2. 职称英语
  3. Until Josquin des Prez, 1440-1521, Western music was liturgical, designed as

Until Josquin des Prez, 1440-1521, Western music was liturgical, designed as

游客2023-12-18  55
问题    Until Josquin des Prez, 1440-1521, Western music was liturgical, designed as an accompaniment to worship. Like the intricately carved gargoyles perched atop medieval cathedrals beyond sight of any human, music was composed to please God before anybody else; its dominant theme was reverence. Emotion was there, but it was the grief of Mary standing at the foot of the Cross, the joy of the faithful hailing Christ’s resurrection. Even the secular music of the Middle Ages was tied to predetermined patterns that sometimes seemed to stand in the way of individual expression.
   While keeping one foot firmly planted in the divine world, Josquin stepped with the other into the human. He scored magnificent masses, but also newly expressive motets such as the lament of David over his son Absalom or the "Deploration d’Ockeghem," a dirge on the death of Ockeghem, the greatest master before Josquin, a motet written all in black notes, and one of the most profoundly moving scores of the Renaissance. Josquin was the first composer to set psalms to music. But alongside Benedicite omnia opera Domini Domino ("Bless the Lord, all ye works of the Lord") he put El Grillo ("The cricket is a good singer who manages long poems") and Allegez moy ("Solace me, sweet pleasant brunette"). Josquin was praised by Martin Luther, for his music blends respect for tradition with a rebel’s willingness to risk the horizon. What Galileo was to science, Josquin was to music. While preserving their allegiance to God, both asserted a new importance for man.
   Why then should Josquin languish in relative obscurity? The answer has to do with the separation of concept from performance in music. In fine art, concept and performance are one both the art lover and the art historian have thousands of years of paintings, drawings and sculptures to study and enjoy. Similarly with literature: Poetry, fiction, drama, and criticism survive on the printed page or in manuscript for judgment and admiration by succeeding generations. But musical notation on a page is not art, no matter how lofty or excellent the composer% conception it is, crudely put, a set of directions for producing art. Being highly symbolic, musical notation requires training before it can even be read, let alone performed. Moreover, because the musical conventions of other days are not ours, translation of a Renaissance score into modem notation brings difficulties of its own. For example, the Renaissance notation of Josquin’s day did not designate the tempo at which the music should be played or sung. It did not indicate all flats or sharps; these were sounded ill accordance with musicianly rules, which were capable of transforming major to minor, minor to major, diatonic to chromatic sound, and thus affect melody, harmony, and musical expression, a Renaissance composition might include several parts--but it did not indicate which were to be sung, which to be played, nor even whether instruments were to be used at all.
   Thus, Renaissance notation permits of several interpretations and an imaginative musician may give an interpretation that is a revelation. But no matter how imaginative, few modern musicians can offer any interpretation of Renaissance music. The public for it is small, limiting the number of musicians who can afford to learn, rehearse, and perform it. Most of those who attempt it at all are students organized in colegia musica whose memberships have a distressing habit of changing every semester, thus preventing directors from maintaining the year-in, year-out continuity required to achieve excellence of performance. Finally, the instruments used in Renaissance times--drummhorns, recorders, rauschpfeifen, shawms, sackbuts, organetto-must be specially procured. [br] The primary purpose of the passage is to______.
选项 A、introduce the reader to Josquin and account for his relative obscurity
B、describe the main features of medieval music and show how Josquin changed them
C、place Josquin’s music in a historical context and show its influence on later composers
D、enumerate the features of Josquin’s music and supply critical commentary
答案 A
解析 这是一个主旨题。这篇文章实际上说了两个问题：准是Josquin?为什么我们未曾听说过Josquin其人?答案A正确地提及了这两个问题。B是不正确的，因为文章的焦点与描述中世纪的音乐无关，作者要说的Josquin是西方文艺复兴时期的人物。C是错误的，因为作者更想将Josquin介绍给他的读者，尽管作者在某种程度上提及Josquin与其前辈断绝关系之事，但这与show its influence on later composers的观点无关。D也是错误的。作者列举Josquin音乐的特点是为厂向读者介绍Josquin，他赞扬了Josquin的音乐，但并没有做任何评论。
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