This is an English translation of an article published in Nikkan San on Aug 15, 2019, as a part of my column, “The Way of the Pianist.
“Smile and the world smiles with you”…Hinako Shibuno, a twenty-year-old Japanese professional golfer who has just won the Women’s British Open also won the hearts of golf fans all over the world with her smiles throughout her game. She attributes her triumph to her smiles, and says that since realizing that reflecting her negative feelings on her facial expressions result in compromise in her games, she has always tried to play with smiles on her face. I know what she means.
When I was struggling with stage fright, someone advised me to smile, even if it was forced. “Your body is relaxed, when you have a smile on your face. So your natural reflex will relax your body if you put a smile on,” he explained. Since then, I’ve always smiled on stage, regardless of how I felt, to this day. I attribute it as one of the things that led to my triumph over my fifteen-year battle with stage fright.
Recently, I’ve learned of another effect of smiling. Are you familiar with “Chameleon Effect”? It is our natural human tendencies to mimic the gestures and expressions of those around us. It enhances our ability to understand and empathize, making our communication smoother, and our cooperation easier. So, if the musician on stage, or a golfer during a game is smiling, the audience is more likely to be smiling back. Smiling audience relaxes the players, whatever their medium, and this results in a virtuous circle. This is a technique easily applicable to anyone preparing for a job interview or a presentation. Furthermore, a couple in a good marriage start resembling each other, as a result of this chameleon effect. Because they develop a tendency to use the same facial muscles, resulting in similar facial structures and expressions over decades.
As a part of my tour in Japan, I visited a remote village in deep in the Kiso mountains, with one train every two hours or so. In a community room, about a hundred villagers gathered for my concert. I talked about the benefit of music, and asked them to close their eyes and swing to the music as I played – they looked as though they were in a hot tub, they looked so happy and relaxed! They made me feel so good. An audience member requested Mozart’s Turkish March for an encore, so I asked them to march in place as I played. Pretty soon, they started marching around the piano in profile, like a bunch of kindergartners, having so much fun! The whole place broke down in laughter and applause when I finished. We all had so much fun!
Try the combination of music and smile! Music is so powerful.
