Midwest Studies In Philosophy, EarlyView.

This article focuses primarily on improvisation in the arts as discussed in philosophical aesthetics, supplemented with accounts of improvisational practice by arts theorists and educators. It begins with an overview of the term improvisation, first as it is used in general and then as it is used to describe particular products and practices in the individual arts. From here, questions and challenges that improvisation raises for the traditional work-of-art concept, the type-token distinction, and the appreciation and evaluation of the arts (...) will be explored. This article concludes with the suggestion that further research and discussion on improvisation in the arts is needed, particularly in the areas of non-jazz improvisation. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the relations between musical works, performances, and recordings, are significantly different in the three traditions of Western classical, rock, and jazz music. In classical music the work of art – the enduring primary focus of critical attention – is a piece that receives various different performances. Classical recordings are best conceived of as giving the listener access to performances of works, or perhaps as performances in their own right. In rock, however, recordings are at (...) the centre of the tradition. The work of art in rock is not a piece for performance, but the track itself, as in classical electronic music. Tracks do manifest songs which may be performed live, but these are not the primary focus of critical attention in rock. In jazz, there are no works of art. This is because the primary focus of critical attention in jazz is the performance, and the relation between standard on which the performance is based and the performance itself is too dissimilar from the model of classical work-performance. Jazz recordings, however, like classical recordings, are best thought of as providing access to performances. These ontological issues are important in part because of their implications for evaluation and musical practice. If rock works are ontologically like classical electronic works, then criticism of them should focus not just on their formal harmonic structures, but on their use of timbral and spatial effects. Since classical recordings endure, but live performances do not, performers should ideally take a different attitude to work-interpretation in those two spheres. (shrink)

I argue for an ontology of jazz according to which it is a tradition of musical performances but no works of art. I proceed by rejecting three alternative proposals: (i) that jazz is a work performance tradition, (ii) that jazz performances are works of art in themselves, and (iii) that jazz recordings are works of art. I also note that the concept of a work of art involved (1) is nonevaluative, so to deny jazz works of art is not to (...) judge it inferior to artistic traditions with works, and (2) is univocal across other musical traditions, so to claim there are works of art in jazz would be to use a different sense of the term than we use when, say, discussing classical music. (shrink)

Few dispute the descriptive necessity of intentions in art, little ground has been gained in virtue of such consensus. Intentions matter, but we must know not only which ones matter and why they matter but also the implications of their mattering for art theory writ large. I show that intentionality cannot be exhausted by mere appeals to deliberateness or bare artifactuality. I then argue that only reflexively governed intentions are necessary for art - artistic intentions are communicative intentions. Finally I (...) show how making intentions reflexive accrues myriad art theoretical advantages ranging from interpretation to evaluation of art. Intentions matter because they are communicative. Art becomes language-like and in doing so art gets to matter because language matters. (shrink)