Coherence and Musical Meaning in Jazz Improvisation

Abstract

In the context of improvised music, and more specifically in jazz—a situation in which at least part of the musical “work” is created at the moment it is perceived—the performers find themselves in an ambivalent condition: like their listeners at the same time they perform the music they experience it for the first time. Improvisers experience the musical content they produce in the act of improvisation as an improvised part of a “work”—an update of it. The “work”, in this case, reveals itself at the moment of performance. In this work I discuss the understanding of musical coherence in order to