Test your basic knowledge |

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






2. A guitar whose sound comes chiefly from electro-magnetic amplification The pioneer of electric blues guitar was Aaron T-Bone Walker - whose urban blues recordings just after World War II were extremely popular - Les Paul created






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






4. 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.






5. The principal medium for disseminating popular sings until the advent of recording in the 1890s.






6. Played records and provided entertaining patter on the radio.






7. Teen-oriented rock 'n' roll song using a twelve-bar blues structure; it celebrated a simple - hip-swiveling dance step.






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






9. 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.






10. Style of folk music that grew in popularity in the burgeoning New York folk scene during the 1960s. It included artists such as Bob Dylan.






11. 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.






12. The quality of a sound - sometimes called 'tone color.'






13. Record company founded by Berry Gordy Jr. in Detroit.






14. 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.






15. Repeating section within a song - consisting of a fixed melody and lyrics repeated exactly - typically following one or more verses.






16. Motive - phrase - cadence






17. The musical pattern created by parts being played or sung together






18. Behind-the-scenes role at a record company. Can be responsible for booking time in the recording studio - hiring backup singers and instrumentalists - assisting with the engineering process - and imprinting the characteristic sound of the finished re






19. 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.






20. Beat - meter - syncopation






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






22. The son of an immigrant leatherworker - did much to bridge the gulf between art music and popular music. Studied European classical music but also spent a great deal of time listening to jazz musicians in New York City. Wrote Porgy and Bess (1935) -






23. Born in New Orleans; a cornetist and singer - he established certain core features of jazz - particularly its rhythmic drive and its emphasis on solo instrumental virtuosity. Armstrong also profoundly influenced the development of mainstream popular






24. 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






25. 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






26. 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






27. 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






28. In the verse-refrain song - the refrain is the 'main part' of the song - usually constructed in AABA or ABAC form.






29. Chord - consonance - dissonance






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.






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






32. 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






33. Process for recording sound in the pre-microphone era. Performers projected into a huge megaphone.






34. Vocal singing without instrumental accompaniment.






35. 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






36. Early rock 'n' roll guitarist - singer - and songwriter from the country/rockabilly side of rock 'n' roll. Killed tragically at the age of twenty-two in a plane crash.






37. 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.






38. '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.






39. Founder of Motown Records.






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






41. 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






42. A memorable musical phrase or riff.






43. 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






44. Describes a song where the stanzas are all sung to the same music






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






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






47. 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.






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






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






50. Record company founded by Berry Gordy Jr. in Detroit.