Unit 11 Enjoy Artistic Beauty
Part Ⅰ Getting ready
A The following words and phrase will appear in this unit. Listen carefully and study the definitions.
1. nominate: propose as a candidate for an award or honor
2. album: a long-playing record with several pieces by the same musician or singer
3. audition: take part in a practical test for performing applicants
4. choreography: the arranging or inventing of dances, especially ballet
5. pantomime: traditional Christmas musical show for children
6. trophy: a prize awarded in a sports contest or other competition
7. nickname: a familiar, often shorter form of a proper name
8. applaud: show approval or enjoyment by clapping the hands
9. usher: a person whose duty is to show people to their seats in a theater, church, etc.
10. cough drop: a small medicated tablet, often sweetened and flavored, for the relief of coughs
B You are going to hear a passage about "The Grammy Awards" in the United States. Supply the missing words while listening.
The Grammy Awards will be presented on Tuesday, March 1st. The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences presents the Grammy Awards each year. The awards go to the most successful people in the recording industry. Recording artists, song writers and technicians organized the academy more than 30 years ago. They wanted to recognize excellent musical recordings and those who create them. Academy members vote to choose the best work of the year. There are now more than 70 awards. They include "Album of the Year", "Record of the Year", and "Song of the Year". The Grammy itself is a small gold statue. It is shaped like earlier record players called gramophones. The word "grammy" is a short way of saying "gramophone". This year British singer Sting is nominated for six Grammy Awards. These include "Album of the Year", "Record of the Year" and "Song of the Year". He also is nominated for "Best Pop Male Singer" for this song If I Ever Lose My Faith in You ... (singing) Another singer nominated for more than one Grammy Award this year is Billy Joel whose nominations include "Album of the Year" and "Record of the Year". He also is nominated for "Song of the Year" for River of Dreams ... (singing) Two recordings by country singer and song writer Mary Chapen Carpenter are nominated for "Best Country Song of the Year". We leave you with one of those songs. It is called "The Hard Way" ... (singing)
Part Ⅱ Karen Kain -a Canadian ballerina
A In this section, you are going to hear an interview during which Karen Kain, a Canadian ballerina, talks about her work and how she first became interested in the ballet. While listening for the first time, add more key words in the left column. After the second listening, answer the questions.
Karen Kain:Well, I actually saw Celia Franka dance, and now she founded the National Ballet of Canada. And she was dancing in my hometown — Giselle, and I was taken for my birthday, and I saw her dance, I fell in love with it, and I started taking ballet lessons, and then at one point ... I think it was around ten ... my teacher said that I should audition for the National Ballet School, which is a full-time academic and ballet training facility here in Toronto. It's one of ... I think it's the only one in North America. I mean, it's the same set-up as the Paris Opera, the Bolshoi, the Leningrad ... you know, that they have the school affiliated with the Company. And you take all your academic training as well as your dance training.
So she told me that I should audition for that, and I did. And when I was eleven years old I went to the ballet school for seven years till I was eighteen, graduated from high school and I joined the National Ballet.
Tom Boyd: Now you were married fairly recently, weren't you?
Karen Kain: It'll be three years next month, yes.
Tom Boyd: Is touring and so forth hard on married life? I believe your husband's an actor, isn't he?
Karen Kain: Yes, he is.
Tom Boyd: So you're probably both away quite a lot.
Karen Kain:
We've been very fortunate. We've managed to stay together most of the time. The longest we were separated was when I was on tour with the National Ballet in Europe last spring, and I was gone for six weeks, and he was making a television series and he was in Australia for six weeks. So we have been separated a few times, but most of the time we manage to be together. We've just been very fortunate.
Tom Boyd: Throughout the year ... how much time do you have off away from the dance?
Karen Kain: Very little. I'm trying to make sure that I get one week in June this year, because I have not had more than two days free since a year ago January. So I've been working very very hard, and I feel that I really need one week free, you know.
Tom Boyd: How long can a ballerina go on before she should start thinking of retiring?
Karen Kain: I hope that I have another ten years at the most to dance.
Tom Boyd: What would you do after that? Would you leave the ballet completely or go into teaching, or choreography?
Karen Kain: I don't think choreography, I don't think I have any talent in ... you know ... I have no desire, no talent. I like to teach, I like to coach young dancers. I don't think I would leave the ballet world entirely, but I may try something else. You never know. I'm interested in other things and I have done some sorts of musical comedy work, and I've enjoyed it very much — just to expand myself a little and to look around. And this Christmas again I'll be playing Cinderella in an English pantomime — which is great fun for me. I really have fun and it's not serious dancing, you know, and I get to speak and act and everything. So I don't know. I would also like to have a family, so I have lots of things that I may do.
B Now try this: listen to a more authentic version of the interview and then do the multiple choice.
本题听力原文同上。
Part Ⅲ "The Scream"
A "The Scream" is a picture by Edvard Munch, a Norwegian painter and graphic artist. Now listen to a passage in which a speaker talks about his understanding of the picture. While listening for the first time, take down some key words in the left-hand column. After the second listening, fill in the gaps in the summary below.
Speaker 1: This picture is "The Scream" by Edvard Munch, and it's a very powerful picture, it's in black and white as, as you see it here. And um I think it's particularly powerful because mainly because of that figure who um, who is, who seems to be running off this bridge here holding his or her head in her hands and screaming. And um, what's very interesting about the picture are the two, the two figures at the end of the bridge or further up this road. And it's difficult to understand whether the person is running from them or whether they're just er innocent bystanders.
Um, so the reason I, like this picture, the reason I find it powerful is because I think that the person is not actually running from the two dark figures at the end of the bridge, but in fact the person is suffering er perhaps some kind of terrible loneliness or sadness, and is, actually seems to be trying to hide that feeling from those people. And I think this is a common feeling, this is something which we all do sometimes when, when we feel some feeling, usually a bad feeling, something like loneliness or terrible unhappiness, we don't want other people to see that, and er so we, we have to try and hide that feeling from, from other members of the, of the public. And I feel that's what this man or woman is doing in the picture here.
B In this section, the speaker is trying to talk about his understanding of the picture from another angle.
Speaker 2: As a design, the picture's very strong as well. The, the bridge or the street is a very strong diagonal line which goes through the, the picture. And then to the, to the right of the screamer's head there's a series of dark vertical lines — it's difficult to know what that is, perhaps it's a field or maybe it could be a wall, it's difficult to know exactly what it is, but those dark vertical lines somehow depress the picture, which is exactly what the artist wanted. And then at the, at the top, you have the sky, which the artist has, has er made in the form perhaps of clouds, which are very strong horizontal lines, very, very bold black lines which again seem to push the whole picture down, and add to the depression of the, the experience which the, the screamer is er, is feeling.
Part Ⅳ More about the topic: The Oscar Award and Others
The following passage is about some well-known awards in the United States such as the Oscar Awards, the Tonys, the Edgars and the Hugos. While listening for the first time, add more key words in the notes column. After the second listening, complete the outline by supplying the missing information.
Oscar is a trademark used especially for any number of golden statuettes awarded annually by a professional organization for notable achievement in motion pictures.
In the spring of 1929, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences made its first presentation of annual awards for excellence in motion pictures, giving the awards that year for pictures released in the 1927-1928 seasons. Up to that time the award, a ten-inch gold-plated bronze statue of a man with his arms in front of him resting on the handle of a sword, was known only as "the statuette".
On her first day of work as a librarian at the Academy in 1931, Margaret Herrick, on seeing one of the statues on the desk of an executive and being told that the statue was the Academy's "foremost member", remarked, "He reminds me of my Uncle Oscar," referring to Oscar Pierce, a Texas fruit and wheat grower (who in reality was her mother's first cousin). What happened next ranks with the best of Hollywood stories. A Hollywood columnist overheard Mrs. Herrick's remark, and the next day his column made the statement: "Employees have affectionately dubbed their famous statuette 'Oscar'." Mrs. Herrick, who later became executive director of the Academy, regretted very much the remark she made in a mad moment of whimsy.
Later, professional organizations in the other arts have also followed the lead of the Motion Picture Academy. In 1947 the American Theater Wing instituted the annual Antoinette Perry Awards for outstanding achievement in the theater. The awards were named after the actress and theatrical director Antoinette Perry. The awards have always been known as the Tonys, after the nickname of the actress-director.
In the field of popular literature, the Mystery Writers of America annually award the Edgars for excellence in mystery writing. The trophies are miniature busts of Edgar Allan Poe, who is regarded as the father of the detective story. Not to be outdone, the World Science Fiction Convention annually presents its Hugos for achievement in the field of science fiction. The trophies, which are silver-plated miniature rocket ships, honor the memory of Hugo Gernsback, who was an American editor, publisher, inventor, and founder of Amazing Stories, the first magazine devoted to science fiction.
Part Ⅴ Do you know ...?
A In this section you are going to hear an interesting anecdote of a music director Kurt Masur. After that some statements will be read to you. Decide whether they are true or false. Put "T" or "F" in the brackets. While you listen, don't forget to take notes.
Speaker 1: The music director of the New York Philharmonic — Kurt Masur recently walked off the stage during a performance because of what he called uncontrolled coughing from the audience. Masur said the noise was so bad that it was distracting the musicians from what they were playing. It was the third movement of Shostakovich Fifth Symphony. Masur has on previous occasions expressed his objections to coughing from the audience. He's even stopped the music briefly when he thought there was too much audience's noise. But this time he left the stage at the Avery Fisher Hall in New York City for about two minutes. The audience applauded and they applauded again when he went back on stage. Kurt Masur says, "I didn't want to get angry. I just wanted to make people aware they were disturbing the process of listening." And some, uh, orchestra conductors in the United States and I … suppose in other countries as well have even gone as far as to have the ushers hand out cough drops to people as they entered ...
Speaker 2: Is that right?
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, I was noting here, had it been the last movement of this Shostakovich Symphony, the music would have been as arousing as this is or even louder. So I don't think he would have walked out on that one.
Statements:
1. The music director left the stage because there was too much coughing from the audience.
2. Mr. Masur said too much coughing distracted some audience from listening to the music.
3. Mr. Masur left the stage for about ten minutes.
4. When Mr Masur went back on the stage, the audience kept silent.
5. In some countries, before people enter the music hall, the ushers will hand out cough drops to them.
B Now try this: listen to a more authentic version of the passage. |