【正确答案】
D
【答案解析】[解析] 11-16
Professor
We are currently experiencing the most radical technological revolution the world has yet known. The age of super technology has touched every aspect of our lives, including how and when we listen to music. From the moment we are awakened by our clock radios, our daily activities unfold against a musical background. We listen to music while on the move—in our cars, on planes, or through our headphones while running or biking—or at home for relaxation. We can hardly avoid it in grocery and department stores, in restaurants, in elevators, at the dentist's office, even at work. We can experience music in live concerts—at outdoor festivals, rock concerts, jazz clubs, the symphony, the opera—or we can hear it at the movies or on television. The advent of MTV (Music Television Video) has revolutionized the way we listen to popular music; now it is a visual experience as well as an aural one. This increased dependency on our eyes—one of our more highly developed senses—makes our ears work less actively, a factor we shall attempt to probe in this lecture.
Music media are rapidly changing too. The LP record is largely obsolete, cassettes are quickly falling into disuse in favor of CDs, and newer formats are on the way. Video disc players are part of some home stereos, and CD-ROM drives are standard on today's computer systems. In our musical experiences, we have learned to accept new sounds, many produced electronically rather than by traditional instruments. Much of the music we hear on television, at the movies, and from pop music groups is synthetic, produced by instruments that can accurately recreate the familiar sounds of piano, violin, or drums as well as totally new sounds and noises for special effects. Composers too have welcomed the technological revolution; the tools of music composition, formerly a pen, music paper, and perhaps a piano, now more likely include a synthesizer, computer, and laser printer. In short, modern technology has placed at our disposal a wider diversity of music—from every period in history, from every kind of instrument, and from every corner of the globe—than has ever been available before.
Given this diversity, we must choose our path of study. In this beginning lecture, we will focus on the classics of Western music and pay special attention to the important influences that traditional, popular, and non-Western music have had on the European and American heritage. The purpose is to expand our listening experience through a heightened awareness of many styles of music. We will also study the uniquely American forms of blues, jazz, and musical theater, as well as rock and contemporary world music. The goal of the whole course is to place music, whether art or popular, within its cultural context, and to highlight the relationships between different styles. These points are, emphasized in the "Cultural Perspectives", stimulating, and informative texts placed throughout our textbook open windows to other cultures and their music.
[解析] 本题为要点题。从讨论的整体内容来看，讨论的主题是讲述音乐欣赏的时间和地点的选择，以及如何学习本课程，也就是对音乐做基本介绍，故选择D项。