An examination of collegiate musicians’ ability to discern conductor intent

The purpose of this two-experiment study was to examine collegiate musicians’ ability to discern conductor intent. In Experiment 1, participants ( N = 44) viewed two videos of Sir Simon Rattle conducting an ensemble performing an excerpt of the Finale to Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 2. One video featured the original performance, whereas the other video was synchronized with a different audio recording from a video of a performance led by Leonard Bernstein. When asked whether any of the two videos were mismatched, results indicated that the proportion of correct responses among our participants differed significantly from chance. In Experiment 2, participants ( N = 127) watched two sets of videos, either matched (unaltered) or mismatched versions of videos featuring Sir Simon Rattle and Leonard Bernstein, and were asked to rate how well the musical intent of the conductor matched the performance of the ensemble they viewed. Although we found a nonsignificant overall result ( p = .053) when comparing the matched and mismatched videos, we found a significant difference in participants’ ratings between the matched and mismatched Rattle videos, but not for those featuring Bernstein. Our findings suggest that a conductor’s visual contribution to the performance can enhance or detract from the observers’ musical experience.