Quote:
Originally Posted by CazMar
I guess someone who plays saxophone in a rock band can never be described as an introvert! Perhaps I'm an exhibitionist introvert.
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You'd be surprise at how many performers are introverts. But it shouldn't be too surprising; excellence in any performance art requires thousands of hours of practice, much of which takes place in solitude. You can't practice your saxophone if your chatting it up all the time with your buddies. Performance art also can requires lots of thinking. Steve Martin, for example, would deeply analyze his comedy routine. After each performance he would note which parts of his routine drew the most laughs and which didn't. He then would theorize as to what made jokes funny, and then develop or refine jokes according to that theory. At the next performance he would again measure the number of laughs his new jokes received and continually refine his theory and jokes.
Public performance is also not a socially interactive activity. It requires extensive planning and practice, and a performer knows precisely what he is going to do before he does it. Additionally, the introvert is able to withdraw within himself, focusing solely on the performance; the audience fades away, leaving the artist in solitude on the stage.