1. What role does the woman wish to take in the school play?
| A．The violinist. | B．The writer. | C．The actress. |
| A．The guitar. | B．The violin. | C．The guzheng. |
2 . Music is an international language. The songs that are sung or played by instruments are beautiful to all people everywhere.
Popular music in America is what every student likes. Students carry small radios with earphones and listen to music before class, after class, and at lunch. Students with cars buy large speakers (扬声器) and play the music loudly as they drive on the streets.
Adult drivers listen to music on the car radio as they drive to work. They also listen to the news about sports, the weather, politics, and activities of the American people. But most of the radio broadcast is music.
Pop or popular music singers make much money. They make a CD or tape which radio stations use in every state. Once the pop singer is heard throughout the country, young people buy his or her tapes. Some of the money from these tapes comes to the singer. Wherever the singer goes, all the young people want to meet him or her. Now the singer has become a national star.
Besides pop music, there are two other kinds of music that is important to Americans. One is called folk music. It tells stories about the common life of Americans. The other is called western or country music. This was started by cowboys who would sing at night to the cows they were watching. Today, any music about country life and the love between a country boy and his girl is called western or country music.
1. In America, every student likes ______.| A．folk music | B．country music | C．pop music | D．western music |
| A．They sell cows. | B．They watch cows. |
| C．They sing and dance. | D．They travel around. |
| A．Three. | B．Four. | C．Five. | D．Six. |
| A．Music in America | B．Music Listeners |
| C．Cowboys in America | D．International Language |
Welcome to School Dance Club
Are you tired of sitting too long? Do you want to be healthier? Join the School Dance Club and move your body! Choice of dances: folk, modern, pop, etc. Level of difficulty: Level 1, Level 2 and Level 3 Teachers: Helen White — 13 years of teaching experience — Graduated from International Master Dance School John Smith — First prize winner of “Dancers on Stage” for 4 years starting from 2016 Ken Power — Skilled in different kinds of dance, especially in “fusion (融合)” dance Who to join: Aged 12~15 If you would like to be one of us, please kindly fill in the form and send it to Maria Cooper’s office before 18th March. |
| A．1. | B．2. | C．3. | D．4. |
| A．Teachers with rich experience. | B．Teachers good at dancing. |
| C．Students aged 10. | D．Students aged 13. |
| A．poster | B．diary | C．poem | D．report |
4 . Fifty years ago, the well-loved musician Bob Dylan played at the Newport Folk Festival and was widely booed (嘘声). The audience may have been unhappy but Dylan’s performance helped change the direction of music and culture in the United States.
The mid-1960s were a time of great change. One such place of change was the world of folk music. Bob Dylan became a symbol of change when he moved from acoustic (原声的) to electric guitar.Rock music historian Elijah Wald has written a new book about the change. It is called “Dylan Goes Electric”.
“There was a moment in the early 1960s when you could look at the Billboard charts and seven of the top 10 albums were folk records. And Joan Baez, Peter Paul and Mary, the Kingston Trio, all had huge, huge, huge number-one records.”
And then this happened: The “British Invasion” introduced the world to the Beatles and grew a huge fan base for rock music. “That worried many folk musicians,” says Elijah Wald.
They hoped that Bob Dylan would come to the rescue. However, a new Dylan sound came from the stage.
Bob Dylan had gone electric, and the followers of folk music were not pleased.
“When Dylan went electric, I think one of the issues was the feeling that — wait a minute, he’s gone over to the enemy.”
Folk lovers had looked to Bob Dylan to save their movement from rock and roll. But, author Wald says Dylan felt differently about the music.
“Dylan had always liked rock and roll and Dylan didn’t think of rock and roll as stupid music.” In fact, Dylan was a Beatles fan. He later said that from the first time he heard the Beatles he knew “they were pointing to the direction where music had to go.”
Beyond the music, Dylan’s performance that night also marked a turn in American culture.
1. How did the audience feel when Dylan played at the Newport Folk Festival?
| A．Unsatisfied. | B．Respectful. |
| C．Uncaring. | D．Excited. |
| A．Great changes had taken place in folk music. |
| B．People had grown sincere love for rock music. |
| C．Folk music was once a huge mainstream pop trend. |
| D．Bob Dylan was the best American musician at that time. |
| A．Introduce the world to the Beatles. | B．Change folk music for better. |
| C．Play rock and roll against the Beatles. | D．Recover the glory of folk music. |
| A．Dylan’s beliefs in the new direction music should go. |
| B．Dylan’s deep love for the Beatles, rock and roll music. |
| C．Dylan’s music as a great contribution to American folk music. |
| D．Dylan’s performance as a mark of a change in American culture. |
1. Where was Open Tchaikovsky Competition held in 1986?
| A．In Moscow. | B．In Chelyabinsk. | C．In Berlin. |
| A．It inspired many young musicians. |
| B．It was the music event of his dreams. |
| C．It was a life-changing experience. |
| A．Rock music. | B．Pop music. | C．Classical music. |
| A．Expressiveness. | B．Smoothness. | C．Completeness. |
6 . Starting in the mid-2010s, the success of streaming services like Spotify, Tencent and Apple Music led the music industry into a period of steady income growth. But the rise of streaming hasn’t just transformed the business of music; it has changed the music as well.
In 1972, the Temptations hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 charts, winning three Grammys, with a seven-minute version of the song “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone”. Before the Temptations sing a word, an instrumental introduction plays for more than four minutes. If the group were in the studio today, the title chorus (副歌) would most likely have been featured much earlier in the song. That’s because music streaming services pay artists based on the number of plays each month, and to count as a play, a user must listen to the song past the 30-second mark. If a song you’ve never heard before takes a long time to get to the hook (旋律最好的部分), there is a good chance that you may simply hit the button to go to the next song. To keep the “skip rate (跳过率)” as low as possible, musical artists are increasingly moving a song’s hook to that initial 30-second sweet spot.
Every track that is listened to for more than 30 seconds counts as a play, but whether a listener makes it all the way through a song helps to determine whether a streaming service like Spotify will recommend similar songs in the future. For a musician, getting a song on Spotify’s popular Today’s Top Hits playlist means real money. A study by researchers at the University of Minnesota and the European Joint Research Centre found that songs on the list gained an average of 20 million streams, worth up to $163,000 in royalties (版税).
As a result, according to an analysis by blogger Michael Tauberg, the average length of hit songs has dropped by more than 30 seconds since 2000, when it was over four minutes. Nearly two-thirds of the songs that achieved the number one spot in the first half of 2021 were under three minutes long.
1. Why is the Temptations mentioned in paragraph 2?| A．To explain what made a song special in the past. |
| B．To show admiration for their musical achievements. |
| C．To illustrate the structure of popular songs in the past. |
| D．To introduce the changes in song structure brought about by streaming. |
| A．The artists will receive higher royalties. |
| B．The listeners are more likely to skip it. |
| C．It will be recommended to more users. |
| D．It will be more popular among listeners. |
| A．Advance in music production technology. |
| B．The change in listeners’ musical preference. |
| C．The desire for higher streaming-based income. |
| D．Increased competition among streaming platforms. |
| A．How streaming changes the length of music. |
| B．How streaming services produce hit songs. |
| C．How streaming promotes the development of music. |
| D．How streaming influences our preference for music. |
1. What is special about a live concert?
| A．The whole experience is unique. |
| B．The sound quality is outstanding. |
| C．The performance can be recorded. |
| A．They are expensive. |
| B．They are often of high quality. |
| C．They are covered by the local media. |
| A．Listening to the works to be performed. |
| B．Checking information at the box office. |
| C．Reading something about the concert hall. |
| A．A news reporter. |
| B．A theater designer. |
| C．A college teacher. |
1. 音乐可以消除疲劳、缓解压力；
2. 音乐可以陶冶情操；
3. 音乐可以使人更有创造力。
注意：1.词数80左右；
2. 不可以逐字翻译；
3. 可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。
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1. 比赛情况；2. 个人感受。
注意：1. 词数80左右；2. 题目已为你写好。
The “Top 10 Singers” Competition
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| A．Modern dance. | B．Folk dance. | C．Ballet. |
