“Tuning” the body of the classical musician : An embodied approach to vocational anticipatory socialization

The purpose of this paper was to investigate the role of the body in the vocational anticipatory socialization (VAS) processes of classical musicians.

Using grounded theory, the paper analyzed semi-structured interviews with 48 musicians (27 children; 21 parents) to understand how classical musicians’ bodies intermediate the meaning of work. The Aristotelian concepts of potentiality and actuality frame this study.

The paper reveals that: “tuning” bodies is as important as tuning instruments (body as object of work), and diseases, occupational injuries, and accidents pose challenges to both health and performance (body as obstacle).

Theoretically, the paper contributes the notion that phases of VAS are fused not just through cognitive and relational processes, but also through embodied learning for classical musicians.

At the practical level, the paper reminds that the body is an important source of vocational socialization information.

The paper is filling a gap in organizational literature, which has under addressed the materiality of the body.