Effects of applause magnitude and musical style on listeners’ evaluations of wind band performances

Abstract

Prior research indicates that listeners' perceptions of music are influenced by the expressed approval of others. The focus of this investigation was the extent to which applause, an overt expression of approval from an audience of other listeners, influenced musicians' perceptions of ensemble performances, specifically the effects of applause magnitude (high magnitude applause, low magnitude applause, or no applause) and musical style (ballad or march). Undergraduate instrumentalists (N = 98) from five institutions listened to recorded excerpts of wind band musicthree identical recordings of a ballad and three identical recordings of a march. A distinct applause magnitude condition was electronically attached to each recording, resulting in six unique stimuli. For each excerpt, participants rated eight performance dimensions, which were summed to create a composite rating. Results indicated that listeners' composite ratings were influenced by an interaction between applause magnitude and musical style. Furthermore, a significant three-way interaction among applause, style, and performance dimension was observed, but the effect size was small. Another significant main effect was found, which could be evidence of an order effect. Results of this study suggest that listeners perceive different audience responses to be approving of musical performances, based on the musical style of works being performed.

The Role of Accompaniment Quality in the Evaluation of Solo Instrumental Performance

“…Definitions of accuracy (“the degree to which the soloist performs with accuracy and precision”) and expressivity (“the degree to which the soloist performs with expression and musicianship”) were printed on each response page to encourage a consistent interpretation of these terms. These operational definitions were informed by previous music performance evaluation studies (e.g., Davidson, 1993; Springer & Schlegel, 2016). In addition to explicitly instructing our participants to evaluate the soloist, we deliberately included false information about a solo competition in order to emphasize further the need to focus on the soloists’ performances.…”

Investigating adjudicator bias in concert band evaluations: An application of the Many-Facets Rasch Model

“…On this instrument, judges rated each ensemble on eight performance criteria similar to those used in previous studies (e.g. Johnson & Geringer, 2007; Springer, 2016) – tone quality, intonation, rhythm, balance/blend, technique, interpretation/musicianship, articulation, and “other performance factors,” which were described as follows: “choice of literature, appropriate appearance, poise, posture, general conduct, [and] mannerisms” (NFHS, n.d.). Judges rated each criterion on a five-point scale with the following anchors: 5 = A superior performance – outstanding in nearly every detail4 = An excellent performance – minor defects3 = A good performance – lacking finesse and/or interpretation2 = A fair performance – basic weaknesses1 = A poor performance – unsatisfactory.…”

The Conductor As Visual Guide: Gesture and Perception of Musical Content

“…These items were similar to the bipolar scales used by Repp (1990) and Bergee (1995) in previous studies of music performance evaluation. These four elements were chosen based on two criteria: Firstly, they are all categories that frequently appear on ensemble adjudication forms in some way or have been used in research into ensemble evaluation ( Bergee, 1995 ; Springer and Schlegel, 2016 ); and secondly, each are elements considered to be controllable by conductor gesture ( Green and Gibson, 2004 ).…”

“…However, Price and Chang (2005) and Price (2006) determined that conductor expressivity does not relate to instrumental ensemble performance adjudication scores, indicating that in certain evaluative contexts there may be more variables at play than conductor expressivity. While much of this literature has used a single “expressivity” rating scale, it is possible that ensemble expressivity ratings are also affected by visual variables or elements outside the performance (such as audience response) on multiple elements of expressivity ( Springer and Schlegel, 2016 ).…”