On the 21st of April, we had our ‘Spring Gala’ concert at school ( The Overseas of Colombo). It was a night full of joy, laughter and an opportunity for people to showcase their many talents. This year the theme was ‘Movie Music’, so I chose to do a solo, singing “I’d Rather Go Blind” by Etta James. I really enjoyed Beyonce’s rendition of the piece, in the movie ‘Cadillac Records’ so I thought it would be nice to sing it. I took initiative in planning some music lessons with my old singing teacher ‘Kumudini’ in order to prepare and go over the song with her. I trust her opinion, and I always try making performances my own, through riffing and little changes in melody, to make it not only a copy paste of the original.
Preparing for the performance was very enjoyable, because I had a lot of passion for the song. After reflection, I realised that I would always push myself to sing extremely challenging songs at all concerts to showcase my talent. However, in doing that I would always stress myself, worrying wether it would be perfect or not. That only created an unenjoyable atmosphere for me, and I didn’t enjoy performing for that reason. So, instead this time I made sure to pick something that I would enjoy singing on stage, and not stress over.
This experience really helped me gain a growth mindset towards performance as a whole. Understanding to enjoy the moments on stage, instead of constantly worrying. I think I was really able to do that during this performance because I didn’t experience the usual extreme nerves I do, and I really loved my time on stage.