This week on Facebook we have been posting a few tips to help with those audition nerves during the opera audition season. Here are just a few ideas…

 

We all know that there are so many factors that can add to nerves and how if allowed to, they can affect our confidence and our voices.

This is vital. You will never feel entirely comfortable if you haven’t done your homework. After that though, there are many things you can do

to help yourself.

Sports stars are well known for having visualised every last aspect of their game from the moment they walk into the arena to the moment they have scored the winning goal or crossed the finish line.  or singers, visualisation is a powerful tool – creative types tend to possess great

imagination. Imagine every last detail of your audition going exactly as you would wish from the moment you walk into the room until the moment you leave. Repeat, refine and repeat until you can’t get it wrong!

Do you have an audition today? Squeeze the pads of your thumb and middle finger together on each hand. Focus all your nerves, insecurities,

negative thoughts and troubles into those points then fling them away and go

sing your socks off!

We all know to stay hydrated and so avoiding caffeine before an audition can help. Yes, first thing in the morning it can seem a good idea to wake us up. However, caffeine can make your heart race, increase anxiety and therefore make you feel anxious. Unsure? Save your coffee for an after-audition treat… with a big slab of cake!

Nothing affects the nerves like a bit of self-sabotage. For some of us, it is food. You know that certain foods don’t really agree with you and

yet, there you are munching on foods that clog your throat, make you burp or give you acid reflux hours before an audition. An audition that could mean the difference between work or no work for a whole season. Think about your diet at least the day before. If your audition falls at an awkward time, make sure you have the appropriate food in the house to take with you. That way you won’t be scoffing a chocolate bar from a vending machine half an hour beforehand.

Have you worked out how you will get to your audition and what is the least stressful way to do it? Do you have an umbrella to stop you looking like a drowned rat if the heavens open? You don’t want to suddenly find yourself needing a taxi to take you to a venue that you can’t remember the name or location of because your phone battery has died and then realise you have no cash on you.

Have you decided on your repertoire!? Do you present the aria where you can only make the top note with a good wind behind you or the bottom note that requires 6 pints of Guinness the night before! Don’t! If you can’t nail the tricky patches five times in a row without

a hitch, you shouldn’t be singing it in public. Keep it on the back burner for a few years down the line and sing something you can do well even if you are not on top form. Why carry that extra stress of ‘will it or won’t it work’ into

an audition room with you?

 

Many years ago someone offered this nugget of information.