Music Performance Anxiety & Emotional Intelligence

Understanding the musician behind the performance

Music performance is often judged by what an audience hears: accuracy, interpretation, expression, technical control and communication.

Yet behind every performance is a musician experiencing a complex interaction of preparation, expectation, emotion, cognition and physical response.

My early research focused on this human dimension of musical performance, particularly on the relationship between Music Performance Anxiety (MPA) and Emotional Intelligence (EI).

The central question was not simply why musicians become anxious before or during performance, but whether the ways in which musicians understand, regulate and respond to emotion may influence their experience of performance anxiety.

This work formed the focus of my Master's research, The Role of Emotional Intelligence in Music Performance Anxiety, and resulted in both theoretical and empirical research into the relationship between these two constructs.

What is Music Performance Anxiety?

Performance anxiety is familiar to many musicians.

A certain degree of heightened arousal can be helpful. It may increase concentration, energy and responsiveness and can contribute positively to performance.

However, when anxiety becomes excessive, it may interfere with the musician's ability to perform at the level achieved during preparation.

Music Performance Anxiety can involve a combination of:

cognitive responses, such as worry, self-doubt or fear of failure;
emotional responses, including apprehension or loss of confidence;
physiological responses, such as increased heart rate, trembling or changes in breathing;
behavioural responses, including avoidance or changes in performance behaviour; and
concerns about evaluation by teachers, adjudicators, peers or audiences.

MPA is therefore more complex than simply being “nervous”.

It reflects the interaction between the musician, the performance situation and the meaning attached to that situation.

Why Emotional Intelligence?

My research investigated Music Performance Anxiety alongside Emotional Intelligence.

Emotional Intelligence broadly concerns the ability to recognise, understand and respond effectively to emotion — both one's own emotional experience and, more broadly, emotional information within interpersonal situations.

For a performing musician, this is especially relevant.

Performance requires the musician to function under pressure while simultaneously maintaining concentration, technical control, musical interpretation and communication.

The musician may therefore need to recognise emotional responses without becoming overwhelmed by them, regulate attention and arousal, adapt to unexpected events and continue to communicate musically despite the pressures associated with performance.

This raised an important research question:

Could musicians' emotional competencies be related to the way in which they experience Music Performance Anxiety?

Building the Theoretical Framework

The first stage of the research examined the theoretical foundations of both Music Performance Anxiety and Emotional Intelligence.

This work considered different ways in which performance anxiety had been conceptualised, alongside emerging theories of emotional intelligence.

Rather than treating anxiety as an isolated problem, the research considered it within the broader emotional experience of the performer.

This theoretical exploration resulted in the article:

Critical Perspectives on Emotional Intelligence and Music Performance Anxiety

The article established the conceptual basis for investigating possible relationships between emotional intelligence and performance anxiety.

It also raised questions that continue to be important in music education:

Can emotional responses associated with performance be understood and developed rather than merely endured?

And:

Should musicians' preparation for performance include emotional and psychological preparation alongside technical and musical preparation?

The Empirical Study

The second phase of the research investigated the relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Music Performance Anxiety empirically.

The study involved 47 participants performing at the 42nd Free State Eisteddfod.

Participants completed established measures relating to anxiety and emotional intelligence, including the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) and the Bar-On Emotional Intelligence Inventory: Youth Version.

The resulting study formed the basis of:

The Relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Music Performance Anxiety: An Empirical Study

The findings indicated a significant inverse relationship between Music Performance Anxiety and Emotional Intelligence.

In broad terms, higher levels of emotional intelligence were associated with lower levels of reported performance anxiety.

The findings did not suggest that emotional intelligence provides a simple solution to performance anxiety. Musical performance anxiety is influenced by multiple psychological, educational, contextual and individual factors.

They did, however, indicate that the emotional capacities of the performer deserve greater attention when considering how musicians prepare for and experience performance.

Beyond “Stage Fright”

One of the important implications of this research is the need to move beyond the casual description of Music Performance Anxiety as simply “stage fright”.

For musicians experiencing significant anxiety, the problem may affect:

performance quality;

confidence;

motivation;

willingness to perform;

enjoyment of music;

and, in some cases, continued participation in musical activities.

A musician may be extremely well prepared technically and still find that the experience of public performance creates difficulties that are not evident during practice.

This means that musical preparation cannot always be understood purely in terms of practising more.

Teachers and performers may also need to consider the emotional and cognitive processes surrounding performance.

Implications for Music Teaching

Although this research initially focused on the performer, it also has important implications for music education.

Teachers can play a significant role in shaping how learners understand performance.

If every performance is experienced primarily as judgement, learners may gradually associate performance with threat.

If performance is instead approached as a developmental process — involving preparation, experimentation, communication, reflection and gradual exposure — learners may develop a healthier and more sustainable relationship with performing.

Music teachers can therefore help learners develop strategies such as:

realistic preparation;

gradual performance exposure;

performance routines;

reflection after performances;

constructive self-evaluation;

attention management;

emotional awareness;

and an understanding that physiological arousal before performance is not necessarily evidence that something is going wrong.

Importantly, these strategies should not replace appropriate professional support where anxiety becomes severe or clinically significant. Rather, they form part of a broader educational approach to preparing the whole musician.

The Whole Musician

Looking back, this early research established an idea that continues throughout my later work:

music education involves the whole person.

A learner does not arrive at a music lesson as a collection of technical skills.

Nor does a performer walk onto a stage as an instrument-producing mechanism.

Musicians bring experiences, expectations, emotions, identities, motivations, relationships and previous successes and disappointments into every musical encounter.

Understanding musical development therefore requires attention to more than what musicians know or can physically perform.

It requires attention to how they experience being musicians.

From the Performer to the Music Teacher

My later doctoral research shifted from the experience of the performer towards the experience of the music teacher.

At first these may appear to be quite different fields of research.

In fact, there is an important continuity.

The Music Performance Anxiety research asked:

How does the individual musician experience and respond to the demands of musical performance?

My later work asked:

How does the music teacher experience and respond to the demands of teaching within complex educational environments?

Both are concerned with people acting within demanding musical contexts.

Both involve adaptation, identity, experience, decision-making and agency.

And both challenge explanations of musical success that focus only on technical knowledge.

Continuing Influence on My Research

Music Performance Anxiety is no longer the sole focus of my research, but the ideas developed during this work continue to influence how I think about music education.

My current research into music literacy, teacher agency, Repertoire-Based Music Literacy Education and sustainable educational pathways continues to recognise the importance of the individual behind the learning process.

A learner's willingness to participate, experiment, perform, create and communicate can be influenced by confidence and emotional experience just as much as by theoretical knowledge.

Musical literacy should therefore not develop at the expense of musical identity or engagement.

Ultimately, becoming musically literate should empower a person to participate more fully in music.

Selected Research

Master's Research

The Role of Emotional Intelligence in Music Performance Anxiety

The study investigated the relationship between emotional intelligence and the experience of anxiety associated with musical performance.

Theoretical Article

Critical Perspectives on Emotional Intelligence and Music Performance Anxiety

A theoretical exploration of the major concepts and perspectives underlying Emotional Intelligence and Music Performance Anxiety and the potential relationship between them.

Empirical Article

The Relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Music Performance Anxiety: An Empirical Study

An empirical investigation involving performers at the Free State Eisteddfod, examining the relationship between measures of emotional intelligence and music performance anxiety.

The Research Question That Remains

Although terminology, research methods and our understanding of performance psychology continue to develop, a question from this early work remains highly relevant to my wider research programme:

How do we educate musicians in ways that develop not only what they can do, but also their capacity to understand, experience and participate meaningfully in music?

That question ultimately connects the performer, the teacher and the learner — and continues into my present work in music literacy education.