A: I started this project in 1961. ... We analyzed 4,000 songs on a computer. Out of that has come a map of world culture. There are 10 big groups or styles of music. Stone age people have style 1. ... We found there's a similarity of Patagonian music and Siberian, even though these people live near the opposite poles. ... Along with studying song, we have also studied dance and conversation in the same way, from film. I probably have the biggest collection of dance film in the world -- 200,000 feet. Maybe the New York Public Library has more, but that's specialized in fine art. Q: What's the purpose of cantometrics? How can someone learn it? A: I recently published a set of seven cassette tapes of folk songs from all 10 cultural levels around the world. In the booklet that comes with it, the songs are broken down and analyzed so that the student can learn the cantometrics system on his own. When you learn the system, you can understand any music, even if you don't know the language it's being sung in. By the time you've heard two or three tapes, you get used to the world standard of music. Cantometrics measures things like repetition, ornamentation, rhythm, melody, orchestral arrangement. ... It analyzes music in relation to social structure -- political organization, community solidarity, severity of sexual sanctions. Cantometrics makes the world's music into a geography. Q: How does American music differ from that of the world in general? A: In our culture, for example, we didn't have much repetition until rock and roll came around. And that represents another influence. ... As you know, we of European background don't sing very well together. Everybody starts singing at a different tempo, like seven cats in a bag. But if you take people who live and work together, it's like clouds rolling out of the sea. ... It turns out that the people with the most repetition in their songs have the most primitive cultures -- at least, in relation to their economic development. Everybody knows the same thing about everything. So being specific is boring, and repetition is what they like. You don't impose your boring accuracy on everyone. Q: What do you consider the real beginning of the folk music movement in America? A: It all began in Texas in 1885 when my father heard "Whoopee Ti Yi Yo" on the Chisholm Trail. He was a country boy. He grew up in Texas, and the cowboys drifted past. He wrote the songs down just for the hell of it. Then he got a grant from Harvard and found out how important it was. He was the first person in the country to use a recording device, in 1902. Q: Did you know Woody Guthrie very well?