Teaching music and performance during the pandemic

During 2020 lockdown Dr Margaret Osborne, a performance psychologist and Senior Lecturer in Psychology and Music (Performance Science) at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, made the overnight shift to Zoom to train her students on achieving peak performance under pressure. It was difficult to simulate music performance situations on a two-dimensional platform with lagging sound.

Dr Solange Glasser, a lecturer in music psychology added, ‘Above and beyond the music performance side I think we all have anecdotal evidence that the student cohort is far more anxious. It’s very difficult to unpick how much is the online environment and the performance aspect and how much is just the fact that many of these students are socially isolated.’