Yes. You can start small and work your way up or just jump right in.

Offer to play for a friend or family member (or event). Having friends over for dinner? Play a tune. Over at a friend's house for dinner? Play a tune or two. These are low stakes, low pressure environments, generally speaking.

But, some people get nervous around friends and family and not nervous around strangers. Open mic events are good if this describes you.

The key is to try and find out what works for you, and keep going.

3 things that worked very well for me:
- Only do songs in a gig that you can fake your way out of a mistake: that is the basis for a relaxed performance (same as on a group context: you can get away with just about anything as long as the other guys continue playing - and the reason why classical music is harder: everyone knows the damn piece! )
- keep working on harder repertoire each day: the moment you get one of those new songs ready to play alone, you realize the previous hard ones are your new “fallback easy repertoire”
- during spring and summer take your instrument into a public place, turn your back on the passers by and play thru your repertoire. Do this as often as possible. In a few weeks the difference is colossal.

All of this hacks are designed for you to improve your entertainment skills and ease with public situations. Music comes right after that.


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Rick Danko from The Band addressed stage fright.
https://youtu.be/NZMfZe7OFFk?si=jwixt5c-EokreCXw

I think we also need to address off-stage fright.
My wife terrifies me

what a fantastic hint....it's exactly like this....

He's talking about IMPROV. I like his style.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/tN2QhNn6j5Q

When I see a "clone band" or a tribute band to play exactly like the original version of a song I admire this because I can't do that...I'm afraid to do mistakes and it's not for me. I learned my whole musical life to know how to improvise and when I'm in this position I feel good. No limits but, of course, I have to follow the chords structure and respect many other rules but the freedom I find in this way of playing music is just nice for me. Sometimes I'm a bit nervous but it calms down after the first song. Instead of learning a lot of pieces by heart, I go more by logic.

I don't know if anyone has suggested this, but Metoprolol can be fairly effective in slowing things ( like heart rate) down a bit.

It does require a healthcare provider to prescribe it and it's really not intended for long term use for anxiety.

I found out how effective it was about a decade and a half ago when at the age of 52, I had to complete a public speaking course for college. I had developed some mild hypertension ( probably due to being surrounded by 20 year old college students - major culture shock for me) and had been given Metoprolol for that . I think the Public Speaking course was about a semester away at that point.

It was odd because I'm fairly (totally) introverted, but I never felt nervous during the course. It seemed to feel natural. It was about a year after completing college, that a phyiscian mentioned while reviewing my prescriptions, that Metoprolol was favored by actors for reducing stage fright.

I don't advocate medication as a solution, but sometimes it can regulate things until your mind or psyche can deal with them more permanently.

Garry