Performance Anxiety and Beta Blockers

[richardfinegold]

There is a piece in the Sunday New York Times today written by a Pianist who gave up the Piano due to uncontrollable performance anxiety.
40 years on she returned to the instrument with joy, but found that the she is still unable to share her joy with family freinds because of intense anxiety.
She sought Professional Help. Her Internist prescribed Beta Blockers (the Doctor takes them herself before she has to give lectures) and her Psychologist has her performing in a large airport, where people are doing all the other things we do at airports and for the most part
ignoring her.
She has found this to be beneficial and can now play for her family and freinds. She also gave the estimate that 30% of all Orchestral Musicians for performance anxiety.
That seems like a large number of musicians. I have been taking a beta blocker due to my recent confinement and it's kicking my a**.
I was curious if the use amongst performers is that prevalent.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Rather worrying if 30% of orchestral musicians suffer from performance anxiety (assuming we are talking about more than normal "concert nerves"). Long ago I dismissed any idea of being a performing musician. Even if I'd been good enough, I wouldn't have been able to take the mental strain. So many of my musician friends consume more alcohol than is good for them.

[MrGongGong]

When I was at college in the 1980's Beta Blockers were very widely used.
I think these days many musicians have found much better ways of managing performance anxiety that don't involve drugs (before the gig at least !)

[Once Was 4]

I have been more-or-less out of mainstream professional orchestral playing for about ten years, doing mainly local professional, semi-pro and paid amateur gigs. But the situation was that over half of the players in one of our regional symphony orchestras at any one time was reputed to be on beta blockers - even for run of the mill concerts on the road.
I took an interest in orchestral players' health problems and attended an international symposium on the subject at the University of York where eminent medical practitioners had quite serious rows with each other as to the effectiveness of a variety of treatments. I 'wrote this up' for an obscure musical periodical and was then phoned by its Editor, one of Sir Thomas Beecham's woodwind players and now deceased, who was scathing about drugs, meditation techniques and a host of other things - reeling off a list of famous players of the past who "could not go onto a stage unless half-cut!"
With regard to beta blockers these were explained as an "I got there first" cure: in other words, the bodily processes which cause the symptoms of nerves (dizziness, feelings of panic, the dreaded 'pearlies - bodily shaking - and so on) are halted by the drug getting round the bloodstream and halting the 'fight or flight' conundrum.
The problem then is that the feelings of excitement which help public performance are also halted and the player thinks that s/he is playing well when in fact the reverse is the case.
I once saw horn player, with whom I have worked many times and for whom I have the utmost respect, shaking like a leaf whilst playing a notoriously 'pearly' solo live on TV. Another, whose career encompassed London and regional orchestras and for who I also have the utmost respect, told me that he had given up playing in public as "every show meant half a bottle of wine and two beta blockers and they were not working any more!"
When I was at music college in Manchester between 1966 and 1970 people who displayed performance nerves were looked upon as 'softies' - we covered up nerves (which I suppose most of us suffered from) with humour and alcohol. Once players got past their first years alcohol often became a prop - a colleague of mine once said that you are at your best when straight out of college - full of self confidence and with a technique still intact before being bashed to bits by the daily slog. Where I worked for 26 years there was a self-policing attitude to alcohol - anybody who turned up for a show having refreshed themself too much was soon shown the error of their ways. Other orchestras have alcohol policies (hilariously, one orchestra banned the use of alcohol on any day when representing the orchestra in public - their MU Steward asked if this included the management when they attended social events glad-handing bigwigs and possible sponsors and caused consternation!)
Now we have BAPAM and the Performing Arts Medicine trust and music colleges do offer help to combat the problem.
Drugs are just bad news!

[richardfinegold]

I have been more-or-less out of mainstream professional orchestral playing for about ten years, doing mainly local professional, semi-pro and paid amateur gigs. But the situation was that over half of the players in one of our regional symphony orchestras at any one time was reputed to be on beta blockers - even for run of the mill concerts on the road.
I took an interest in orchestral players' health problems and attended an international symposium on the subject at the University of York where eminent medical practitioners had quite serious rows with each other as to the effectiveness of a variety of treatments. I 'wrote this up' for an obscure musical periodical and was then phoned by its Editor, one of Sir Thomas Beecham's woodwind players and now deceased, who was scathing about drugs, meditation techniques and a host of other things - reeling off a list of famous players of the past who "could not go onto a stage unless half-cut!"
With regard to beta blockers these were explained as an "I got there first" cure: in other words, the bodily processes which cause the symptoms of nerves (dizziness, feelings of panic, the dreaded 'pearlies - bodily shaking - and so on) are halted by the drug getting round the bloodstream and halting the 'fight or flight' conundrum.
The problem then is that the feelings of excitement which help public performance are also halted and the player thinks that s/he is playing well when in fact the reverse is the case.
I once saw horn player, with whom I have worked many times and for whom I have the utmost respect, shaking like a leaf whilst playing a notoriously 'pearly' solo live on TV. Another, whose career encompassed London and regional orchestras and for who I also have the utmost respect, told me that he had given up playing in public as "every show meant half a bottle of wine and two beta blockers and they were not working any more!"
When I was at music college in Manchester between 1966 and 1970 people who displayed performance nerves were looked upon as 'softies' - we covered up nerves (which I suppose most of us suffered from) with humour and alcohol. Once players got past their first years alcohol often became a prop - a colleague of mine once said that you are at your best when straight out of college - full of self confidence and with a technique still intact before being bashed to bits by the daily slog. Where I worked for 26 years there was a self-policing attitude to alcohol - anybody who turned up for a show having refreshed themself too much was soon shown the error of their ways. Other orchestras have alcohol policies (hilariously, one orchestra banned the use of alcohol on any day when representing the orchestra in public - their MU Steward asked if this included the management when they attended social events glad-handing bigwigs and possible sponsors and caused consternation!)
Now we have BAPAM and the Performing Arts Medicine trust and music colleges do offer help to combat the problem.
Drugs are just bad news!

Wow.
I recently attended a CSO concert that featured the Brahms Second PC. That first horn part is so exposed. At the interval I saw the first horn (who was magnificent) and he was drenched in perspiration as if he run a Marathon.