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Test your basic knowledge |
Music
Start Test
Study First
Subjects
:
performing-arts
,
music
Instructions:
Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
If you are not ready to take this test, you can
study here
.
Match each statement with the correct term.
Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.
This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. Founded in 1914 in an attempt to force all business establishments that featured live music to pay fees ('royalties') for the public use of music.
ASCAP
Hank Williams
Cole Porter
Ethel Merman
2. The musical structure of a piece of music; its basic building blocks and the ways they are combined.
Irving Berlin
Form
Producer
Rockabilly
3. The standard form of a blues song: a twelve-bar structure made up of three phrases of four bars each; a basic three-chord pattern; and a three-line AAB text.
Dick Clark
12-bar Blues
Herman Parker
urban folk
4. Repeating section within a song - consisting of a fixed melody and lyrics repeated exactly - typically following one or more verses.
Chorus
Bob Dylan
Countrypolitan
Countrypolitan
5. The leader and guiding spirit of the Beach Boys during their first decade. He wrote and produced many of the Beach Boys' biggest hits - including 'Good Vibrations.'
Lyrics
Electronic recording
Brian Wilson
Texture
6. A person who writes the words for songs
Sheet music
Lyricist
The Rolling Stones
Harmony
7. Technique that involves the use of nonsense syllables as a vehicle for wordless vocal improvisation.
Scat singing
AABA form
Major/Minor
Refrain
8. The words of a song.
Lyrics
Reverb
The Beatles
Jerry Lee Lewis
9. Chord - consonance - dissonance
Diana Ross
Harmony
Electric Guitar
Irving Berlin
10. Generally recognized as the most productive - varied - and creative of the Tin Pan Alley songwriters. His professional songwriting career started before World War I and continued into the 1960s. His most famous songs include 'Alexander's Ragtime Band
Blues
Irving Berlin
Bob Dylan
Crooning
11. Introduced as a commercial and marketing term in the mid-1950s for the purpose of identifying a new target audience for musical products. Encompassed a variety of styles and artists from R&B - country - and pop music.
12. A recurrent rhythmical series
Elvis Presley
cadence
Diana Ross
Paul Whiteman
13. The principal medium for disseminating popular sings until the advent of recording in the 1890s.
Tin Pan Alley
Sheet music
motive
Form
14. Teen-oriented rock 'n' roll song using a twelve-bar blues structure; it celebrated a simple - hip-swiveling dance step.
15. Brilliantly clever and articulate lyricist and songwriter - fine rock 'n' roll vocal stylist - and pioneering electric guitarist. One of the first black musicians to consciously forge his own R&B styles for appeal to the mass market. Also known for h
Hook
Chuck Berry
Form
The Supremes
16. A style rooted in the venerable southern string band tradition. It combines the banjo - fiddle - mandolin - dobro - guitar - and acoustic bass with a vocal style often dubbed the 'high - lonesome sound.' The pioneer of bluegrass music was Bill Monroe
Countrypolitan
Rockabilly
Bluegrass
Frank Sinatra
17. The B section of AABA song form found in the refrain of a Tin Pan Alley song. The bridge presents new material: a new melody - chord changes - and lyrics.
The Rolling Stones
Bridge
Ballad
Berry Gordy - Jr.
18. A musical genre that emerged in black communities of the Deep South-especially the region from the Mississippi Delta to East Texas-sometime around the end of the nineteenth century
Boogie Woogie
urban folk
Blues
Gertrude 'Ma' Rainey
19. Illegal practice - common throughout the music industry - of paying bribes to radio disc jockeys to get certain artists' records played more frequently.
Nashville sound
Payola
AABA form
Beach Boys
20. Blues piano tradition that sprang up during the early twentieth century in the 'southwest territory' states of Texas - Arkansas - Missouri - and Oklahoma. In boogie-woogie performances - the pianist typically plays a repeated pattern with his left ha
Buddy Holly
'The twist'
Boogie Woogie
Acoustic recording
21. African American musical style rooted in R&B and gospel that became popular during the 1960s.
soul music
Timbre
Classic blues
Bel canto
22. A style of singing made possible by the invention of the microphone. It involves an intimate approach to vocal timbre.
ASCAP
Hook
Crooning
Ragtime
23. Bandleader for the most successful dance orchestra of the 1920s. He billed himself as the 'King of Jazz -' widened the market for jazz-based dance music - and paved the way for the Swing Era.
Bessie Smith
Paul Whiteman
Refrain
ASCAP
24. The underlying pulse of a song or piece of music; a unit of rhythmic measure in music.
Beat
Diana Ross
Acoustic recording
Scott Joplin
25. Developed in 1925 using a new device - the microphone. Electric recording converts sounds into electrical signals.
Lyricist
Electronic recording
Concept album
Chuck Berry
26. A technique used by opera singers that emphasizes breath control - a fluid and relaxed voice - and the use of subtle variations in pitch and rhythmic phrasing for dramatic effect.
R&B
Bessie Smith
Bel canto
Major/Minor
27. A theme that is elaborated on in a piece of music
motive
Bob Dylan
Duke Ellington
sound
28. Founder of Motown Records.
Jerry Lee Lewis
Berry Gordy - Jr.
Standards
Minstrel Show
29. Rock group from Liverpool - England - who dominated American popular music during the mid-1960s and started the 'British Invasion.' The band included John Lennon and George Harrison on lead and rhythm guitars and vocals - Paul McCartney on bass and v
The Beatles
Electronic recording
Banjo
Cakewalk
30. A guitarist and inventor - designed his own eight-track tape recorder and began in 1948 to release a series of popular recordings featuring his own playing - overdubbed to sound like an ensemble of six or more guitars.
Herman Parker
Les Paul
Ray Charles
Timbre
31. The first successful singing cowboy; born in Texas - He was a successful film star and a popular country and western musician. Helped establish the 'western' component of country and western music. Developed a style designed to reach out to a broader
Strophic
Dick Clark
Gene Autry
Bessie Smith
32. Clarinetist and popular band leader; known as the 'King of Swing.' His popularity and the success of his band helped establish the swing era in the early 1930s. He was the first white bandleader to hire black musicians in his band
Benny Goodman
sound
Form
Paul Whiteman
33. African American composer and pianist; the best-known composer of ragtime music. Between 1895 and 1915 - Joplin composed many of the classics of the ragtime repertoire and helped popularize the style through his piano arrangements - published as shee
Strophic
Motown
Ballad
Scott Joplin
34. The most significant single figure to emerge in country music during the immediate post-World War II period. Williams wrote and sang many songs in the course of his brief career that were enormously popular with country audiences at the time; between
The Rolling Stones
Hank Williams
Classic blues
Chuck Berry
35. Recordings of performances by African American musicians produced mainly for sale to African American listeners.
The Rolling Stones
soul music
Race Records
Lyricist
36. The first form of musical and theatrical entertainment to be regarded by European audiences as distinctively American in character. Featured mainly white performers who artificially blackened their skin and carried out parodies of African American mu
Minstrel Show
The Rolling Stones
phrase
Boogie Woogie
37. The lead singer for the Supremes. After leaving the Supremes in 1970 - she became a successful solo artist.
phrase
Diana Ross
Tempo
sound
38. A version of a previously recorded performance; often an adaptation of the original's style and sensibility - and usually aimed at cashing in on its success.
Cover version
'The twist'
The Beatles
The Supremes
39. Urban folk singer and songwriter; he took his stage name from his favorite poet - Dylan Thomas. His songs include hits such as 'Blowin' in the Wind -' 'Mr. Tambourine Man -' and 'Like a Rolling Stone.'
Countrypolitan
Beat
Bob Dylan
Minstrel Show
40. 'The Queen of Soul -' she began singing gospel music at an early age and had several hit records with Atlantic - including 'Respect' in 1967 and 'Think' in 1968.
Gertrude 'Ma' Rainey
Aretha Franklin
Producer
AABA form
41. Born into a wealthy family in Indiana; studied classical music at Yale - Harvard - and the Schola Cantorum in Paris.
Elvis Presley
Ballad
Polyphonic
Cole Porter
42. The first successful singing cowboy; born in Texas - He was a successful film star and a popular country and western musician. Helped establish the 'western' component of country and western music. Developed a style designed to reach out to a broader
cadence
Beat
urban folk
Gene Autry
43. Pianist - composer - arranger - and bandleader; widely regarded as one of the most important American musicians of the twentieth century. As a composer and arranger - he devised unusual musical forms - combined instruments in unusual ways - and creat
Scat singing
Duke Ellington
Jerry Lee Lewis
sound
44. Pitched/unpitched - dynamic - timbre or tone color
sound
R&B
Bridge
The Supremes
45. Africanized version of the European quadrille (a kind of square dance). The cakewalk was developed by slaves as a parody of the 'refined' dance movements of the white slave owners
Motown
The Rolling Stones
Bridge
Cakewalk
46. The 'Godfather of Soul.' He was known for his acrobatic physicality and remarkable charisma on stage. No other single musician has proven to be as influential on the sound and style of black music as James Brown.
James Brown
Minstrel Show
ASCAP
Melody
47. The musical pattern created by parts being played or sung together
Texture
phrase
Ethel Merman
phrase
48. 'Time' in Italian; the rate at which a musical composition proceeds - regulated by the speed of the beats or pulse to which it is performed.
ASCAP
Tempo
Bridge
Producer
49. Known as the 'Genius of Soul'; songwriter - arranger - keyboard player - and vocalist fluent in R&B - jazz - and mainstream pop.
Big Band
Tempo
Phil Spector
Ray Charles
50. A musical genre that emerged in black communities of the Deep South-especially the region from the Mississippi Delta to East Texas-sometime around the end of the nineteenth century
Sheet music
Cakewalk
Dick Clark
Blues