The influences of facial expression and conducting gesture on college musicians' perceptions of choral conductor and ensemble expressivity

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the influences of facial expression and conducting gesture on perceptions of choral conductor and ensemble expressivity. College musicians (N = 156) viewed excerpts of two choral conductors who had been recorded conducting with either an expressive conducting gesture and a neutral/static face or an expressive facial expression and a neutral/static conducting gesture. They then rated the expressivity of the conductor and of the ensemble. Results indicated no significant differences in participant ratings of choral conductor expressivity or ensemble expressivity (p > .05) between conditions. Responses to open-ended questions revealed four themes that impacted perceptions of ensemble and conductor expressivity: facial expression, conducting gestures, musical elements, and conductor investment.

Keywords

Choral conducting expressive conducting facial expression perceptions of expressivity

When audience members observe the interplay between conductors and their ensembles, there is an implicit understanding that a relationship exists between what the conductor demonstrates nonverbally and the sounds that are being produced. Basic conducting skills such as patterns, time-beating, and the ability to synchronize with the ensemble are considered fundamental to the discipline by conducting pedagogues (Manfredo, 2008; Romines, 2003) and feature prominently in undergraduate conducting textbooks (Pasquale, 2008). Although these technical skills are undeniably essential for a conductor to succeed, many professionals argue that the most important function of the conductor is to express the music nonverbally (Rudolf, 1995).

Researchers have investigated how others perceive expressive conducting and what elements contribute to these perceptions. Conductors who demonstrated high-affect nonverbal conducting behaviors such as expressive gesture, varied facial expression, and frequent eye contact were viewed more positively than those who did not by college musicians in both instrumental (Morrison et al., 2009) and choral (Morrison & Selvey, 2014; Nápoles, 2012) contexts. This preference extended to nonmusicians (Price et al., 2016) and secondary school instrumentalists (Price & Winter, 1991; Silvey & Koerner, 2016). Additional variables such as baton usage (Nápoles et al., 2014; Nápoles & Silvey, 2017; Silvey et al., 2017) and conducting plane (Silvey & Fisher, 2015) have also been shown to influence observers' perceptions of conductor and ensemble expressivity. Taken together, these findings indicate a preference for conductors who vary their levels of expressivity. In the present study, we wished to explore these preferences further by isolating two nonverbal behaviors that have been found to contribute to perceptions of expressivity: facial expression and conducting gestures.

Facial expression has been identified as an important aspect of nonverbal communication (Harper et al., 1978; Malandro & Baker, 1983) in human interaction. Mehrabian (1972) studied nonverbal behavior extensively and determined that it communicated feelings and attitudes more strongly than speech. Drag and Shaw (1967) posited that a person's state of mind could be projected through their facial expressions. In music performance settings, facial expression helped performers share their musical intentions with the listener (Thompson et al., 2005), convey emotion (Livingstone et al., 2009), and alert listeners to upcoming musical information (Thompson & Russo, 2007).

Facial expression in connection with conducting has also been studied in music teacher education settings. In a seminal study, Yarbrough (1975) isolated aspects of a high and low magnitude conductor, and the use of facial expression was one component of her definition of magnitude. A high magnitude conductor, for example, displayed a face that reflected sharp contrasts between approval and disapproval. Approval was expressed by grinning, laughing, raising eyebrows, and widening eyes. Low magnitude conductors had neutral/static faces. Not surprisingly, high school chorus students preferred high magnitude conductors with engaging and varied facial expressions, although this preference was not significant. Using information from that study, Madsen and Yarbrough (1985) later developed forms for systematic observation and included a number of other elements that contribute to conducting effectiveness, including expressive gesture, eye contact, proximity, voice volume, and voice modulation.

Researchers have noted that facial expression is often related to participants' ratings of and preferences for conductors. For example, in her study of undergraduate music majors evaluating female collegiate conductors, Van Weelden (2002) found that conducting effectiveness was highly correlated with facial expression (r = .72). Johnson et al. (2003) examined relationships between student and professional conductors' nonverbal behaviors and determined that collegiate participants preferred conductors who demonstrated high amounts of nonverbal behaviors (including varied facial expression).

Other researchers have examined the role of facial expressions in the evaluation of conductors. After reviewing videotaped excerpts, Byo and Austin (1994) differentiated between novice preservice and expert instrumental music conductors' nonverbal conducting behaviors. They concluded that expert conductors varied facial expression significantly more than did novice conductors. In their definition, expressive facial expression included raised or furrowed eyebrows, smiles, open mouth, grimaces, pursed lips, and a tilted head. In addition, the researchers noted that experts often combined expressive qualities from two or more categories to look decidedly expressive, whereas novices lacked that multidimensionality. In Whitaker's (2011) perception study, high school band directors and students watched rehearsal video excerpts. Directors rated excerpts containing little variety in facial expression lowest, and students rated excerpts with varying facial expression highest. Facial expressions were defined in this study as approving, disapproving, or neutral. Ratings of wind band conductors' expressivity were significantly different depending on the type of facial expressions exhibited by the conductors in Silvey's (2013) study: Ensemble members considered any type of facial feedback, whether approving, disapproving, or a mixture of the two, as more expressive than a neutral/static face.

The link between effective conductors and their usage of engaging/varied facial expressions has been explored. When observing eight successful high school and junior high band directors in rehearsal, Sherrill (1986) noted that these directors did not frequently display engaging facial expressions. It appears that facial expression and effective conducting can be experienced discretely. Moreover, facial expression and expressive gesture can provide different pieces of information that impact viewers and listeners' perceptions, and the identification and correct response to these conducting elements can be learned by ensemble musicians (Mayne, 1992). Using a spatial occlusion approach that included video recordings where the face was completely isolated from the conducting gesture, Wöllner (2008) found that high school musician participants rated videos of the conductor's face alone most similarly to those in which the conductor's whole body appeared.

There are multiple opinions regarding when to introduce elements of facial expression into conducting curricula. Price and Byo (2002) suggested that “perhaps novice conductors should first develop a varied repertoire of nonverbal skills in gesture and body” before concentrating on facial expression (p. 343), so that they can focus on a single activity at a time. Contrastingly, Wöllner (2008) recommended that facial affective behavior should be included early in conducting training. Silvey (2013) suggested that facial expression and conducting gesture be introduced simultaneously, especially because undergraduate music majors have indicated their belief that facial expression is not as well developed in their curricula as the more technical aspects of conducting. In his conducting text, Rudolf (1995) advised young conductors that “the expression of your eyes and your general facial expression can tell the players more about your intentions than fancy hand waving” (p. 314). Ideas about when facial expression should be taught are influenced by the value placed on that component's contribution to overall conducting expressivity. Given the variety of opinions and disparate research findings regarding nonverbal conducting behaviors, it seems worthwhile to investigate how musicians prioritize facial expression and gestural expressivity when determining whether a conductor is expressive.

The purpose of this study was to examine the separate influences of facial expression and conducting gesture on perceptions of choral conductor and ensemble expressivity. Specific research questions included the following:

Research Question 1: Will participants rate the expressivity of a conductor with an expressive gesture and a neutral/static face differently than a conductor with a neutral/static gesture and an expressive facial expression?

Research Question 2: Will participants rate the expressivity of the ensembles differently under these same conditions?

Research Question 3: What self-reported factors influence participants' ratings of conductor and ensemble expressivity?

Method

Synopsis

We video-recorded three conductors—one practice conductor and two experimental conductors—who simulated conducting excerpts of choral music in two conditions and presented these recordings to collegiate musicians. We asked participants to provide numerical evaluations regarding the expressivity of the conductors and their ensembles, and we asked three brief free-response questions.

Participants

Evaluators

Prior to participant (i.e., evaluator) recruitment, we used G*Power 3.1.9.2 software (Faul et al., 2007) to determine the necessary sample size for ensuring statistical power of .80 (Cohen, 1988). Given our plan to use a paired-samples t test, with an a priori significance level of α = .05, and anticipating a small effect size of d = .25, we calculated a minimum sample size of 128.

Participants (N = 156) in this study were undergraduate (n = 143) and graduate (n = 13) college musicians who were taking music classes at one of two large university schools of music located in the mid-west and Rocky Mountain regions of the United States. Graduate participants were all licensure-seeking students who had substantially similar coursework and ensemble experience as the undergraduates. Participants were recruited via in-class announcements. There were 84 male and 61 female participants, 3 participants who indicated “other,” and 8 participants who did not indicate their gender. Majors represented included music education (n = 115), music performance (n = 11), music education and music performance double major (n = 3), music composition (n = 5), Bachelor of Arts in music (n = 12), other music majors (n = 4), and non-music majors (n = 6). Participants reported an average of 9.52 years (SD = 2.81 years) of playing or singing in a conducted ensemble.

Conductors and preparation of video stimuli

We initially recruited five graduate choral conducting students at the principal investigator's institution to serve as conductors for this study. All were White males in their mid-20s. The principal investigator consulted with each of them to review definitions of expressive-versus-static conducting gesture and expressive-versus-static facial conditions, based on the operational definitions of Yarbrough (1975) and Byo and Austin (1994), and worked with them to confirm that they could satisfactorily demonstrate these characteristics in their conducting.

We chose five selections of choral music with orchestral or piano accompaniment (one for each conductor), all from the Teaching Music Through Performance in Choir series (Buchanan & Mehaffey, 2005) and considered standard pieces of choral repertoire, as music to be used for this study. Selections were lyrical in a moderate tempo, so as to allow maximum opportunity for conductors to demonstrate gestural and facial expression appropriate to each piece. Within each selection, we identified 30 s excerpts that were largely homophonic in texture. These criteria were consistent with previous conductor and ensemble expressivity studies (Nápoles & Silvey, 2017; Silvey & Koerner, 2016).

The principal investigator video-recorded each conductor conducting their assigned excerpt in synchronization with a professional recording. Conductors wore black attire and were recorded in a large rehearsal hall against a neutral background, with a Zoom video camera placed directly in front of them about 20 feet (6.1 m) away. We recorded each excerpt several times, with conductors asked in different “takes” to intentionally demonstrate in their conducting (1) expressive gesture and static facial expression and (2) static gesture and expressive facial expression. Conductors were asked not to utilize a baton, which is customary in conducted choral music. In post-production, the principal investigator synched and superimposed the professional audio recordings onto the video recordings, so as to generate final video recordings that featured the best sound quality possible. Then, the principal investigator presented the set of recordings to the second and third authors. Together, we agreed upon four video recordings—two each from two conductors (labeled hereafter as Conductor A and Conductor B)—whose conducting performances best exhibited the dichotomy of expressive gesture with static facial expression, and vice versa. Reliability was established by having each author reference the operational definitions while independently reviewing recordings. We then discussed any differences with one another until consensus was reached. We had also recorded conductors conducting with both unexpressive gesture and static facial expression, and we selected a fifth such recording from a third conductor for use as a practice session. Recordings from the remaining two conductors were not used in this study.

From these recordings, we assembled four different QuickTime movies featuring three different conductors (the practice conductor and the two experimental conductors), with each conductor conducting 30-s excerpts of their respective selections. Each movie began with the practice conductor (with unexpressive gesture and static face, conducting Dirait-On by Morten Lauridsen), the viewing of which served as a practice opportunity for participants. The first movie followed with Conductor A (static gesture, expressive face, conducting Sure on This Shining Night by Samuel Barber), then Conductor B (expressive gesture, static face, conducting Ave Verum Corpus by Mozart). The second movie featured Conductor B then Conductor A in those same gesture/face pairings. The third and fourth movies featured the conductors with opposite gesture/face pairings, in both orders, with the same corresponding excerpts. Each movie, which was preceded with instructions to participants and which had 15 s of a black screen following each conductor, was about 4 min in total duration.

Procedure

We presented one of the four stimulus movies to participants at each institution in order to avoid nesting order with school. We used the audio/video playback equipment available in each classroom to show the recordings, projecting them onto a screen at the front of the room. We distributed Institutional Review Board (IRB)-approved consent forms along with a response form (See Supplemental material online, which began with these instructions: “After viewing each excerpt, please circle a number from 1 to 10 that best represents the expressivity of each conductor and each ensemble (from ‘not expressive’ to ‘very expressive’). Use your own definition for expressivity.” Participants were asked to respond to three free-response questions following the presentation of the three video excerpts, with space provided for brief answers: (1) What factors impacted your ratings of the conductors and their ensembles? (2) What was the biggest difference among the videos? (3) What do you consider to be the most important factor when assessing the expressivity of a conductor? All data collection procedures lasted about 10 min in total duration, at the conclusion of which we collected all consent forms and response forms.

Results

We began our analysis by comparing both experimental pairings between Conductor A and Conductor B. Finding no significant differences between conductors, we combined participants' ratings by conducting condition. Thus, there were overall ratings of “expressive gesture/static face” and “static gesture/expressive face” for each of our two dependent variables, conductor expressivity and ensemble expressivity. All data related to the practice conductor were disregarded. Using a paired-samples t test, we found no significant difference between participants' ratings of conductor expressivity for excerpts that were conducted with an expressive face/static gesture (M = 4.99, SD = 1.67) compared to those with a static face/expressive gesture (M = 5.08, SD = 1.84); t(155) = 0.479, p = .63. Similar results were found for participants' ratings of ensemble expressivity, with excerpts that were conducted with an expressive face/static gesture (M = 5.91, SD = 1.58) being rated almost identically to those featuring a static face/expressive gesture (M = 5.87, SD = 1.69); t(155) = 0.275, p = .78.

To analyze responses to the three open-ended questions, we independently reviewed participants' responses, assigned codes, and combined codes into themes (Creswell, 2007; Gibbs, 2007). Once descriptive coding (Saldaña, 2016) was complete, with comments manually summarized using short words or phrases for categorization, we exchanged the list of themes with one another. To address trustworthiness, the primary author analyzed and coded participants' data, then we all discussed emergent themes together until consensus was reached (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005), thus minimizing overlapping and redundant categories. Saldaña (2016) explained that “some researchers may wish to transform their qualitative data and/or codes into quantitative representations” to “corroborate quantitative data” (p. 86). Because we were interested in a hierarchical understanding of participants' perceptions of expressivity, we counted the number of instances that participants wrote about each category. Interrater reliability, using the formula [agreements/total observations], was 85.71% for Question 1, 86.96% for Question 2, and 92.31% for Question 3. Reliability exceeded the acceptability threshold of 80% proposed by Madsen and Madsen (2016).

Five categories emerged in participants' responses: conducting gesture, facial expression, musical elements, conductor investment, and other. Conducting gestures referred to movements and positions of the arms, hands, and body, as well as the mechanics of conducting. The category of facial expression encompassed all features of the face: eyes, eyebrows, forehead, cheeks, and mouth. We included elements of style, dynamics, musicality, phrasing, ensemble togetherness, tone quality, and the selections themselves in the musical elements category. Conductor investment comments related to the passion, desire, interest, energy, and emotion of the conductor, including how well they connected with the ensemble. The “other” category included other personal preferences of the participants or comments regarding undefined expressiveness. Many participants wrote multiple comments for each question, and we coded each separately to capture the various perceptions.

For the first question, “What factors impacted your ratings of the conductors and their ensembles?” participants wrote 358 total comments. The largest number of comments were in the facial expression category (130; 36.31%), followed by conducting gesture (123; 34.35%), musical elements (64; 17.87%), conductor investment (30; 8.38%), and other (11; 3.07%). Some of the positive written comments included “clarity of conducting, connection to the ensemble, and general show of interest in the music”; “if what they were doing made the ensemble more musical”; “The main factor for the conductors was the range in size, variety in shape, and amount of stylistic indications in the conducting pattern,” and “the conductors' use of multiple arms and their facial expressions.” Negative comments included “None of the conductors showed facial expression and the only parts of their body that were moving were their arms and hands”; “I did not notice any discernable differences in the ensembles, but when the conductor appears more expressive, the ensembles do, too”; and “Sometimes some conductors almost act as a metronome/robot.”

Participants wrote 231 total comments for the second question, “What was the biggest difference among the videos?” The largest number of comments were regarding conducting gesture (95; 41.12%), then facial expression (81; 35.06%), conductor investment (26; 11.25%), musical elements (15; 6.49%), and other (14; 6.06%). Some of their comments included “The conductors had different body language”; “Conductor 2 did not seem interested at all in the music”; “Facial expression in video 3 seemed more lively”; and “The second conductor was smiling, looking at the ensemble and cueing, while the others seemed more stoic and unengaged.”

For the final question, “What do you consider to be the most important factor when assessing the expressivity of the conductor?” our participants' comments followed a somewhat different pattern. Of the 230 total comments, most referenced facial expression (90; 39.13%), then conducting gesture (62; 26.95%), conductor investment (45; 19.56%), musical elements (17; 7.39%), and other (16; 6.95%). These included “animated face”; “if the conductor is passionate”; “how well their motions matched the shaping of the music”; and “apparent engagement with the music.”

Discussion

We investigated whether the presence of either an expressive face or expressive gesture—in the absence of the other—would perhaps sway participants' ratings of conductor or ensemble expressivity. The results of this study indicated no significant differences between college musicians' ratings of either dependent variable for excerpts that were conducted with an expressive face/static gesture versus those that were conducted with a static face/expressive gesture. As evidenced by participants' scores being clustered near the midpoint of our scale (i.e., 4.99 vs. 5.08 for conductor expressivity; 5.81 vs. 5.87 for ensemble expressivity), it is likely that the absence of one aspect of conductor expressivity (expressive gesture or facial expression) made it difficult for participants to rate conductor or ensemble expressivity highly, thus resulting in suppressed overall ratings.

Our findings are different than those of Wöllner (2008), whose participants rated the expressivity of a conductor's face alone significantly higher than either arms-only or whole-body conditions. It should be noted, however, that we intentionally designed this study to set up a comparison between conductors demonstrating either expressive gesture or expressive facial expression alone and not the combination of these two factors. Still, observers' general preference for globally expressive conducting over globally unexpressive conducting seems well-established in the research literature, as we have reviewed.¹ Future researchers might continue efforts in separating and combining various discrete conducting behaviors in the hopes of pursuing a more detailed understanding of the components of expressive conducting and their effects upon observers.

Our qualitative analyses appeared to confirm our quantitative results. Participants commented frequently on both conducting gestures and facial expressions of the conductors. While slightly more of the participants' comments referenced conducting gestures for the first open-ended question, with 130 facial expression comments and 123 conducting gestures comments, the trend was reversed for the second question, with 95 conducting gestures comments and 81 facial expression comments. There were more comments regarding facial expression for the third question related to the most important factor for evaluating conductor expressivity (90) than comments about conducting gesture (62). It was clear that participants perceived the contrasts in our independent variables, as the majority of comments (176 of 231) in answer to the question “What was the biggest difference among the videos?” pertained to gestures and facial expression. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that, while understanding how the videos differed, participants' quantitative responses were reflective of their value systems when assessing expressivity.

While responses to the first open-ended question provided us with data regarding factors that impacted participants' ratings of the videos in general, we included the third open-ended question to specifically target a single factor that participants deemed most important when considering conductor expressivity. Conducting gesture was mentioned frequently (26.95%) but was second only to facial expression (39.13%).

For all three questions, many participants commented on the investment of the conductor (101 comments of 819), and that it was an important element affecting their perceptions. We were curious about how our participants determined that the conductor was or was not invested in the music and the ensemble, given that no conductor was seen communicating verbally. It is possible that these were ideas that might be translated into observable behaviors of facial expression, conducting gesture, congruence between musical and gestural/facial affect, or other factors. Passion, interest, and the connection between a conductor and the ensemble are elements that merit continued study,² both in choral contexts as we have done here, and with instrumental ensembles as well, using a greater variety of musical literature.

Importantly, many of our participants' comments were not value-laden; rather, they reflected a summative statement of their perceptions. We were careful not to categorize their responses as positive or negative. Similarly, very few participants differentiated between the ensemble's expressivity and the conductor's expressivity. We encourage future researchers to explore these elements more richly, perhaps through interviews and focus groups, to delve more deeply into participants' perceptions and with pointed questions unveiling more nuance.

Our data show that both facial expression and gesture are important elements of the overall construct of expressivity. Like Johnson et al.'s (2003) participants, ours referenced facial expression as a preferred mode of nonverbal communication, and its presence was noted. As referenced earlier, the persistent ratings near the mid-point of the scale for both neutral/expressive pairings suggest that the absence of either one is detrimental to perceptions of conductor or choral ensemble expressivity. Still, we should note that although our participants saw conductors from the visual perspective of ensemble members, this was not a live ensemble setting; they did not know the conductors they viewed on screen, and they did not sing in response to what they saw. Importantly, neither did the conductors see or respond to the simulated ensemble. These considerations may help explain the somewhat disparate findings in prior research that demonstrate expressive facial conditions were preferred (Johnson et al., 2003; Van Weelden, 2002), but not uniformly so among all observers (Whitaker, 2011). Moreover, such facial expression is not always used even among expert teachers (Sherrill, 1986), nor is highly expressive gestural movement always seen among experts (Price & Chang, 2005). It seems best to understand these elements as tools in an expert conductor's repertoire, used judiciously toward specific ends (cf. Byo & Austin, 1994).

These findings also suggest that both elements (face and gesture) are inextricably linked when participants consider expressivity. Indeed, we noted that our volunteer conductors found it quite challenging to suppress only one expressive modality at a time. Expressive gesture is a universal component of undergraduate conducting coursework (Romines, 2003); our results highlight the necessity for teaching both gesture and facial expression as part of a comprehensive conductor preparation program. When considering the implications for teacher education, the findings of this study lend credence to the idea that the whole body communicates expressivity. Rather than conceiving of the gesture as the single most important element of conducting, it is clear that facial expression also plays a large role in how others perceive a conductor's expressivity. Future researchers may choose to investigate conducting curricula with these variables in mind.

There are many expressive behaviors that can be used and demonstrated by a conductor. Within that range of choices, a conductor must determine which ones are most appropriate when demonstrating the character of the music. The capacity and procedure to learn these skills remain as areas of continued inquiry. Even if the most important variables in ensemble conducting are difficult to discern and isolate, continued research on these matters is warranted.

Supplemental Material

sj-pdf-1-ijm-10.1177_0255761420926665 - Supplemental material for The influences of facial expression and conducting gesture on college musicians' perceptions of choral conductor and ensemble expressivity

Supplemental material, sj-pdf-1-ijm-10.1177_0255761420926665 for The influences of facial expression and conducting gesture on college musicians' perceptions of choral conductor and ensemble expressivity by Jessica Nápoles, Brian A Silvey and Mark Montemayor in International Journal of Music Education

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Jessica Nápoles

Supplemental material

Supplemental material for this article is available online.

Notes

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