you’re going to have that feeling of nervousness that you need to plan around. To conclude: knowing that you’re going to be a little bit nervous, you want to practice often to ensure you know your song really well.
For tips on this, get my free PDF guide here on “How to Practice Singing”
2 – Organize A Mock Performance
The second way you can know you’re ready to perform is by organizing a mock performance for yourself and testing out your singing in front of an audience. What I mean is, invite one or two of your closest friends, room-mates, boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, or even your dog! Invite them to come over and be your audience, and give them a performance.
Pretend that it is a real performance. Go through the motions. For example, walk-in through the door like you’re walking onto the stage. Then, introduce yourself if you’re going to be introducing yourself wherever you’re performing. Finally, start your singing performance.
When I was in college we used to do mock juries. The juries were for our end of year exam. So I still do mock performances myself today. My husband is always the first person to hear a performance along with my dog Coco. These two are the best audience participant and is available 24/7!
3 – Feeling Great and Loving Your Song
Finally, the third way you can know you’re prepared is by feeling great and loving your piece. Remember that if you pick a song that you don’t really like, you are never going to have it fully prepared to perform. It’s human nature to procrastinate about things we don’t want to do or don’t like. So make sure you have a piece that you really like. Then you work it up, you feel confident you can perform it from start to finish. Then you schedule yourself that mock performance to seal the deal and perform.
If you require some inspiration for that perfect song, then check out my shop for some books. There are also remedies in it to keep you healthy!
Get That Performance in Your Calendar
The moment you finish that mock performance, you need to sign yourself up for a real performance. You might not be able to sign yourself up for an open mic at first. However, you need to put the open mic date in your calendar and commit to it.
The reason for writing down that date signifies that you make that decision that you’re going to do something. You’re much more likely to follow through with that decision. If you don’t commit to actually turning up to a performance, you will come up with excuses to not go. So put that date in your calendar and turn up!
Every time you perform, it gets easier, I promise you. Your first performance might be a little rough, a little nerve-wracking, a little bit scary and that’s okay. The first time that you perform, you are just going to be so proud of yourself. By overcoming that fear of performing, you won’t even care how it went as you’ll be feeling so great about yourself.
After you do your second, third, fourth performances, then you can start to tweak things. That way you’ll be able to see how you best perform or what kind of situations you most like to perform in. You can figure out so much more about your performing style once you are more at ease.
These three ways are the top ideas of how you will know when you are ready to push yourself to perform:
1 – Know your song from start to finish and be able to get through it completely.
2 – Schedule a mock performance for yourself.
3 – Really love the song that you’re singing and that you’re able to portray the storyline to the audience, whether it’s your song or someone else’s.
If you want more help with your performing or if you’d like a safe place to talk about voice and how to improve, then come and join our Facebook Group The Singing Collective community of singers.
Ready to learn more about how you can work with me? Join the waitlist for my signature membership site Total Vocal Freedom here. By joining the waitlist, you’ll be the first to hear about special promo’s, trials, and when the doors are open!
Leave a Reply