Relaxation Techniques

Preparing for Practice or Performance:

We all have good days and bad days both in practice and performance. Its been said that the mark of a professional is that he or she can play well even on a bad day. Its not necessarily because they are so amazing that even their bad days are great. Its jut as likely to be because they've learned some relaxation and control techniques.

The bad days (in terms of practice and performance) we all have, can obviously have more than one cause. But more often than not, physical tension seems to be at the root of the problem.

When we are relaxed, we tend to play at our best both physically and emotionally. You may feel emotion when you are physically tense, but it may be hard to express it through your instrument unless you are physically relaxed. To play fluently, to play fast; both are a contradiction in terms with the concept of physical tension. In other words it is more or less impossible to play fast or fluent lines while your hands are tense.

We also tend to learn faster and concentrate better when relaxed. Subtle playing is also something that requires relaxation.

Another important use of relaxation techniques is for gigging and recording. Almost everyone gets a little nervous before a gig or during a recording session. If you know how to really relax your body at will, you can turn these 'nerves' into useful energy and end up quite possibly play better than normal. If on the other hand, you don't really know how to relax properly, you can get into a sort of tension feedback loop. You feel nervous so you tense up, this makes you breath too fast, which makes you feel more nervous, that in turn makes you more tense, etc... this process can cycle round until you are verging on panic or otherwise known as stage fright. Hence you get out on stage and struggle the whole gig or recording session and end up playing far below your potential.

So lets look at the actual relaxation techniques.
There are many books on the subject available from any decent library or book shop. Most of them cover much of the same territory. I recommend that you get a book (or tape) or two of your choice on relaxation techniques and spend a few weeks with them. If you stick with relaxation techniques for a few weeks, you'll find that they quickly become part of your natural way of being. Part of the idea is that you become aware (for many people to their surprise for the first time), of the difference between real relaxation and non-relaxed states. Many of us (my self included) go around our every day activities, assuming that we are if not totally relaxed, at least not that tense. Where as in fact we are far from truly relaxed. The daily stresses of life naturally cause tension in most of us, so we have to get rid of that tension at least from our body in order to play and practice well.

The basic relaxation technique involves lying in a darkened room staring at a spot on the ceiling and moving your attention to each part of your body in turn and relaxing it. ie: start with your face and move down one bit at a time to your toes. But there's more to it.

The most important thing is to learn what it feels like to be relaxed. When you really know what it feels like, and have really learned this feeling, you can bring about relaxation without the need of lying down in dark rooms - you'll be able to do it anywhere.

One method that really helps get you there is this:

1. Lie down in a comfortable position on the floor eyes closed (no pillow), remove your shoes etc...
2. tense up your face, neck arms and hands, really tense. Take a deep breath and hold it for about 10 seconds.
3. Slowly release the breath letting the tension out of your chest, then let the tension flow out of your hands, then spread up your for arms, upper arms, neck and face. Do it slowly. Your upper body will naturally start to relax beyond your normal state of relaxation. The point here is that, you concentrate on what it FEELS LIKE to relax, the actual physical sensations of relaxation flowing into your body. You want to learn this feeling.
4. Do the same tensing and relaxing exercise with the lower half of your body.
5. Do it all again only this time do your whole body at the same time. Starting with your face, arms, hands, take the deep breath (hold for about 10 seconds), tense your feet, ankles legs. then as you release the breath, let the tension flow out of your body slowly, concentrating on what it feels like. First chest, then hands, arms, neck, legs, feet.
6. Now you will feel even more relaxed. Concentrate on what this feels like. Many describe it as a 'warm, soft and heavy' feeling or a feeling of floating.
7. Continue taking deep breaths and holding them for 5 to 10 seconds, then releasing them slowly and thinking: relax, relax, relax, letting the tension flow out. Do these breaths slowly. Continue like this for a few minutes, concentrating on what the sensation feels like.
8. In your own time, slowly open your eyes and get up.

Do this exercise perhaps 7 or 8 times. Then carry on doing it with the breathing, but without the tensing up. In a week or two you can change to doing the exercise sitting up in a chair. At this point, you'll find you can bring on relaxation almost anywhere, anytime.

Its important that you really give this the time it needs. Its no good doing it two or three times and then thinking, right, I've done this now. You need to spend a good two or three weeks with it, doing it once a day, to really learn the feeling well enough to be able to use it in daily life.

Many professional players do a relaxation exercise (sitting up) religiously everyday before practising. Doing this means that you will be in the optimum physical state for practising or playing. There's nothing worse that putting in a good bit of time practising, but getting little improvement from it because your weren't relaxed enough. 'Bad days' on your instrument are more often than not in my experience, caused by physical tension. Its very often that a 'bad day' (which would otherwise be a waste) on your instrument, can be turned into at least a decent day (if not a good one), by using relaxation techniques.