This article discusses approaches to improvisation from a learning perspective, using Irish traditional fiddle music as a case study. Within this genre, concepts of improvisation are largely implicit: many skilled musicians are engaged in spontaneous variation, without particular attention given to the phenomenon and without reference to the term…

This article examines the formative interaction between instrumental technique and musical style by analysing different approaches to the violin/fiddle. It is argued that technique is constitutive of style and that musical concepts are intimately related to the accumulated experience of sensations associated with handling the instrument in a…