Within the scope of theater dance, one finds three principle senses of choreography: the set of embellishments left to the individual artist to select from during an improvisation; choreography as a process of setting movement to then invent original material from during an improvisation; and choreography for its own sake that is brought to a high level of performance.
-a slight rewording of Curtis Carter’s three principle senses of improvisation. From pg.182 of The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 2000.