Expressive Priority and Goal Structure and Complexity During Collegiate, Faculty, and Professional Chamber Music Rehearsals

The purpose of this study was to discover the artistic conceptualizations and priorities of collegiate, faculty, and professional musicians during the moment-to-moment decision-making of a rehearsal. We utilized musicians’ verbalizations during chamber music rehearsals as a vehicle for exploring their thought processes. Analysis 1 investigated the rehearsal targets ensembles prioritized as a percentage of total rehearsal time allocated to each. Analysis 2 investigated the complexity and form of professional, faculty, and collegiate chamber musicians’ goal structures as they attended to musical targets in relation to one another. Professional chamber ensembles prioritized the expressive targets of character and phrasing above all others, and significantly more as a percentage of rehearsal time than did collegiate chamber ensembles. Goal complexity increased with each level of experience from collegiate to professional ensembles; faculty and professional ensembles pursued elemental and technical goals in service of paramount expressive ends such as character and phrasing. We discuss the possible causes for this phenomenon, implications for music education, and recommendations for further research in these areas. We also recommend that teachers consider crafting music learning experiences to facilitate learners’ focus on expressive ends and pursual of proximal goals in service of artistic aims.