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Music Appreciation

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. Parton was born in the hill country of Tennessee and began her recording career at age eleven. She moved to Nashville in 1964 and built her career with regular appearances on country music radio and television.






2. The term 'alternative'—like the broadly equivalent terms 'underground' and 'independent'—is used across a wide range of popular genres - including rock - rap - adult contemporary - dance - folk - and country music. It is used to describe music that c






3. Achieved celebrity as a member of the art rock group Genesis before embarking on a solo career. Gabriel's best-selling single 'Sledgehammer' became Number One pop and Number Sixty-one R&B in 1986. The award-winning video version of 'Sledgehammer' was






4. In progressive country - performers wrote songs that were more intellectual and liberal in outlook than their contemporaries and were more concerned with testing the limits of the country music tradition than with scoring hits. The key artists includ






5. The most important woman in the history of hip-hop - in terms of both her commercial success and her effectiveness in establishing a feminist beachhead on the male-dominated field of rap music.






6. 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.






7. Trio consisting of the MCs Run (Joseph Simmons - b. 1964) and D.M.C. (Darryl McDaniels - b. 1964) - and the DJ Jam Master Jay (Jason Mizell - b. 1965). Perhaps the most influential act in the history of rap music - they established a hard-edged - roc






8. Gangsta rapper born in Long Beach - CA - He was a protaga of Andre 'Dr. Dre' Young and collaborated on Dr. Dre's 1992 album The Chronic. Snoop's soft drawl and laid-back-but-lethal gangster persona were featured on Doggystyle - which debuted at the t






9. Regional style of alternative rock from Seattle that blended heavy metal guitar textures with hardcore punk. Bands from Seattle included Green River - Mudhoney - Pearl Jam - Nirvana - and Soundgarden.






10. Kurt KObain's band - Nevermind album






11. One of the biggest stars to emerge from disco in the 1970s. She sang on several disco classics - including 'Love to Love You Baby' (1976) and 'Good Times' (1979).






12. Variant of MPEG; MP3 enables sound files to be compressed to as little as one-twelfth of their original size.






13. Marketing category that emerged around 1990; it is most often used to describe bands like are.E.M. - Sonic Youth - the Dead Kennedys - and Nirvana.






14. Publicly traded corporation that owns more than 1 -200 radio stations - 39 television stations - 100000 advertising billboards - and 100 live performance venues - ranging from huge amphitheaters to dance clubs - enabling them to present more than 70






15. Pioneered West Coast gangsta rap with the release of the album Straight Outta Compton. Their recordings expressed the gangsta lifestyle - saturated with images of sex and violence. The nucleus of the group was formed in 1986 - when O'Shea ;Ice C






16. -one of the forerunners of the Grunge genre - originally part of the 'no wave' scene in NY -Many alternative bands such as Nirvana looked up to them -album 'Daydream Nation' was well-received by critics - and then they were signed to Geffen Records -






17. Singer and guitarist who founded the alternative rock band Nirvana. His recordings broke through to the commercial mainstream and popularized grunge rock. He shot himself in Seattle in 1994.






18. Gangsta rapper born in Long Beach - CA - He was a protaga of Andre 'Dr. Dre' Young and collaborated on Dr. Dre's 1992 album The Chronic. Snoop's soft drawl and laid-back-but-lethal gangster persona were featured on Doggystyle - which debuted at the t






19. Centered on the creation of a strong rhythmic momentum or groove - with the electric bass and bass drum often playing on all four main beats of the measure - the snare drum and other instruments playing equally strongly on the second and fourth beats






20. The first commercially successful white act in hip-hop. Their early recordings represent a fusion of the youth-oriented rebelliousness of hardcore punk rock—the style they began playing in 1981—with the sensibility and techniques of hip-hop.






21. Band that originated in the 1960s San Francisco rock scene. Their career spanned more than three decades.






22. 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.






23. Achieved celebrity as a member of the art rock group Genesis before embarking on a solo career. Gabriel's best-selling single 'Sledgehammer' became Number One pop and Number Sixty-one R&B in 1986. The award-winning video version of 'Sledgehammer' was






24. Rapper from Oakland - California; hit the charts in 1990 with Please Hammer Don't Hurt 'Em - which held the Number One position for twenty-one weeks and sold over ten million copies - becoming the bestselling rap album of all time.






25. Emerged during the 1970s as one part of the cultural complex of hip-hop. It consisted of rhymed speech accompanied by funk-derived rhythmic grooves.






26. The most influential and economically successful member of N.W.A. He founded an independent record label (Death Row/Interscope) - cultivated a number of younger rappers - and continued to develop a distinctive hip-hop production style - christened 'G






27. Acrobatic solo dancing improvised by the young 'B-boys' who attended hip-hop dances.






28. Singer-songwriter Who wrote many hits in the 1960s with Gerry Goffin. In 1971 - the success of her album Tapestry made her a major recording star.






29. Prince is one of the most talented musicians ever to achieve mass commercial success in the field of popular music. He has sold almost forty million recordings. Between 1982 and 1992 - he placed nine albums in the Top 10 - reaching the top of the cha






30. Device that standardized digital technologies - enabling devices produced by different manufacturers to 'communicate' with one another.






31. Heterogeneous category that includes artists from Africa - the Near East - and Asia—the ultimate margins of the American music industry.






32. Veteran of folk pop groups such as the New Christy Minstrels and the First Edition - star of made-for-TV movies. One of the main beneficiaries of country pop's increasing mainstream appeal.






33. Heterogeneous category that includes artists from Africa - the Near East - and Asia—the ultimate margins of the American music industry.






34. Music played by San Francisco bands that encompassed a variety of styles and musical influences - including folk rock - blues - 'hard rock -' Latin music - and Indian classical music.






35. Genre that developed out of hard rock in the 1970s and achieved mainstream success in the 1980s.






36. Hip-hop artist whose work is a self-conscious alternative to the violence and sexism in the work of rap stars such as Dr. Dre - the Notorious B.I.G. - and 2Pac Shakur. Her commitment to female empowerment builds on the ground-breaking example of Quee






37. Centered on the creation of a strong rhythmic momentum or groove - with the electric bass and bass drum often playing on all four main beats of the measure - the snare drum and other instruments playing equally strongly on the second and fourth beats






38. A style of soft rock - lightly tinged with country music influences: John Denver - Olivia Newton-John - Kenny Rogers.






39. In progressive country - performers wrote songs that were more intellectual and liberal in outlook than their contemporaries and were more concerned with testing the limits of the country music tradition than with scoring hits. The key artists includ






40. DJ and leader of the furious five - he developed many of the turntable techniques that characterized early hip-hop music.






41. Style modeled on that of the early acoustic string bands; probably the original 'alternative country' music.






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






43. Rapper from Oakland - California; hit the charts in 1990 with Please Hammer Don't Hurt 'Em - which held the Number One position for twenty-one weeks and sold over ten million copies - becoming the bestselling rap album of all time.






44. 'Glam rock' pioneer who established the character of Ziggy Stardust.






45. Device that records musical data rather than musical sound and enables the creation of repeated sound sequences (loops) - the manipulation of rhythmic grooves - and the transmission of recorded data from one program or device to another.






46. The norm since the introduction of recording in the nineteenth century. Transforms the energy of sound waves into physical imprints (as in pre-1925 acoustic recordings) or into electronic waveforms that closely follow (and can be used to reproduce) t






47. 'Glam rock' pioneer who established the character of Ziggy Stardust.






48. Ice's first album - To the Extreme (1990) - monopolized the Number One position for sixteen weeks in early 1991 - selling seven million copies. When it was discovered that Van Winkle - raised in reasonably comfortable circumstances in a middle-class






49. Acrobatic solo dancing improvised by the young 'B-boys' who attended hip-hop dances.






50. Co-founded in 1984 by the hip-hop promoter Russell Simmons and the musician-producer Rick Rubin. During the 1980s - Def Jam cross-promoted a new generation of artists - expanding and diversifying the national audience for hip-hop - and in 1986 became







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