Unit 01d The Arts

Complete each sentence with a time word from the
box.

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

1 I saw Jake at the shops  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill . He said he had an audition  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill

2 Liz was unemployed for some time but she's  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill on tour with a theatre company in China.

3 I've  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill been so humiliated in all my life as when I fell over on stage in full view of the audience.

4 What have you been up to  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill ? It seems a long time  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill we went to that rap concert together.

5 They  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill haven't decided on a venue for the jazz weekend - I hope it will be somewhere nice.

6 I used to play the trumpet in an orchestra but I only play  currentlyjust nowlatelylaterneveroccasionallysincestill these days - I just don't have time anymore!

Complete the text with the correct form of the
verbs in brackets.

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

Britt Tajet-Foxell has been the Royal Ballet's resident psychologist for nearly 20 years, working alongside its physiotherapists and body-control experts to lead dancers to realise their full potential. Her skills in the context of rehabilitation from significant physical
injury (also / earn) her an outstanding reputation in the world of sport.
Tajet-Foxell originally (train) as a physiotherapist at St Thomas' Hospital in London
in the early 1970s. She (join) the Royal Ballet at a time when a specific science of
dance: 'physiotherapy' (not exist) . 'The theoretical models were all drawn from sport. Before then, nobody (give) any thought to what dancers (continually / ask) their bodies to do,' she recalls. 'Now there's much more awareness. Working on the mechanics of dancers' injuries, I (become) increasingly
fascinated by their psychology. It was amazing how two dancers with the same injury could respond to it in completely different ways.' So Tajet-Foxell (embark) on a psychology degree and (come) out with a double-sided perspective that is, she (believe) ,
unique in the field.

Read the text below and think of the word that best
fits each space. Use only one word in each space.

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

According James Cutting, a psychologist at Cornell University, film-makers are getting better at constructing films in a way that they hold our attention. He points that the viewer's attention is held more effectively in films which feature shots of a similar length. What's , this
effect is enhanced those shots recur in a regular pattern throughout a film. analysed over a hundred Hollywood movies, he has come to the conclusion that, the more recent they are, the more closely their shot lengths have a tendency to follow the same mathematical pattern that also describes human attention spans.
Cutting suggests that following such a pattern well make films more gripping because they resonate the rhythm of natural attention spans. However, he doubts that directors are deliberately using mathematics in the making of movies. Instead, he thinks films that happen to be edited in this way tend to be successful, in turn encourages others to copy their style, explaining why more recent films tend to conform to the pattern.

Complete each sentence with a preposition

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

1 Most performers thrive positive recognition but react badly to negative criticism.

2 The organisers were hard-pressed new ideas for evening entertainment, so when I suggested a classical evening at a club, they thought it was great!

3 A professional pianist, Boris really enjoyed getting his teeth challenging pieces by Bartok
or Shostakovich.

4 Why is it that the older generation always hark to the good old days ofthe 60s and
70s music scene?

5 As part of the breakdancing team, we spent months working a common goal.

6 Sally took her new hobby of amateur theatricals like a duck to water!

Complete each sentence with the correct form of
an idiom from the box. The meaning is given in
brackets at the end of each sentence.

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

1 Someone said he was a well-known actor but his name doesn't  blowing her own trumpetchanged his tuneplay it by earpulled out all the stopsring a bellwent for a song. (=sound familiar)

2 That acrobatic display was fantastic! They certainly  blowing her own trumpetchanged his tuneplay it by earpulled out all the stopsring a bellwent for a song.(= tried their very best)

3 Leila spent the whole meeting  blowing her own trumpetchanged his tuneplay it by earpulled out all the stopsring a bellwent for a song instead of listening to other people's opinions!(= talking about her own achievements)

4 Their old gymnastic equipment  blowing her own trumpetchanged his tuneplay it by earpulled out all the stopsring a bellwent for a song on a well-known online auction site.(= was sold very cheaply)

5 Phil insisted that he loathed any form of dance but after seeing the Cuban dancers performing live, he quickly  blowing her own trumpetchanged his tuneplay it by earpulled out all the stopsring a bellwent for a song . (=expressed a different opinion)

6 I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to say to Lisa about her performance but I'll  blowing her own trumpetchanged his tuneplay it by earpulled out all the stopsring a bellwent for a song and see how she reacts. (= see how a situation develops before deciding what to do)

Complete the text

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

Top classical festivals are very expensive and difficult to get into. But now a mouse-click may be all you need. Europe's elite classical music festivals do not, as a rule,  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider cheap. Many have dizzying ticket prices; some are habitually so over-subscribed that it's nearly impossible to get in even if you can afford it. Now though, you can beat financial pressure by  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider such events from the comfort of your home computer: some savvy organisations have set out to reach a  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider
audience for the events via webcasting. The technology has made  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider progress since the first opera webcast in 1999. The Berlin Philharmonic's pioneering, year-round Digital Concert Hall has set the  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider high in terms of standard and many more orchestras and opera houses have since started  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider with online streaming. Festivals are no exception; their webcasts are making rapid gains in both quality and quantity.
For them the advantages of webcasting are obvious. More viewers mean more  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider attendees, while the  barcomedabblingeasepotentialsamplingsignificantwider of access dilutes any suggestion of elitism.

Complete each sentence with a suitable word
formed from the one given in brackets

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

1 In my view, there is no room for (mediocre) in the world of the performing arts
today. It's a highly (compete) field where a certain amount of (ruthless) is required in order to succeed.

2 Stella's performance really bowled me over tonight! All the various (subtle) of gesture and mood were evident in her performance and I'd be amazed if she doesn't get rave reviews after all the (set) she's had to overcome recently.

3 The noise level was (deaf) at the rock concert but everyone seemed to be having a good
time.

4 Do you think all performers have two sides to their personality? The ones I know seem to be
very (go) on stage but in real life they have a (tend) to be quite introverted and anti-social!

In which section does the writer mention

Quiz

Cirque Mandingue

A
Cirque Mandingue is both a circus school and a touring company; money earned touring helping to fund the training of thirty young performers back in Guinea. Junior Camara, leader of the acrobatics troupe, doubles as the school's director. I've come to meet them and to get hands-on experience of what they do. I'll be learning how to become part of a human pyramid. But first I watch their show to see what I'm letting myself in for. Bantering performers - gymnasts, contortionists and acrobats - crowd the stage, dancing and leaping to the insistent sound of live djembé drumming. Scenes move between a blur of frenetic handstands and incredibly fast leaps, with performers flipping themselves on to each other's shoulders, to slower, intricately choreographed contortion routines. As the show draws to a close, it's my turn. As I
head backstage, Junior approaches me enthusiastically, 'You've done this before, right?' 'Err no, I haven't.' This prompts some conferring among the team as to what's safe to do with a novice.
B
I'm told to clamber on to the shoulders of a gymnast called Francois. I've no idea what's about to happen, so there's little choice but to go with it and hope I don't break
my neck. I manage to scramble up but then I'm instructed to hold my legs at a right angle and point my toes upwards. This isn't as straightforward as it sounds. My thighs are aching and I'm ready to buckle but more performers are attaching themselves to the chap below me. 'Hurry up!' I yell, 'I can't hold it much longer.' They insist that what we're doing is quite safe but I'm not entirely convinced. I also feel incredibly puny next to the real acrobats, who aren't shy about demonstrating either their physiques or their immense strength. Their training takes years and most of them started young. As I concentrate on staying more or less upright, I realise too that the kind of acrobatics I've watched on stage depend totally on a mix of confidence and trust. To be able
to flip so precisely that you land on someone's shoulders as easily as a bird alights on a bough requires fearlessness, true but you also have to know that your partner won't let you down.
C
Regis Truchy, a French clown, performs in and choreographs part of the show and his narrative humorously highlights artistic differences between western and African cultures, particularly in music. Some scenes see Truchy's cheesy western pop pitched against Guinean hip-hop. Truchy, 38, has worked as both a ballet dancer
and a figure skater and says Cirque Mandingue has given him a new lease of life. For him, the stand-out element of the show is the way it mixes contortion with dance.
Contortion is an ancient practice found across the world so and the technique tends to remain very traditional. 'These guys,' says Truchy, 'mix it up a bit.' In the current show,
one of the guys mixing it up is Naby, 25, whose feats of contortion make one fear for his spine. He started learning acrobatics when he was ten and, as well as contortion, he dances and plays the 'djembé'
D
Aboubacar, 26, also started aged ten, at first learning from friends on the beaches of Conakry. At 15, his hard work paid off when he started working with Junior. He says touring can be hard on artists' families, but, 'It's a chance for me to have a job and make some money for them.' With my attempt to be one of the gang now concluded,the group winds down for dinner. I'd been warned that even when the troupe relaxes, the vibe never falters and sure enough I find myself in the middle of a full-on rap show, Guinean-style; the table shaking as everyone joins in a fast and furious battle of rhythm and rhyming. It's rather like a verbal version of their passionate physical skills. They tell me about a festival where the troupe was joined by some
French performers who asked to warm up with them. The group's daily warm-up takes at least two hours and is followed by four hours of practice- acrobatics, contortion,
hand-balancing and traditional dancing. Barely an hour into the session exhaustion forced their guests to throw in the towel. Somehow, I'm not surprised.

 

1. the performers maintaining a constant level of energy
   throughout the visit?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
2. a way of generating jncome for a related initiative?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
3. an attempt to give a novice reassurance?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
4. the unique feature of the group's style of performance?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
5. a move that is unexp~ctedly challenging?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
6. an example of the stamina demanded by a routine?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
7. a shift away from the conventions of a genre?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
8. a feeling of relative inadequacy?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
9. an appreciation of the faith performers have in
   each other?
   1.   A
   2.   B
   3.   C
   4.   D
10. the contrasting pace of elements of the performance?
    1.   A
    2.   B
    3.   C
    4.   D