New live performance simulators for artists?
This is fucking weird.
The Gist
Musicians rehearse endlessly, but facing a real audience can feel like a whole new game. The crowd gives instant feedback, the energy can be electric, and it can be nerve-wracking. But what if you could actually practice in a live setting, minus the pressure? Enter the performance simulator.
Here’s my take
Although this is interesting tech. It’s actually kind of cool. My overall opinion?
It’s fucking stupid. It’s more showy than anything. It’s unnecessary.
Take it from someone like me who has played many shows in front of live crowds.
If you want to perform in front of a crowd, just practice.
Plain and simple. Practice, practice, practice.
If you have any amount of self awareness, you’ll know whether or not you are ready for a live show. You’ll know whether or not you sound good enough to perform in front of a crowd. You’ll know whether or not your songs are good enough to play for an audience.
But what all of this comes down to is building confidence. Once you get to the point of being able to play these songs effortlessly in one take, then you’ll feel comfortable and confident enough to perform your songs live in front of a crowd.
A good way to build that confidence before the big show is to make sure that when rehearsing with your band, pretend you are actually performing in front of a huge crowd. Simply act like you’d want to act in front of that future crowd. If you want to give off high energy, then practice playing and/or singing the songs while moving, running or jumping around the stage. Bring it during rehearsals. You just have to embody what you want to be. Once you have your “routine” down, your confidence to perform will be at an all-time high.
Having confidence should also ease some of the anxiety you may have before the show. Will there still be some anxiety? Of course there will. Can you get rid of all anxiety? For most, absolutely not. In the above video, they even say, the anticipation before the performance is more stressful than actually being on stage performing to a live audience. A live audience simulation is not going to do more for your anxiety than just doing the old fashioned normal rehearsals. You’ll feel anxious regardless.
Can this new simulation tech help? Sure it can. However, a simulated crowd is nothing like a real crowd. Again, performance in front of a live audience is all about confidence. You’ll never get there without real practice. Get to the point where you can effortlessly play and sing your songs while expressing yourself exactly how you envision on stage, and rest assured, once you have that, you’re more than ready to go.
Side note
If you’re interested, here’s my old band performing one of our songs at what would end up being our unplanned final show in 2005. I’m the one singing in the middle.
Let me know what you think in the comments? Do you think this live crowd simulator would be helpful?