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Seeing it from a semiotic perspective, musical performance is understood as a communication model in which a series of coded messages are sent or enacted and their meanings received or decoded. For example, in a theatre or an opera performance, which have been for a long-time subject to semiotic analysis, the meaning is encoded and transmitted through the various systems of staging, such as set, lighting, costume, music, etc. In addition, rich and complex significations are provided by the performers/actors themselves, their bodies, actions, and interpretive choices. All this can be said about the art of music performers as well, and, if we think of a musical performance as a mere actualization of a musical score, we obviously underline the potential density of its semiosis.This chapter aims at presenting some possible model of a semiotic theory of musical performance art that would enable an analysis of the activity of musical performers based on the musical, cultural, and social messages generated and sent by them. From the methodological point of view, the core of the present analysis consists in the application (sometimes adaptation) of some important models produced within musical semiotics, such as Gino Stefani's theory of musical competence, certain aspects of Eero Tarasti's existential semiotics, and the addition of the author's own formulations.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-017-9404-6_34

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