Navigating the Emotional Rollercoaster of Auditions

Auditions are stressful.  Even if you follow every step in the process we laid out during out last article, you’ll still likely experience some level of performance anxiety.  It’s completely reasonable to feel nervous around an audition: they’re a potential turning point in our careers or lives, they tap into our fear of the unknown, and the process of standing in front of judging strangers could have been lifted directly from an anxiety dream.  The whole process can be an emotional rollercoaster of anxiety, desire, and - frequently - disappointment.

We spoke to our friends Tyler, Joelle, and TJ; all professional vocalists who have gone to their fair share of auditions.  Below we share our best advice alongside their real-world anecdotes to help you navigate the emotional minefield of auditioning.

You Might Fail - And That’s OK

Let’s get the hard talk out of the way first: regardless of how talented you are, you’re probably going to fail a few auditions - and that’s okay!  If there are 100 people auditioning for one slot, 99 of them are going to fail - not because they’re not great singers, but because they weren’t the right fit for that role.  

Our friend Tyler has been both a performer and director in community musical productions and said working as a director completely changed his understanding of auditions.  “You start looking at people and start to realize it doesn’t have anything to do with talent, you maybe just didn’t look enough like Princess Jasmine,” he explains. If a gig requires a certain look like in the case of a theatre or film audition, there may be someone who fits that physical description better.  If the role needs a very specific voice type, you may sing beautifully, but there could be a singer better suited for the part.  

In the case of television competitions, the contestant’s stories are as important as their skills and they need as many emotional meltdowns as they do success stories.  In fact, the producers often already have an idea of who they’ll have as finalists on the show that season; the big cattle-call auditions you see during the first several episodes are more about getting footage of crowds than finding local talent.  All three of the vocalists we spoke to considered television singing competitions as their worst audition experiences.  TJ even had producers attempt to goad her into crying when she was abruptly told she had failed her audition and that she wasn’t as good as the other singers that had performed that day.  Knowing TJ’s vocal abilities, this was definitely meant to get a rise out of her rather than an honest assessment of her talent.  Luckily, she kept her cool and wasn’t featured in one of the many “bad audition” montages.

We’re not sharing this to discourage you from auditioning (well, maybe think twice about television talent shows), but rather to set your expectations.  Even successful pros fail auditions.  It’s never fun to hear you didn’t get the gig, but it’s not a bad or uncommon thing.  It doesn’t reflect negatively on your talent, your hard work, or your value as a musician - let alone as a human being.  

With the amount of pressure we tend to put on auditions, especially at the start of our musical journeys, it can feel like the world will end or your career will never take off if you fail; but the reality is, failure is a part of any successful singer’s path.  Joelle looks at auditions as speed bumps to navigate on her singing journey.  Even if you fail, you’re still making progress and making impressions.  Fifteen years ago, Joelle failed an audition for a wedding band based in Atlanta; twelve years later, they called her out of the blue asking if she was available to sing with them.  She was the wrong fit for the gig at the time, but her talent didn’t go unnoticed.

Even successful pros fail auditions.  It doesn’t reflect negatively on your talent, your hard work, or your value as a musician - let alone as a human being.

Setting Goals

So how do you emotionally prep for possible failure without being self defeating?  Our favorite technique starts with setting the right goals for your audition.  If your goal is “get the gig,” you’re setting yourself up to feel like you failed if you don’t pass or days of anxiety if don’t find out the results right away.  As we discussed above, there are many factors outside of your control that decide the outcome of your audition from your appearance to how long the auditor had to sit in traffic on their way to the audition.  Instead, make your goals things you actually have control over.

We recommend borrowing from sports psychology when figuring out what goals to set: frame them positively, keep them specific with a clearly observable outcome, and use multiple short range goals to accomplish a long range goal.  Rather than making your goal “don’t trip while walking into the room,” reframe it as “walk into the room confidently.”  Keeping the language of your goal positive might seem like a small thing, but it can help stop negative and self-defeating self-talk before it starts.  

Make your positive goals specific, and use several of them to accomplish a larger goal.  For example, rather than making your goal “do my best” (a great, achievable goal that our friend Melanie uses when she auditions), you might ask yourself not only what “doing your best” means to you, but what steps are involved in doing your best.  To achieve the big goal of “doing your best” you can make smaller goals like “arrive 20 minutes early,” “warm up to my whistle-tones,” “do 10 minutes of deep breathing,” or “smile and thank the auditors.”  Not only are these entirely in your power to achieve, they make the process of auditioning the goal so that, regardless of whether you pass or fail, you have succeeded simply by completing your audition.

Developing Anxiety Mitigation Strategies

A list of healthy and achievable goals can help you feel accomplished post audition, but it probably won’t totally eliminate your performance anxiety.  Finding some fast-acting stress-reduction techniques that work for you can go a long way towards making your audition experience more enjoyable.  

Deep breathing exercises like the ones we wrote about in our article on stage fright are a scientifically backed method for reducing anxiety that can be done pretty much anywhere by pretty much anyone with no special equipment or training.  You can use the Marine Corp’s 4-7-8 technique (breath in for a count of four, hold for seven, and exhale for eight) or Zelda’s favorite, in for three and out for six.  Regardless of which technique you choose, make sure you’re breathing into your belly rather than your shoulders and that your exhale is twice as long as your inhale.

For some people, guided visualization or meditation can be life changing practices.  If you don’t already have a meditation or a visualization practice, the day of your audition is not the time to start one.  Use the weeks leading up to your audition to find a meditation that works for you and practice it just like you’re practicing your audition songs.  On the day of the audition, make sure you have headphones and a recording of your meditation or guided visualization on your phone so that you can listen discreetly while you wait.

Mindfulness is becoming increasingly popular.  The practice involves being present in the moment and present with yourself rather than ruminating on the past, contemplating the future, or being haunted by your emotions.  There are courses, books, and podcasts that you can explore if you think you might benefit from this practice, but Tyler has been subconsciously using this technique to audition for years.  Before he begins singing, he takes a breath during which he “puts down his luggage” as he describes it and puts on the character he’s about to perform.  He’s fully focused on delivering the song as best he can rather than worrying about the performance.

Before Tyler enters the audition room, he takes a moment to say to himself, “I know there’s a point in time during this where you’re going to do one thing not perfect.”  When that one (or two or three) thing happens, he doesn’t let it phase him.  Observing but not reacting to your mistakes can prevent a chain reaction of overthinking or psyching yourself out.

Our friend Melanie has found that keeping going through a mistake can save an audition: “I was doing my university audition.  I had prepped for classical sight-reading, but when I entered the room there were two professors with instruments playing along with me.  I panicked, lost track of where I was in the music, and instead of stopping I just started improvising.  To my surprise, the auditors were actually excited that I could improvise and spent a few minutes testing out how well I could handle different chord changes.  I wound up getting accepted with a partial scholarship.”

Put Yourself Back in the Drivers Seat

One of the most important things to remember about an audition is that they aren’t about the people judging you or how good you are or even how good of a fit you are for the gig: they’re about finding a gig that fits you.  Joelle takes her mind off audition anxiety by focusing on how the gig would fit into her life if she does get it.  “On my way to the audition, I’m already imagining what it will be like after I make the audition,” she explains. “Sometimes […] you find a lot of downsides.”

Both her and Tyler have walked away from auditions that they passed or were progressing successfully through because they didn’t fit their lives at the time.  The Atlanta band that kept her number for twelve years was turned down because the commute didn’t make sense.  She made it through a couple rounds of X-Factor auditions, but walked away when she saw the exploitative contract contestants are required to sign.  “If you do get results,” says Joelle, “make sure they’re results that will benefit you and not 15 minutes of fame that will screw you for life.”

We’re all the main characters in our own stories; don’t forget that just because you’re in an audition room.  It’s as - if not more - important that the compensation, schedule, and other parameters of the gig work for you than that the auditors like you.  Stay grounded and don’t get too cocky if it’s going well, but remember that your time and talent have value.  The auditors will figure out if you’re a good fit for a gig; it’s your job to ask, as Joelle puts it, “Do they deserve my talent?”

Start Loving Your Voice Today

Auditioning is an emotional, oftentimes stressful process, but getting in the right headspace and learning anxiety mitigation techniques can make the experience a much better one.  Best yet, you can take your fresh perspective and stress-busting strategies into your daily life.  Our final tip for you: no matter how your audition goes, love yourself and love your voice.

If you need help prepping for your next audition, get in touch with Zelda to set up a lesson!

Mention this article for a 20% discount on your first lesson.