Journalism had the pleasure of interviewing freshman Evelyn Lopez in Orchestra here at BP, who has been playing since seventh grade. We interviewed her on the topic of what motivates her and their performance with Beatty Middle School.
Big performances can leave many performers with concerns, but what motivates each player brings them past the uncertainty and leads them to try their all.
We were interested in what Evelyn was feeling when we heard that there was an upcoming performance with Beatty Middle School. Intrigued to know more we interviewed her and she responded, “I think it will be little harder since we’re gonna have to try, and be together most of the time”. It is clear that in any performance, one of the most important things to get right is to stay in sync with each other, especially with the challenge of a newly added player.
With the right motivation, Evelyn overcomes those concerns and calm her nerves, focusing on, “…what really motivates me is sounding the best.” Wanting to sound the best takes a lot of practice both at her own home and here at school, in the home of the Coyotes. Evelyn has shown this, being that she’s been playing since seventh grade and had a lot of practice with performances. Focusing on something she wants to improve on instead of being anxious if they will be in sync; not only clears her mind, but helps her perform her best.
Everyone deals with anxiety and tends to overthink about not only our own performance, but how others will react. Having enthusiasm and confidence is important when performing in front of an audience, helping to reduce the chance of mistakes you make. Just like Evelyn said, sounding the best is her key motivator. If practicing to sound the best is what gets her through stressful performances, this can help a lot of others during big showcases too. In big performances when pre-show jitters typically uprise, it’s important to have the ambition and enthusiasm to turn your focus towards what you want to improve on, to help attain your future goals.
