Jacopo Lazzaretti

Most of the musicians I work with have already done the preparation. They know the piece, they've put in the hours, and they can play it well when no one's watching. But performance still costs them more than it should: something happens between the practice room and the stage that technical readiness doesn't touch. I know this from the inside. For years I thought what I needed was more qualifications, better performances, more achievements — and what I eventually found was that the obstacles weren't technical at all. They were the assumptions and beliefs I was carrying about myself and my music. Coaching with me isn't about nerve-management technique. In the week before a performance, we look at what's actually running through your mind: the specific thoughts, the specific worries, not generic pre-performance advice. When something goes wrong mid-performance — a slip, a memory lapse, a moment of doubt — we look at what happens next in your head, because that's usually where a small mistake turns into a spiral, or doesn't. And afterwards, we look at what stays with you: what you replay, what you remember, and why certain performances sit heavier than others regardless of how they actually went. What changes isn't the nervousness itself, but what you can do with it. A slip stays a slip instead of spiralling into the whole performance. Musicians describe having an actual method for the moment before they start, rather than just getting used to the discomfort — staying with the music even when a self-critical thought shows up, and relating differently to that critical voice without needing it to disappear. I'm a certified NLP Practitioner and Coach, trained through the UK College of Personal Development, with further training in self-worth-based coaching through the Self-Worth Academy. I've been performing and teaching as a classical guitarist for over a decade, trained at the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia in Rome and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.