Description: A demo video for the Global Jukebox Project. Produced by Interval Research Corporation for the Association for Cultural Equity. Director: Gideon D'Arcangelo; Camera/Editing: Rachel Strickland; Sound and Lighting/Editing: Gilles Tassé; Producer: Michael Naimark.
Between 1989 and 1995, Alan Lomax's studies into global performance style - Cantometrics, Choreometrics, and Parlametrics, carried out with colleagues Forrestine Paulay, Roswell Rudd, Irmgard Bartenieff, and Victor Grauer, among others - were combined in a multimedia platform called the Global Jukebox. Some 7,000 coded performances were linked to sound and film clips, photographs, descriptions, and a discography and filmography - all of which were searchable through various geographic, stylistic, and the Cantometric databases, and an interactive globe.
Beyond its intended uses in research and education, the Global Jukebox was meant to be an egalitarian showcase for the expressive arts and aesthetic values of all cultures. Alan Lomax called it the "first democratic educational machine ever invented," as it had no specific orientation and allowed users to explore the range of the world's expressive culture from any starting point.