cantometrics

is the study of how dominant values of societies might fundamentally influence how their members sing.

Cantometrics arose out of 'The Cross Cultural Study of Expressive Style', a multi-disciplinary research programme, formed under the direction of Alan Lomax in 1961.1. The study was lodged at Columbia University until 1982. It was later transferred to Hunter College, New York.1 The term refers to a system for the measurement of singing style which had been devised jointly by Lomax and musicologist Victor Grauer, to test a number of hypotheses formed by Lomax during his collecting work. These were... that the dominant values of societies fundamentally influence how their members sing... that this influence applies wherever folksong is found in its natural state... and that the world distribution of singing styles is patterned on the world distribution of human societies.' (net)

cantometrics, n.Definitions

cantometrics