ABSTRACT
The term performance theory for an ethnomusicologist points to a range of meanings. In musicology, the idea of “performance practice” (Afführungs praxis) has long referred to ways of interpreting scores that are passed down in the performing culture, in contrast to details written in notation. The second focus of performance theory draws not from this musicological vision but rather from the broader sense of performance theory developed by folklorists to explain oral performance, drawing on sociolinguistics in the 1970s. Yet a third aspect of performance theory has been that used to explain theatrical performance of all kinds A fourth kind of performance theory-cultural performance-comes from anthropology and the work of scholars like Milton Singer, working with large-scale cultural festivals. A fifth kind of performance might encompass the concept of “performativity,” which scholars like Judith Butler (1997) use to encompass everyday behavior. This final use of performance, however, is in conflict with other definitions of performance that see daily life as quite distinct and separate. Whereas the first-musicological
focus-has tended to be much more specific, the folkloric, theatrical, and anthropological foci have been much broader. What all the performance approaches share is that they move away from the score or text as object.
