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Test Item File
Part 1: The Middle Ages: 476 CE–Early Fifteenth Century
1. Medieval courts used the arts primarily as a means of
a. educating their young in the schools.
b. exploring religious and political debates.
c. projecting their cultural power and impressing subjects and visitors.
d. funding their budgets through public shows and concerts.
2. The earliest chant manuscripts show
a. simple symbols above the texts, indicating motion of the pitch up or down.
b. carefully notated rhythms.
c. indications of which instruments should play the harmonies.
d. no indication of pitch whatsoever.
3. In Hildegard’s Play of Virtues, Satan does not sing, but
a. pantomimes his part.
b. shouts his lines.
c. plays the pan pipes.
d. is heard offstage playing the viol.
4. Gregorian Chant is named after Pope Gregory I, who
a. organized a group of composers to write a new set of plainchant melodies.
b. had his name put on the first printed edition of the Gregorian Chant hymnal.
c. was said to have written the bulk of the standard chants, according to later legend.
d. wrote the harmonies and instrumental parts for all of the chants.
5. A syllabic setting is
a. music chanted on nonsense syllables.
b. text set to one note per syllable.
c. music sung on the syllable “la.”
d. music sung on the solfeggio syllables.
6. Hildegard’s Play of Virtues is
a. a comedy.
b. a dramatized Mass.
c. a dramatized allegory of good versus evil.
d. based upon the writings of Charlemagne.
7. What rhythmic approach was always used in performing plainchant in the Middle Ages?
a. free
b. measured
c. modal
d. No one knows exactly how it was performed.
8. In Hildegard’s play, Satan is like
a. Peter Pan in Neverland.
b. Gollum in Lord of the Rings.
c. Dumbledore in the Harry Potter series.
d. Darth Vader in Star Wars.
9. Melismatic refers to
a. sacred themes in musical works.
b. text set to multiple notes per syllable.
c. melodies sung in an automatic and mechanical style.
d. text set to one note per syllable.
10. The texture in Hildegard’s play was
a. monophonic, allowing performers to project the text with great clarity.
b. homophonic, causing the text to be lost in the harmony.
c. heterophonic, making Satan appear even more frightening.
d. very different from the texture of the Gregorian chants.
11. The opening of the excerpt “Soul, Penitent” from Hildegard’s Play of Virtues is in which
mode?
a. Dorian, beginning and cadencing on the note D
b. Mixolydian, beginning and cadencing on the note E
c. Phrygian, beginning and cadencing on the note F
d. Lydian, beginning and cadencing on the note G
12. Hildegard wrote her Play of Virtues to be performed
a. at the Council of Trent.
b. by a traveling troupe of minnesingers.
c. in her own convent by her fellow nuns.
d. at a gathering of archbishops on All Saints Day.
13. Gregorian Chant during the Middle Ages was chiefly
a. monophonic in texture.
b. homophonic in texture.
c. polyphonic in texture.
d. both b and c
14. Hildegard entered the Benedictine convent at what age?
a. 17
b. 7
c. 42
d. 2
15. In addition to her music, Hildegard
a. experienced visions and revelations and directed the life of a thriving convent.
b. considered herself a channel through which the Holy Spirit spoke to humankind.
c. was the first woman to receive permission from a pope to write on theology.
d. all of the above, in addition to writing on medicine, plants, and the lives of saints.
16. In her letter to the authorities defending the practice of music, Hildegard
a. uses references from the book of Psalm.
b. refers to the biblical prophet David.
c. discourages the use of Gregorian chant in worship.
d. both a and b
17. An important female composer of the Middle Ages was
a. Alicia de lo Rocha.
b. Hildegard of Bingen.
c. Mary Lowell.
d. Eurydice.
18. Plainchant consists of
a. one instrument playing alone.
b. several voices and instruments with harmony.
c. readings by Pope Gregory I.
d. melody sung alone or by a group in unison.
19. Which of the following is NOT true of Gregorian chant?
a. It conveys a calm, otherworldly quality and enhances the meaning of the words.
b. It was well suited for performance in the large resonant spaces of the medieval
churches.
c. The melodies tend to move stepwise with a narrow range of pitches.
d. It is polyphonic in texture.
20. What is the rhythmic approach of the recording of Play of Virtues?
a. free
b. metered
c. duple
d. none of the above
21. What is the melodic contour of many of Hildegard’s phrases?
a. a doubly-inverted-arc contour
b. begin with upward leap, then descend through a series of steps
c. begin with downward leap, then ascend through a series of steps
d. ascend gradually to the reciting tone
22. Which is NOT a character in Hildegard’s Play of Virtues?
a. Victory
b. the Devil
c. the Prophet
d. the Soul
23. Monophonic chant appears
a. in cultures throughout the world and across historical epochs.
b. only as a relic of musical practices in the Catholic Church.
c. primarily in secular music of indigenous cultures.
d. as a new phenomenon during the shift from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance.
24. The text of the Eagle Dance
a. represents the call of the eagle as it flies.
b. is a series of vocables rather than words.
c. describes the importance of virility in Native American culture.
d. is written in a now-lost San Ildefonso language.
25. The text of a song like Eagle Dance comes from
a. children’s games.
b. political issues surrounding the Native American struggle for statehood.
c. the spirit world, through dreams or revelation.
d. ancient warrior legend.
26. The Eagle Dance is part of a
a. water baptismal ceremony.
b. marital ceremony.
c. rain ceremony.
d. corn ceremony.
27. Native American gatherings called powwows
a. evolved as a specifically Omaha tradition.
b. are intertribal gatherings.
c. have existed unchanged for centuries, carrying on ancient traditions.
d. have now become tourist shows run by outside corporations.
28. Like other Native American ceremonies, the Eagle Dance is
a. accompanied by drums.
b. accompanied by flutes.
c. usually chordal in texture.
d. no longer performed.
29. The eagle featured in Eagle Dance is regarded as the
a. pursuit of women by men.
b. path of a human life.
c. struggle between the spirits of light and dark.
d. connecting link between heaven and earth.
30. In its texture, the Eagle Dance resembles
a. Handel’s Messiah.
b. shamanic chants.
c. “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.”
d. fire-ball alternative punk.
31. The descending melodic phrases in the Eagle Dance
a. are heard only in the free rhythm introduction.
b. represent the ceremonial touching of the feathers to the ground.
c. are typical of North American Indian chant melodies.
d. use word-painting to convey the meaning of the vocables.
32. How are the sections organized in Eagle Dance?
a. ABBA
b. AABA
c. ABAA’
d. ABA
33. The B section in Eagle Dance
a. is a strict repetition of the A section.
b. consists of a shorter vocable set than the A section.
c. consists of a melody played by flutes.
d. is marked by the drummers dropping out.
34. The phrases in Eagle Dance use which melodic patterns?
a. downward terraced contour
b. ascending terraced contour
c. extended static repetition of notes
d. all of the above
35. At a powwow, the “Grand Entry” of participants in the area is followed by
______________________, who carry in the American and tribal flags.
a. tribal elders
b. military veterans
c. ceremonial singers and drummers
d. the winners of last year’s competition
36. In “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” Bobby McFerrin sings meaningless syllables called
a. chant.
b. solfege.
c. modal cadences.
d. vocables.
37. Blackfire performs a style of music they call
a. shamanic chant.
b. free chant.
c. Pan-Indian processional music
d. fire-ball alternative punk
38. In Francesco Landini’s “Behold Spring,” the two voices are similar, yet
a. the rhythms often diverge, then return to unison at a cadence.
b. diverge into separate rhythms at cadences.
c. each was taken from a different Gregorian chant.
d. they move by wide leaps and never correspond to each other.
39. Music was already the ____________________ in the Middle Ages, long before
Shakespeare coined the phrase.
a. bread of life
b. spring of joy
c. tamed shrew
d. food of love
40. The repertory of secular songs in the Middle Ages is
a. extremely small.
b. unknown.
c. enormous.
d. based upon the music of Hildegard.
41. A twelfth-century cleric named Perotin, who worked at the Cathedral of Notre Dame,
wrote long and detailed works with the first harmonies, known as
a. organum.
b. ballata.
c. flutium.
d. monophonies.
42. In polyphony, what is the relationship between the voices?
a. chordal
b. melody with accompaniment
c. one in which each voice is melodious and retains its own identity
d. two or more voices in unison
43. In the Middle Ages, polyphony was used for
a. sacred music.
b. secular music.
c. songs about courtly love.
d. all of the above
44. In the Middle Ages, lavish manuscripts were generally
a. funded by the church or by a wealthy patron.
b. written on inexpensive paper.
c. funded by the individual composer.
d. written by the nobility, who were the only educated class.
45. The Middle Ages was known as the age of
a. heterophony.
b. courtly love.
c. free enterprise.
d. the Parisian chanson.
46. What is the meter of Landini’s “Behold Spring”?
a. duple
b. triple
c. quadruple
d. compound
47. Landini was
a. blinded by smallpox at an early age.
b. the most famous and prolific composer of the fourteenth century.
c. the organist at a church in Florence for many years.
d. all of the above.
48. For each four-line unit of poetry in “Behold Spring,” Landini inserts a cadence at the
end of
a. each line.
b. the first and fourth lines.
c. the second and fourth lines.
d. only the fourth line.
49. Organum was built by layering melodic lines above
a. existing plainchant melodies.
b. secular love songs.
c. existing polyphonic works.
d. all of the above.
50. How many strophes does Landini use in “Behold Spring”?
a. one strophe
b. one strophe, repeated four times
c. two strophes, each repeated once
d. three strophes, with the first repeated at the end
51. ________ are to music as periods are to verbal expression, indicating the end of a unit of
thought.
a. Cadences
b. Stanzas
c. Rhymes
d. Measures
52. Composers create musical form using all of the following EXCEPT:
a. repetition
b. convolution
c. variation
d. contrast
53. The rhythm of “Behold, Spring” falls into consistent units of how many beats?
a. two
b. three
c. four
d. five
54. The text setting for “Behold, Spring” is
a. syllabic.
b. always melismatic, with considerable polyphonic elaboration.
c. trochaic.
d. largely syllabic, with occasional melismas.
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55. Landini is believed to have written more than 150 _________ songs, which represent
about one-third of all Italian music that has survived from the fourteenth century.
a. sacred
b. secular
c. monophonic
d. allegorical
56. In the Middle Ages every musical document had to be
a. printed in Italy or the Frankish empire.
b. written by the nobility.
c. approved by Pope Gregory.
d. written by hand.
57. An early manuscript that we know was written in the monastery of Santa Maria degli
Angeli in Florence is the
a. Montpellier Codex.
b. Hidden Shroud.
c. Squarcialupi Codex.
d. Organum Codex.
58. In “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady,” cadences are identified in the music by a
a. rhyme.
b. harmonic resolution from dominant to tonic.
c. change from polyphonic to heterophonic texture.
d. point of arrival, coupled with a pause in the forward motion of the voices.
59. Guillaume de Machaut’s “Messe de Nostre Dame” is
a. a plainchant setting of the central Christian liturgical service.
b. the first polyphonic setting of the Mass Ordinary by a single composer.
c. a song celebrating the wedding feast at Cana in the New Testament.
d. an example of non-liturgical texts being included in a Christian liturgical service.
60. The person who is being addressed by the singer of “I Can All Too Well Compare My
Lady” is
a. ignoring the singer’s pleas, much as a statue would ignore its sculptor’s pleas.
b. waiting for a better song from a wealthier suitor.
c. entranced by the singer’s song.
d. already married and has no reason to listen to another marriage proposal.
61. Guillaume de Machaut was appointed a canon at Rheims, meaning he
a. became a lawyer for the Church.
b. joined the staff of the local cathedral.
c. studied military science.
d. sang “rounds,” which were pieces based on a melody in canon.
62. The form of “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady” is similar to that of
a. “My Country ‘Tis of Thee.”
b. “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.”
c. “East Side, West Side.”
d. “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
63. Which is a story of an artist creating and then falling in love with his creation?
a. My Fair Lady
b. Andromeda
c. Meet Me in St. Louis
d. The Iliad
64. How many voices are in “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady”?
a. one
b. two
c. three
d. four
65. What is the texture of “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady”?
a. heterophonic
b. monophonic
c. quadrophonic
d. polyphonic
66. What is the relationship of the voices in “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady”?
a. active upper voice with slower lower voices
b. two voices of equal prominence
c. unison
d. polyphony over a plainchant melody
67. In “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady,” the B section is ________ the A section.
a. shorter than
b. longer than
c. the same length as
d. identical to
68. Machaut’s works are known primarily through
a. manuscript fragments.
b. the Squarcialupi Codex.
c. songbooks copied by traveling musicians.
d. a set of manuscripts copied under the supervision of the composer himself.
69. In addition to being a composer, Machaut was famous for his work as a
a. poet.
b. sculptor.
c. painter.
d. all of the above.
70. Guillaume de Machaut
a. worked for various monarchs and traveled widely throughout northern Europe.
b. was also a painter.
c. learned polyphonic techniques from Hildegard of Bingen.
d. all of the above.
71. Composers like Jacopo de Bologna, Bernart de Ventadorn, and Oswald von Wolkenstein
share with Machaut a strong interest in
a. sacred polyphony.
b. courtly love.
c. organum.
d. instrumental music.
72. In texts of courtly love, a nobleman admires a woman especially if she
a. takes no interest in him.
b. is already married to another man.
c. appreciates his musical talent.
d. is well-educated.
73. How many structural cadences occur in “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady”?
a. none
b. one
c. three
d. five
74. The Pygmalion story has its origins in
a. French Medieval literature.
b. Greek and Roman myth.
c. Italian Trecento poetry.
d. the Christian Bible.
75. What is the form of “I Can All Too Well Compare My Lady”?
a. AAB
b. ABA
c. AABA
d. ABCA
76. The two subfamilies of reed instruments are
a. buzzy and dull.
b. loud and soft.
c. double and single.
d. ancient and modern.
77. Instruments used during the Middle Ages include the
a. saxophone, trumpet, piccolo, and guitar.
b. lute, trumpet, clappers, and drums.
c. shawm, cello, bassoon, and tin horn.
d. strohviol, kazad, kiddish, and kyrie.
78. Which of these textures is NOT used in the performance of “He Who Gladly Serves”?
a. polyphony
b. monophony
c. homophony
d. heterophony
79. Heterophony is
a. music sung by members of the same tribe.
b. two voices singing exactly the same notes.
c. two voices singing the same melody simultaneously, but with different
embellishments.
d. music sung by an elite group of monks.
80. Two double-reed instruments used today are the
a. flute and the clarinet.
b. timpani and the trombone.
c. bassoon and the oboe.
d. French horn and the lute.
81. Two single-reed instruments used today are the
a. flute and timpani.
b. oboe and French horn.
c. clarinet and saxophone.
d. lute and euphonium.
82. John Coltrane’s “My Favorite Things” is an example of what medieval practice?
a. heterophony
b. monophony
c. organum
d. arranging a texted song for instruments alone
83. The form of “He Who Gladly Serves” consists of the repetition of how many melodic
units?
a. one
b. two
c. three
d. four
84. The effect of the drone bass is like that of which medieval instrument?
a. trumpet
b. bagpipe
c. violone
d. string bass
85. Who is the probable composer of “He Who Gladly Serves”?
a. Alfonso el Sabio
b. Guillaume de Machaut
c. the head musician of Alfonso’s court
d. the real composer is probably anonymous
86. Where was the drum part for “He Who Gladly Serves” notated?
a. underneath the melody
b. in a separate part-book
c. above the melody
d. It was never notated.
87. Which is NOT an example of medieval music set to instruments?
a. “La quinte estampie real”
b. “Missa Nostre Dame”
c. “Saltarello”
d. “Palästinlied”
88. The drone bass is an example of what texture?
a. homophony
b. monophony
c. heterophony
d. polyphony
89. Which double-reed instrument is heard in the recording of “He Who Gladly Serves”?
a. oboe
b. sackbut
c. shawm
d. lute
90. Monophony is when
a. one instrument plays a melody over a drone bass.
b. two or more instruments play independent melodies.
c. all instruments play the same notes together, in unison.
d. two instruments play the same melody, but with different embellishments.
91. Heterophony is when
a. one instrument plays a melody over a drone bass.
b. two or more instruments play independent melodies.
c. all instruments play the same notes together, in unison.
d. two instruments play the same melody, but with different embellishments.
92. Which type of medieval instrument tends to have a “buzzy” sound?
a. shawm
b. castanets
c. psalter
d. recorder
93. Which is NOT a musical instrument from the Middle Ages?
a. vielle
b. tambourine
c. viola da gamba
d. organ
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94. Which of the following is (are) used to create large-scale form in “He Who
Gladly Serves”?
a. repetition
b. contrast
c. both a and b
d. none of the above
95. How do we know that drums were central to many instrumental ensembles in the Middle
Ages?
a. notated music
b. diaries
c. partbooks
d. paintings
96. Many composers in the Middle Ages
a. are now anonymous.
b. were monks, priests, or nuns.
c. were troubadours, trouvères, or minnesingers.
d. all of the above.