Visual Perception of Expressiveness in Musicians' Body Movements

• Published in: Music perception Vol. 24; no. 5; pp. 433 - 454
• Main Authors: Dahl, Sofia, Friberg, Anders
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berkeley University of California Press 01.06.2007; University of California Press Books Division
• Subjects: Aesthetic subjects; Anger; Cues; Emotional expression; Emotions; Estetiska ämnen; expression; Fear; gesture analysis; Happiness; HUMANIORA och RELIGIONSVETENSKAP; HUMANITIES and RELIGION; Movement; movement perception; Music; music performance; Musical expression; Musical perception; Musical performance; Musicians; Musicians & conductors; Musikvetenskap; Percussion music; Performing artists; Studies; Visual perception; Sweden; Japan
• ISSN: 0730-7829; 1533-8312; 1533-8312
• DOI: 10.1525/mp.2007.24.5.433

MUSICIANS OFTEN MAKE GESTURES and move their bodies expressing a musical intention. In order to explore to what extent emotional intentions can be conveyed through musicians' movements, participants watched and rated silent video clips of musicians performing the emotional intentions Happy, Sad, Angry, and Fearful. In the first experiment participants rated emotional expression and movement character of marimba performances. The results showed that the intentions Happiness, Sadness, and Anger were well communicated, whereas Fear was not. Showing selected parts of the player only slightly influenced the identification of the intended emotion. In the second experiment participants rated the same emotional intentions and movement character for performances on bassoon and soprano saxophone. The ratings from the second experiment confirmed that Fear was not communicated whereas Happiness, Sadness, and Anger were recognized. The rated movement cues were similar in the two experiments and were analogous to their audio counterpart in music performance.