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This volume brings together philosophical and interdisciplinary perspectives on improvisation. The contributions connect the theoretical dimensions of improvisation with different viewpoints on its practice in the arts and the classroom.

The chapters address the phenomenon of improvisation in two related ways. On the one hand, they attend to the lived practices of improvisation both within and without the arts in order to explain the phenomenon. They also extend the scope of improvisational practices to include the role of improvisation in habit and in planned action, at both individual and collective levels. Drawing on recent work done in the philosophy of mind, they address questions such as whether improvisation is a single unified phenomenon or whether it entails different senses that can be discerned theoretically and practically. Finally, they ask after the special kind of improvisational expertise which characterizes musicians, dancers, and other practitioners, an expertise marked by the artist’s ability to participate competently in complex situations while deliberately relinquishing control.　　

Philosophy of Improvisation will appeal to anyone with a strong interest in improvisation, to researchers working in philosophy, aesthetics, and pedagogy as well as practitioners involved in different kinds of music, dance, and theater performances.　

Introduction: The Competences of Not Being in Control …1
SUSANNE RAVN, SIMON HØFFDING, AND JAMES McGUIRK
PART I
Reconsidering Improvisation …11
1 The Birth of Planning out of the Spirit of Improvisation:
The Iceberg Model …13
BETH PRESTON
2 Improvisation as Online Planning …31
RAUL HAKLI
3 Towards a Wide Approach to Improvisation …50
JOEL KRUEGER AND ALESSANDRO SALICE
4 Improvisation as a Social Process …70
NICK CROSSLEY
PART II
Specific Aspects of Improvisational Practices …85
5 Taking Responsibility by Letting Go: The Improvisation
of Responding to the Call …87
BRUCE ELLIS BENSON
6 Dance Improvisation and the Metaphysics of Force …101
PHILIPA ROTHFIELD
7 Joint Improvisation as Interaction Ritual …122
MIKKO SALMELA
PART III
Improvisation in Practice …141
8 Improvising Affectivity: Kitt Johnson’s Site-Specific
Performances …143
SUSANNE RAVN
9 Inner and Outer Ears: Enacting Agential Systems in Music
Improvisation …161
SIMON HØFFDING AND TORBEN SNEKKESTAD
10 Improvisation in the Classroom: Towards an Aspectual
Account of Improvisatory Practice …183
JAMES McGUIRK
Afterword: ‘Yes, and . . .’: Having It All in Improvisation
Studies …200
JOHN SUTTON
List of Contributors …210
Index …214