Studies in musical improvisation show that musicians and even children are able to communicate intended emotions to listeners at will. To understand emotional expressivity in music as an art form, communicative success needs to be related to improvisers’ thought processes and listeners’ aesthetic judgments. In the present study, we used retrospective verbal protocols to address college music students’ strategies in improvisations based on emotion terms. We also subjected their improvisations to expert ratings in terms of heard emotional content and aesthetic value. A qualitative analysis showed that improvisers used both generative strategies (expressible in intramusical terms) and imaginative, extramusical strategies when approaching the improvisation tasks. The clarity of emotional communication was found to be high overall, and linear mixed-effects models showed that it was supported by generative approaches. However, perceived aesthetic value was unrelated to such emotional clarity. Instead, aesthetic value was associated with emotional complexity, here defined as the heard presence of “nonintended” emotions. The results point toward a view according to which the expressive content of improvisation gets specified and personalized during the very act of improvisation itself. Arguably, musical expressivity in improvisation should not be equated with the error-free communication of previously intended emotional categories.

音乐即兴创作的研究表明，音乐家甚至儿童都能够随意向听众传达预期的情绪。要将音乐中的情感表达理解为一种艺术形式，传播成功需要与即兴创作者的思维过程和听众的审美判断相关联。在本研究中，我们使用回顾性口头协议来解决大学音乐学生在基于情感术语的即兴创作中的策略。我们还根据所听到的情感内容和审美价值对他们的即兴创作进行了专家评级。一项定性分析表明，即兴演奏者在完成即兴创作任务时既使用生成策略（可以用音乐内术语表达），也使用富有想象力的音乐外策略。发现情感交流的清晰度总体上很高，和线性混合效应模型表明它得到了生成方法的支持。然而，感知到的审美价值与这种情感清晰度无关。相反，审美价值与情感复杂性相关，这里定义为听到的“非故意”情感的存在。结果表明，在即兴表演本身的过程中，即兴表演的表达内容被具体化和个性化。可以说，即兴创作中的音乐表现力不应等同于先前预期的情感类别的无错误交流。这里定义为听到的“非故意”情绪的存在。结果表明，在即兴表演本身的过程中，即兴表演的表达内容被具体化和个性化。可以说，即兴创作中的音乐表现力不应等同于先前预期的情感类别的无错误交流。这里定义为听到的“非故意”情绪的存在。结果表明，在即兴表演本身的过程中，即兴表演的表达内容被具体化和个性化。可以说，即兴创作中的音乐表现力不应等同于先前预期的情感类别的无错误交流。