Jammin' an ending: Creativity, knowledge, and conduct among jazz musicians

Abstract

Research into musical creativity has hitherto involved highly disparate approaches and has taken place largely at the level of the individual. As a result, creativity has tended to be interpreted in terms of either expressive behaviour(s) in performance or ineffable innovation. In the meantime, however, a tranche of interdisciplinary research has moved towards a more collaborative understanding of creativity. With reference to that research, this article analyses the performance of a jazz standard played at a jam session in London. In exploring this unplanned moment of collaborative creativity, the study looks at the relationship between the mundane shaping of an ending and its occurrence within a cultural tradition that demands inventiveness on the part of performers. From an examination of the different sets of cultural knowledge on which musicians draw and an analysis of the momentary interactive conduct of the performers we obtain a view of creativity as an emergent amalgam-a shifting blend of knowledge and conduct that works to bring a song to a close. © 2012 Cambridge University Press.