Improvisation in Music and Philosophical Hermeneutics

In the first book to examine the overlooked relationship between musical improvisation and philosophical hermeneutics, Sam McAuliffe asks: what exactly is improvisation? And how does it relate to our being-in-the-world?
Improvisation in Music and Philosophical Hermeneuticsanswers these questions by investigating the underlying structure of improvisation. McAuliffe argues that improvising is best understood as attending and responding to the situation in which one find itself and, as such, is essential to how we engage with the world. Working within the hermeneutic philosophical tradition - drawing primarily on the work of Martin Heidegger, Hans-Georg Gadamer, and Jeff Malpas - this book provides a rich and detailed account of the ways in which we are all already experienced improvisers.
Given the dominance of music in discussions of improvisation, Part I of this book uses improvised musical performance as a case study to uncover the ontological structure of improvisation: a structure that McAuliffe demonstrates is identical to the structure of hermeneutic engagement. Exploring this relationship between improvisation and hermeneutics, Part II offers a new reading of Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics, examining the way in which Gadamer's accounts of truth and understanding, language, and ethics each possess an essentially improvisational character.
Working between philosophy and music theory, Improvisation in Music and Philosophical Hermeneutics unveils the hermeneutic character of musical performance, the musicality of hermeneutic engagement, and the universality of improvisation.

Sam McAuliffe is a philosopher and musician living in Melbourne, Australia. McAuliffe completed his PhD at Monash University, Australia and his work has been published in numerous journals, including the Journal of Applied Hermeneutics, Critical Horizons,and the Journal of Aesthetic Education.

Acknowledgements Introduction Part I: The Structure of Improvisation, Derived from Music Chapter 1: The Conversation of Improvised Musical Performance Chapter 2: Place and the Origin of Improvisation Chapter 3: Where Are We When We Improvise Music? Part II: Improvisation in the Philosophical Hermeneutics of Hans-Georg Gadamer Chapter 4: Improvising with Gadamer Chapter 5: Hermeneutics and the Call to Improvise Chapter 6: Improvisation, Ethics, and Factical Life Coda: Soon We Shall Be Song Bibliography Index