Test your basic knowledge |

Subjects : performing-arts, music
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
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  • Match each statement with the correct term.
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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. A recurrent rhythmical series






2. Popular dance ensemble during the swing era - consisting of brass - reeds - and rhythm sections.






3. Popularly known as the 'Mother of the Blues -' was the first of the great women blues singers and had a direct influence on Bessie Smith.

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4. A memorable musical phrase or riff.






5. Pitched/unpitched - dynamic - timbre or tone color






6. Host of the popular teen-oriented television show American Bandstand






7. Black female vocal group who were featured artists with Motown Records in the 1960s. Their song 'You Can't Hurry Love' was a Number One hit in 1966.






8. 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.

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9. Illegal practice - common throughout the music industry - of paying bribes to radio disc jockeys to get certain artists' records played more frequently.






10. 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.

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11. Called the 'Empress of the Blues -' She was born in Chattanooga - Tennessee - and performed in traveling shows and vaudeville before embarking on a recording career with Columbia Records. Her recordings include W. C. Handy's 'St. Louis Blues' and Irv






12. Album conceived as an integrated whole - with interrelated songs arranged in a deliberate sequence.






13. A theme that is elaborated on in a piece of music






14. The underlying pulse of a song or piece of music; a unit of rhythmic measure in music.






15. Technique that involves the use of nonsense syllables as a vehicle for wordless vocal improvisation.






16. The most successful white blues singer of the 1960s. Born in Port Arthur - Texas - Joplin came to San Francisco in the mid-1960s and joined a band called Big Brother and the Holding Company.






17. 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






18. The scale systems central to Western music; a series of pitches organized in a specific order of whole- and half-step intervals. The major scale can give music a feeling of openness and brightness - whereas a minor scale can give music the feeling of






19. Country vocalist who scored crossover hits with songs such as 'I Fall to Pieces -' and 'Crazy -' both recorded in 1961.






20. At the age of twenty-one - introduced 'I Got Rhythm' in the stage show Girl Crazy written by George Gershwin.






21. 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.






22. 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






23. White rockabilly singer and pianist.






24. Vigorous form of country and western music informed by the rhythms of black R&B and electric blues. Exemplified by artists such as Carl Perkins and the young Elvis Presley.






25. Musical texture with interlocking melodies and rhythms.






26. A type of song in which a series of verses telling a story - often about a historical event or personal tragedy - are sung to a repeating melody (this sort of musical form is called strophic).






27. Technique that involves the use of nonsense syllables as a vehicle for wordless vocal improvisation.






28. Nickname for a stretch of 28th Street in New York City where music publishers had their offices—a dense hive of small rooms with pianos where composers and 'song pluggers' produced and promoted popular songs. The term - which evoked the clanging soun






29. Recordings of performances by African American musicians produced mainly for sale to African American listeners.






30. '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.






31. Blues written by professional songwriters and performed by professional female blues singers such as Bessie Smith and Ma Rainey.






32. '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.






33. 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.






34. Country music style involving polished arrangements and a sophisticated approach to vocal presentation. The recordings of Patsy Cline were among the most important manifestations of the Nashville sound.






35. Four- or five-stringed instrument with a membrane stretched over a wooden or metal hoop that is strummed or plucked. It was developed by slave musicians from African prototypes during the early colonial period. The banjo was used in the music of the






36. Chord - consonance - dissonance






37. Known as the 'Genius of Soul'; songwriter - arranger - keyboard player - and vocalist fluent in R&B - jazz - and mainstream pop.






38. 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






39. 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.






40. Sophisticated approach to the vocal presentation and instrumental arrangement of country music; a fusion of 'country' and 'cosmopolitan.'






41. American popular songs from the Tin Pan Alley style of songwriting that remain an essential part of the repertoire of today's jazz musicians and pop singers.






42. Vocal singing without instrumental accompaniment.






43. Host of the popular teen-oriented television show American Bandstand






44. Trombonist and bandleader; formed his own band in 1937. Miller developed a peppy - clean-sounding style that appealed to small-town Midwestern people as well as to the big-city - East and West Coast constituency.






45. A short musical passage






46. Vocal singing without instrumental accompaniment.






47. 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






48. 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






49. Usually sets up a dramatic context or emotional tone. Although verses were the most important part of nineteenth-century popular songs - they were regarded as mere introductions by the 1920s - and today the verses of Tin Pan Alley songs are infrequen






50. Developed in 1925 using a new device - the microphone. Electric recording converts sounds into electrical signals.