You are not alone

This series draws on peer-reviewed research in music psychology and music education. Full references are listed at the foot of each post. Where findings from my own doctoral research are shared, this will be clearly indicated.

If your child has ever stood in the wings before a performance and whispered that they didn't want to go on — you are not alone.

If you've sat at the back of a concert hall watching a student you know to be talented and well-prepared freeze, rush, or perform well below their capability — you are not alone.

And if you are a young singer who has ever felt that everyone else seems fine while something inside you feels anything but — you are especially not alone.

One of the quietest but most damaging aspects of music performance anxiety (MPA) is the isolation it creates. Because anxiety often hides — behind a composed face, a last-minute illness, a sudden loss of interest in singing — young musicians frequently carry the impression that what they experience is unusual. Personal. A private sign that they don't quite belong in performance the way others do.

The research tells a very different story.

How common is music performance anxiety?

Studies have consistently found that music performance anxiety is experienced by musicians at every level — from young students to seasoned professionals. Music psychologist Dianna Kenny's comprehensive review of the literature found that performance anxiety affects between 15 and 25 percent of professional orchestral musicians to a clinically significant degree. Among student musicians, the figures are at least as high, and in some studies, considerably higher.

For young musicians specifically, the work of Margaret Osborne and Dianna Kenny with Australian adolescent music students found that a substantial proportion reported significant MPA, with many describing it as affecting both their enjoyment of music and their willingness to engage with performance opportunities. Crucially, their research found that MPA in young musicians tends to intensify across adolescence rather than resolve naturally with experience — a finding that challenges the common assumption that students simply grow out of it.

This matters. It means that without thoughtful support, time alone is unlikely to be the answer.

Who is most affected?

Research has identified a number of factors associated with higher levels of MPA in young musicians, though it is important to understand these as tendencies rather than fixed predictions. Every child's experience is shaped by their unique combination of temperament, musical history, relational context, and the specific demands of the performance situations they encounter.

With that said, the literature points to several consistent patterns. Young musicians with a general disposition toward anxious responses tend to report higher MPA. Students who measure their success primarily through external evaluation — rather than personal growth and enjoyment — show greater vulnerability. And those who have had early negative performance experiences — a memory of something going wrong in front of an audience — often carry those experiences forward in ways that shape subsequent performance expectation.

Research also points to specific questions worth asking about how vocal identity, social belonging, and the pressures of adolescence intersect in ways that may shape particular vulnerabilities. It is an area the existing literature is still developing, and one that genuine curiosity, rather than settled answers, is driving forward.

The silence around it

Perhaps more significant than the prevalence figures themselves is what tends to surround them: silence.

Young musicians rarely tell their teachers they are anxious. They rarely tell their parents the full story. Research by Ioulia Papageorgi, Susan Hallam and Graham Welch found that young musicians were more likely to attribute performance difficulties to lack of preparation or natural ability than to anxiety — even when anxiety was clearly a contributing factor. In other words, they were blaming themselves for something they didn’t fully understand.

This silence has consequences. When MPA goes unnamed, it can't be addressed. When a child interprets their anxiety as personal failure rather than a common and navigable experience, the shame that accompanies it becomes an additional burden. And when teachers and parents aren't sure what they're looking at, well-intentioned responses — more practice, more encouragement, more pressure to just get up and do it can inadvertently deepen rather than ease the difficulty.

Naming it changes things. Not dramatically, not overnight, but meaningfully.

What normalising MPA actually means

It's worth being precise here, because normalising performance anxiety doesn't mean minimising it. It doesn't mean telling a distressed child that everyone feels this way and they should simply push through. That response, however common, tends to communicate that their experience isn't worth taking seriously — which is both inaccurate and counterproductive.

What genuine normalisation offers is something more considered: the message that what you are experiencing is real, recognised, experienced by others too, and that there are people who understand it and want to help you navigate it. Research by Margaret Osborne on interventions with young musicians suggests that even simply teaching them what MPA is and why it happens can produce meaningful reductions in anxiety and improvements in performance confidence.

Knowledge is not a small thing.

For the child reading this

If you are a young singer, or if you know one who might find their way to these words, what you feel before a performance is not a sign that you don't belong there. It is not a sign that you aren't talented, or that you haven't worked hard enough, or that music isn't meant for you.

It is a sign that this matters to you. And that is a beautiful thing — even when it doesn't feel that way.

You are not alone. Not even close.

The title of this post comes from the song You are Not Alone by Allison Russell featuring Brandi Carlile.

Part of the Little Voices, Big Feelings series — an evidence-informed exploration of music performance anxiety in child singers, written for parents, teachers, and music educators. Published weekly.

References and Further Reading

References

Kenny, D. T. (2011). The psychology of music performance anxiety. Oxford University Press.

Kenny, D. T., & Osborne, M. S. (2006). Music performance anxiety: New insights from young musicians. Advances in Cognitive Psychology, 2(2–3), 103–112.

McPherson, G. E., & O'Neill, S. A. (2010). Students' motivation to study music as compared to other school subjects: A comparison of eight countries. Research Studies in Music Education, 32(2), 101–137.

Osborne, M. S. (2013). Maximizing learning and performance in the music performance classroom. In G. E. McPherson & G. F. Welch (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of music education (Vol. 1, pp. 693–711). Oxford University Press.

Osborne, M. S., & Kenny, D. T. (2008). The role of sensitizing experiences in music performance anxiety in adolescent musicians. Psychology of Music, 36(4), 447–462.

Papageorgi, I., Hallam, S., & Welch, G. F. (2007). A conceptual framework for understanding musical performance anxiety. Research Studies in Music Education, 28(1), 83–107.

Further Reading

Kenny, D. T., & Osborne, M. S. (2006). Music performance anxiety: New insights from young musicians. Advances in Cognitive Psychology, 2(2–3), 103–112.

Ryan, C. (2004). Gender differences in children's experience of musical performance anxiety. Psychology of Music, 32(1), 89–103.

Steptoe, A. (2001). Negative emotions in music making: The problem of performance anxiety. In P. N. Juslin & J. A. Sloboda (Eds.), Music and emotion: Theory and research (pp. 291–307). Oxford University Press.