Musimetrics Musimetrics

Can the arts be analyzed in a quantitative manner? We propose a methodology to study music development by applying multivariate statistics on composers characteristics. Seven representative composers were considered in terms of eight main musical features. Grades were assigned to each characteristic and their correlations were analyzed. A bootstrap method was applied to simulate hundreds of artificial composers influenced by the seven representatives chosen. Applying dimensionality reduction we obtained a planar space used to quantify non-numeric relations like dialectics, opposition and innovation. Composers differences on style and technique were represented as geometrical distances in the planar space, making it possible to quantify, for example, how much Bach and Stockhausen differ from other composers or how much Beethoven influenced Brahms. In addition, we compared the results with a prior investigation on philosophy. The influence of dialectics, strong on philosophy, was not remarkable on music. Instead, supporting an observation already considered by music theorists, strong influences were identified between subsequent composers, implying inheritance and suggesting a stronger master-disciple evolution when compared to the philosophy analysis.