Ambivalence / Pep Talk

As excited as I was earlier this year about the prospect of joining a community orchestra, I am now having some ambivalence. 

One thing tamping down my enthusiasm is that I feel--make that I AM--underprepared for auditions. August is just so rough at work that I have been too tired when I got home to keep up with practicing. 

Another thing bothering me is--and I know I should not dwell on this--ghosts of auditions past. Am I remembering the good ones? No, I am remembering the ones where my hands shook and the bow did spiccato on its own and I convincingly demonstrated that you cannot fake high parts when you are the only one playing. (Academic Festival Overture, I'm looking at you.) 

So, how can I turn this mindset around? What was my best audition ever? My audition for the school orchestra when I started high school, hands down. I went in with no expectations and put no pressure on myself. I was secure in the belief that I would get in, and I didn't care where I sat. I have no memory of what I played or how I thought it went at the time, but I ended up third chair in the first violins.

With these auditions, I have different reasons in the case of each orchestra to think I am no sure thing to get in. It's absolutely true that I don't care where I sit, so I've got that going for me, which is nice. 

How else can I take pressure off of myself? Maybe I could think of it as a job interview in a situation where I already have a job that I like and am reasonably secure in. I don't need to nail this. No matter what happens, I am gaining experience with the audition process and making local orchestra contacts. 

Do I judge people when they get nervous and don't perform at their best? No. I  need to treat myself the way I treat other people who are nervous. (In August, I interact with a lot of nervous people at work.) I need to politely ignore the nervousness and envision only calmness and confidence. I need to convey that I anticipate success and comment on every bit of success that I notice. Thank you and goodbye, nervousness--calmness and confidence and success are going to take over now. 

Now that I think it through, this is sounding very much like what Noa Kageyama wrote about a few weeks ago on The Bulletproof Musician and what Joyce DiDonato spoke about in the video he included. It's reassuring to think that you can overachieve, in a way, in relation to your technical preparation (or maybe it's more accurate to say make the most of your technical preparation) by investing in some mental preparation. Not that I have done a ton of mental preparation, but--OK, no second guessing. Time to get in some productive practice and a good night's sleep.