Course › Chapter 7: Effective Teaching › 7.4 The Mental Game

7.4 The Mental Game

The Inner Game: Quieting Self 1 to Enable Self 2

If we let ourselves lose touch with our ability to feel our actions, by relying too heavily on instructions, we can seriously compromise our access to our natural learning processes and our potential to perform.

— W. Timothy Gallwey, The Inner Game of Tennis

Reading: The Inner Game

Dealing with Performance Anxiety

Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway

Performance anxiety is universal — even the most accomplished musicians experience it. The key is not to eliminate fear, but to move through it with intention:

1. Acknowledge the fear
2. Trust your preparation and decision-making
3. Use centering and focus skills to quiet dissent and distractions
4. Commit to the decision and the plan
5. Do it
6. No regrets — just learning and experience

Reading: Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway

Learn to Perform in Flow

Flow is a state of deep, effortless concentration where you are fully immersed in the act of performing. Coined by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, flow occurs when the challenge of the task closely matches your skill level — difficult enough to demand your full attention, but not so difficult that it triggers anxiety. In flow, Self 1 quiets down and Self 2 takes over: you stop overthinking, lose track of time, and perform at your best. Musicians often describe it as "being in the zone" — the music seems to play itself.

Flow is not accidental. It can be cultivated through thorough preparation, clear performance goals, focused attention, and a willingness to let go of the need to control every detail. The more you practice performing — not just practicing — the more familiar this state becomes.

Focus

Quiet Self 1 by focusing on the now with your other senses:

• Use vision by focusing on the music or your instrument with your eyes
• Use hearing by focusing on the sound as you play
• Focus on the audiation you hear in your head as you play — Self 2 will automatically try to match that sound
• Focus on your feelings
• Focus on the message you want to convey
• Give yourself an experience goal: "have fun"

Teaching Methods to Promote Flow Performance

While it is, of course, often necessary to help with fundamentals and teach with concrete instructions, overdoing Style A feedback-heavy teaching can promote overthinking and doubt rather than sensation and flow. Style B teaching promotes kinesthetic awareness and encourages multiple senses to be activated. Without any concrete instructions, however, students can develop bad habits, so the teacher must remain vigilant about the fundamentals but dole out advice with care. Knowing how much feedback to offer comes with practice, but you can start to learn to recognize effective teaching styles in these scenarios.

Scenarios

Scenario 1: Flute — Long lyrical phrase in Fauré's Morceau de Concours

Style A (Over-Corrective)

"Play it this way — your tone got thin on the descent, you ran out of air before the cadence, the low B was flat, your embouchure is too tight on the high D, and you dropped your right elbow. This is difficult but you need to support more. Let's get it right this time."

Every item is true and technically valid, but the student now has five simultaneous problems to solve and loses the phrase entirely on the next attempt.

Style B (Awareness-Based)

"Listen for the color shift between registers — like the phrase is walking from sunlight into a shaded room." The teacher sings the line, shaping the air with their hand as it descends. "Notice the feeling of warm air on the back of your throat as you go low."

The student tries it, and the tone opens up — but the low B is still flat. The teacher addresses that one thing: "One quick fundamental: drop your jaw a hair on that low B, it wants more space." Then returns to imagery: "Now tell me the difference you hear when you aim the air over the note instead of at it."

One concrete fix, nested inside sensation-based work.

Scenario 2: Trumpet — Approaching a high G in a Haydn concerto

Style A (Over-Corrective)

"You're muscling it. Corners collapsed, the attack was splatty, you went flat as soon as you got there, and your tongue is too far back. This is difficult but you have to commit — try harder this time."

All real issues, but the cumulative weight of them makes the student grip the horn and miss the note completely on the next try.

Style B (Awareness-Based)

"Be aware of the feeling of the air already arriving at the high G before you play it — the note is living up there waiting for you." The teacher buzzes the pitch on the mouthpiece, then demonstrates a lip slur up to the partial.

The student tries — the note speaks but cracks on entry. The teacher notes that the attack needs addressing directly: "Quick thing: start the note with the air already moving, then let the tongue join — 'hoo-too' rather than 'too.'" Back to sensation: "Notice what you hear in the room when the pitch locks in."

The fundamental is named, briefly, and then the student returns to listening rather than analyzing.

Scenario 3: Clarinet — Crossing the break from throat A to clarion B

Style A (Over-Corrective)

"That was lumpy. Your right hand came down late, the air stopped, the B was sharp, and your voicing is too low. Watch your fingers, focus on the air, and this time do it cleanly. Let's get it right."

The student stares at their hands, tries to monitor air and voicing simultaneously, and the transition gets worse.

Style B (Awareness-Based)

"Listen for the air continuing through the note change, as if pouring water from one cup to another without spilling." The teacher plays the transition slowly, then sings it.

The student tries — the air line is better but the right hand is genuinely late, creating a smear the student can't hear. The teacher makes a concrete adjustment: "Your fingers want to be already hovering over the keys before the A — set them up in advance, like a pianist preparing a chord." Then back to awareness: "Now tell me what you hear when you cross the break on a single syllable of breath."

The fundamental of finger preparation is taught directly because imagery alone wouldn't surface it — but it's one specific fix, not a list of five.

Scenario 4: Trombone — Legato passage in a Rochut étude

Style A (Over-Corrective)

"You're tonguing between every note — this is supposed to be legato. Your slide is bumpy, you're accenting beat three, and you're running flat on the descending fifth. This is difficult but you need more control. Try again and don't tongue."

The student now juggles four concerns and plays stiffly — and still tongues, because the correction "don't tongue" doesn't tell them what to do instead.

Style B (Awareness-Based)

"Be aware of the air as one long line — the slide is just passing through it." The teacher hums the phrase, then plays it with exaggerated air continuity.

The student tries; the air is better but the slide still arrives late, creating audible smears. The teacher addresses this directly: "The slide wants to arrive slightly before the new note — lead with it, don't follow." Then returns to sensation: "Tell me the difference you hear when you connect the notes with a soft 'doo' instead of a 'too.'"

The concrete fundamental (slide timing) is taught, but it's framed as one adjustment in service of the felt line, not a catalog of flaws.

Scenario 5: French Horn — Missing partials in a hunting-call passage

Style A (Over-Corrective)

"You cracked the F, you were below the high C, your tonguing was mushy, and your right hand position in the bell is off. This is difficult but you're not focused. Really concentrate this time."

The student concentrates so intently that their embouchure locks and they miss again.

Style B (Awareness-Based)

"Listen for the pitch in your head first — sing it in your mind before you play." The teacher sings the interval, then buzzes it on the mouthpiece.

The student hums the passage and plays — the partials are cleaner, but the right hand position is genuinely muffling the tone. The teacher addresses it plainly: "One thing to check — cup your right hand a little more open; the horn wants to breathe." Then back to imagery: "Notice how the note 'clicks' when your ear is ahead of your embouchure."

The fundamental is corrected once, concretely, and folded back into sensation-based work.

What Did You Notice?

In every Style B example, the teacher does address fundamentals — but chooses one at a time, names it briefly, and returns the student to listening and feeling rather than monitoring a checklist. Style A isn't wrong for what it says — the flaws it names are usually real. The problem is what it asks the student to do with that information. A student holding five corrections in working memory while playing has no bandwidth left for listening, breathing, or responding to the phrase. They aren't making music anymore — they're auditing themselves in real time.

This is the opposite of flow. Flow requires singular focus, sensory feedback, and a loss of self-consciousness. Style A produces the inverse: fragmented attention, verbal evaluation in place of felt sound, and a trained internal critic that the student can't turn off. And the habits students rehearse in lessons are the habits they bring to the stage. A student whose lessons are continuous evaluation will walk onstage evaluating themselves. A student whose lessons are listening, feeling, and imagining will walk onstage listening, feeling, and imagining.

This is why Style A is ineffective even when it's accurate. Diagnosing every flaw isn't the same as teaching. The good teacher knows that information must be timed, sequenced, and delivered in doses the student can act on — and that much of real teaching happens not through words, but through modeling, imagery, and the cultivation of the student's own ear.

Reading: Also Sprach Mental Controls

Mistakes Are Key to Learning

Take risks, especially in the practice room or lesson studio. Help your students by encouraging them to experiment, research, evaluate, and experiment more.

Reading: Fear of Failure

Additional Resources

• Overcome Performance Anxiety with Noa Kageyama — bulletproofmusician.com
• Don Greene — winningonstage.com
• Conquering Performance Anxiety with Dinka Migic-Vlatkovic (YouTube)
• Adopting the Growth Mindset in Music — Horn Society
• Performance Anxiety: How to Tackle It — Horn Society
• Visualize to Realize — Horn Society