Sharing Musical Expression Through Embodied Listening: A Case Study Based on Chinese Guqin Music

IN THIS STUDY WE REPORT ON THE RESULT OF AN experiment in which a guqin music performance was recorded and individual listeners were asked to move their arm along with the music that they heard. Movement velocity patterns were extracted from both the musician and the listeners. The analysis reveals that the listeners' movement velocity patterns tend to correlate with each other, and with the movement velocity patterns of the player's shoulders. The findings support the hypothesis that listeners and player share, to a certain degree, a sensitivity for musical expression and its associated corporeal intentionality.