No, not the kind of performance anxiety for which every second spam email has an instant cure, I mean the kind that is better known as ’stage fright’. Even among seasoned professional performers of all kinds, stage fright is surprisingly common. For many, the act of walking out onto a stage can produce anything from clammy palms to a debilitating panic attack. Beta blocker drugs help to reduce the effects of the anxiety, but then so does alcohol, which could explain why so many professional entertainers end up with a drinking problem.
If ever an audience was likely to induce an attack of stage fright just from its sheer size alone, it would be this one. This was the biggest live audience any performer has ever stood in front of. It was the equivalent of more than six Wembley Stadiums on FA Cup Final Day, all at once. From here, the crowd was incomprehensibly vast, and it seemed to stretch out beyond the visible horizon, beyond the curvature of the earth. Even for those lucky performers who had never experienced stage fright, entertaining a crowd this big must still have seemed like a daunting task.
If I had been booked to play at this Festival, I think I would have insisted on performing at night. After dark, from the stage, you couldn’t see past the lights on the speaker towers.
Peter
Looking at today’s photo of Tiny Tim, and particularly at those in the audience at the front, reminded me of the following announcement that appeared in The London Times of August 11th 1970 in the Personal Column:
ANNOUNCEMENTS
The Isle of Wight
Pop Festival 1970
Fri. Sat. and Sun. 28, 29, 30th
Aug
Special VIP seated arena
Weekend Tickets £10 for the 3 days
Ring Jayne on 01 636 2861
or write ( with cheque ) to
N S M H C
86 Newman Street W1
************
Bearing in mind that the weekend ticket I and my friends bought, in the “non VIP” section, cost £3 I wonder how many of the £10 tickets were sold and what type of person bought them.Measured against average earnings £10 then is worth just over £200 today but still really good value I’d say for three days top class entertainment. The Times was then very much the voice of the Establishment (although of course in the late 1960’s the Editor, William Rees Mogg , had penned the famous “Who Breaks A Butterfly On A Wheel” editorial in support of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards who had just been sent to prison following the Redlands drug bust). You were more likely to have seen tickets for Wimbledon or Glynebourne for sale in their Personal Column in the summer of 1970.
Who were NSMHC….? Whatever became of Jayne….?
Interesting, Robert. Thanks.
I’ll try and check this out with one of the original promoters, but I think this must have been a scam. The VIP area was barely large enough to contain the entourages of the artists as well as some real VIPS and the camera crews (plus all the gate crashers who just climbed over the little fence), so I can’t imagine that there was some official arrangement to sell tickets to the area through some third party. That doesn’t make sense to me. I bet they made a few quid out of it, though.
Pretty insightful post. Never thought that it was this simple after all. I had spent a good deal of my time looking for someone to explain this subject clearly and you’re the only one that ever did that. Kudos to you! Keep it up
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And according to this article, I totally agree with your opinion, but only this time!