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Sarastar Shares Top 5 Ways to Improve Your Music Performance

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Sarastar
Sarastar Shares Top 5 Ways to Improve Your Music Performance

When you begin playing around town, either at open mics or showcase shows, you will quickly learn that you are far from the only singer-songwriter playing acoustic guitar and trying to get people to notice you. The only way to do that is to impress them with your performance. Here are the top 5 tips to improve your music performance so you can stick out from the crowd.


1. Know Your Stuff

Nothing will cause an audience to write you off quicker than being unprepared. If you have to pause to remember the next line or chord, they will soon tire of waiting for you and will turn their attention elsewhere. 

Playing from sheet music or reading lyrics off a page makes you look like an amateur and doesn’t project an air of confidence.

Sarastar says having your songs memorized and well-rehearsed, on the other hand, you come off as a professional, and the audience is willing to trust you with their attention. You can sing with intention and connect with the crowd. So, practice, practice, practice!


2. Be Dynamic

3 or 4 minutes doesn’t seem very long, but when you’re on stage it can be an eternity. If your song sounds the same from start to finish, it may become monotonous and become background noise. Changing the volume, intensity, and tone throughout your song can help keep the crowd’s focus on you.

Luckily there are some simple tricks you can use to spice up a repetitive chord progression. Changing your strumming pattern or playing a verse extra loud can add energy and emphasis. Or you could play the chords only once and let it ring, or play the notes of the chords in arpeggio to drop the energy and turn the focus toward the lyrics.


3. Sing To Your Audience, Not At Them

Live music performance has the potential to be an intimate experience if you’re willing to connect with your audience. Ideally, by forming a bond with the audience you can create a unique experience that only you and the people in the room that night will be privileged to have. Sarastar tells the energy the crowd gives you can put you in the zone, heightening your performance and further increasing the energy in the crowd.

If you sing with your eyes closed or sing over everyone’s heads, however, you throw away the opportunity to connect with anyone. If that’s the case they might as well be listening to a jukebox.


4. Develop Your Own Style

When you are beginning your performing journey, you will likely sound like a poor imitation of your favorite musicians. This is natural and encouraged. You should try out elements of great singers in order to expand your repertoire of performance skills.

Eventually, however, you need to curate your own recognizable style. Take the skills that you are best at and develop them into something that is new and uniquely yours. If all goes according to plan, someday a new generation of performers will develop their chops by imitating you.


5. Play Through Your Mistakes

The audience usually doesn’t know how the song is supposed to sound, so they are unlikely to notice when you make a mistake as long as you don’t call attention to it. If you just continue playing with confidence, they will never notice.

If you pause the song or even go back to replay the part properly, all you are doing is letting the crowd know that you’ve made a mistake. They will have less confidence in you moving forward.

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