Electric Guitar托福听力原文翻译及问题答案

Electric Guitar托福听力原文翻译及问题答案

一、Electric Guitar托福听力原文：

NARRATOR:Listen to part of a lecture in a music history class.The professor has been discussing music of the twentieth century.MALE PROFESSOR:And what instrument comes to mind when you think of rock and roll?FEMALE STUDENT:The electric Guitar?MALE PROFESSOR:Exactly.I think it's fair to say that the sound of the electric guitar typifies the rock and roll genre,which became popular in the 1950s.But really the instrument we know today was the result of a continuing development that started for our practical purposes in the 1920s.

But long before that even,people were experimenting with ways to modify traditional acoustic guitars.The first guitars were wooden.This is the Spanish guitar and the strings were made from animal products.Then came steel strings.And that led to the lap guitar,which is also called the steel guitar because the player slides a steel rod up and down the neck.And those are all acoustic guitars.OK?

But then,eventually,we have electric guitars.Over the years,many inventors and musicians contributed to the design of these instruments.And each design was intended to alter the sound in some way,at first at least with the electric guitar,to make it louder.Eh,So let's get back to when the steel guitar was first introduced in the United States.It was right after the Spanish-American war in the late 1890s.US sailors who were stationed in Hawaii then a US territory,were very enamored with the music they heard there.Uh,Hawaiian music was based on the steel guitar I just described.

Some sailors learned how to play the steel guitar and brought it home to the States.Before long,Hawaiian steel guitar music was all the rage in the mainland US.It actually had a strong influence on the development of several musical genres—rock and roll,most notably,but also jazz and blues.Anyway...by the 1920s,with the advent of the public dance movement,people were gathering in large groups to listen to steel guitar music.But they had trouble hearing it,especially in large public settings.

As I mentioned,the instrument was played horizontally,on the lap.Since the strings faced upward,the sound was projected toward the ceiling rather than outward toward the audience.Something had to be done,because the music venues and the audience kept getting larger and larger.So what would you do?FEMALE STUDENT:Find a way to amplify the sound?MALE PROFESSOR:Yes.And to do that,inventors started attaching electronic devices,electrical coils to the acoustic guitars.And the electronics worked!But attaching electronics didn't just affect how loudly you could play.It also changed the quality of the sound.

These early electric guitars were hollow and these early amplifiers caused vibrations in the bodies of the instruments.So as the sound got louder,it became more distorted,fuzzy-sounding.And what musicians at the time wanted was a pure,clean sound.FEMALE STUDENT:So where does Les Paul fit in?Wasn't he the first to electrify acoustic guitars?MALE PROFESSOR:Uh,no.Electrified guitars already existed by the time Les Paul came into the picture around 1940.What Paul did was experiment with ways of removing the distortions and he succeeded.He designed a guitar with a solid body that relied solely on electronics.Paul's solid body eliminated the vibrations,and thus the distortions.FEMALE STUDENT:Excuse me.But when I think of electric guitar music,I think of Jimi Hendrix.MALE PROFESSOR:Jimi Hendrix,one of my favorites!FEMALE STUDENT:But Hendrix's style really was all about distortion,that's what's so great about his music,all those special effects.I think a lot of rock-and-roll fans prefer that to a pure sound.MALE PROFESSOR:Yeah.You are getting ahead of me here.But good,because the point I was going to make is that the sound of rock-and-roll changed over the years.And the designs and technology of electric guitars made those changes possible.So whereas Les Paul's goal was to remove the distortion,later musicians wanted to produce it.And by the time Jimi Hendrix came around.Well,essentially,Hendrix reinvented the electric guitar,in the sense that he created amazing effects and vibrations that changed the sound of rock and roll completely.So eventually,people tried to improve on Les Paul model, well,to modify it,I should say.

二、Electric Guitar托福听力中文翻译：

旁白：听音乐历史课的一部分讲座。教授一直在讨论二十世纪的音乐。男教授：当你想到摇滚乐时，你会想到什么乐器？女学生：电吉他？男教授：没错。我认为可以公平地说，电吉他的声音是摇滚乐流派的典型，这在20世纪50年代开始流行。但事实上，我们今天所知道的工具是20世纪20年代为我们的实际目的而开始的持续发展的结果。

但早在那之前，人们就开始尝试改变传统的原声吉他。最初的吉他是木制的。这是西班牙吉他，琴弦是用动物制品制成的。然后是钢弦。这导致了膝上吉他，也被称为钢吉他，因为演奏者在琴颈上下滑动一根钢棒。这些都是原声吉他。好啊

但最终，我们有了电吉他。多年来，许多发明家和音乐家为这些乐器的设计做出了贡献。每一种设计都是为了在某种程度上改变声音，至少是在电吉他上，使声音更响亮。呃，让我们回到钢吉他最初在美国的时候。它发生在19世纪90年代末的美西战争之后。当时驻扎在夏威夷的美国水手对那里听到的音乐非常着迷。夏威夷音乐是基于我刚才描述的钢吉他。

一些水手学会了如何弹钢吉他，并把它带回了美国。不久，夏威夷钢吉他音乐在美国大陆风行一时。事实上，它对一些音乐类型的发展产生了巨大的影响——摇滚乐，尤其是爵士乐和蓝调。无论如何，到了20世纪20年代，随着公共舞蹈运动的出现，人们聚集在一起听钢吉他音乐。但他们很难听到，尤其是在大型公共场合。

正如我提到的，乐器是水平演奏的，在膝盖上。由于琴弦朝上，声音被投射到天花板上，而不是向外朝向观众。必须采取一些措施，因为音乐场地和观众越来越多。那你会怎么做？女学生：想办法放大声音吗？男教授：是的。为了做到这一点，发明人开始将电子设备、电线圈连接到声学吉他上。电子设备工作了！但是连接电子设备并不仅仅影响你播放的声音。它也改变了声音的质量。

这些早期的电吉他是空心的，这些早期的扩音器在乐器的主体中引起振动。因此，随着声音越来越大，声音变得越来越扭曲、模糊。当时的音乐家想要的是纯净、干净的声音。女学生：那么Les Paul在哪里？他不是第一个给原声吉他通电的人吗？男教授：呃，不。当Les Paul在1940年左右出现时，电吉他已经存在。保罗所做的是尝试消除扭曲的方法，他成功了。他设计了一种完全依靠电子技术的实心吉他。保罗的实体消除了振动，从而消除了扭曲。女学生：对不起，但当我想到电吉他音乐时，我会想到吉米·亨德里克斯。男教授：吉米·亨德里克斯，我最喜欢的人之一！女学生：但亨德里克斯的风格真的是扭曲的，这就是他音乐的伟大之处，所有这些特效。我认为很多摇滚乐迷更喜欢那种纯粹的声音。男教授：是的。你在这里比我快。但很好，因为我要说的是，摇滚乐的声音在这些年里发生了变化。电吉他的设计和技术使这些变化成为可能。因此，尽管Les Paul的目标是消除失真，但后来的音乐家想要制作它。当吉米·亨德里克斯出现的时候。基本上，亨德里克斯重新发明了电吉他，他创造了惊人的效果和振动，彻底改变了摇滚乐的声音。因此，最终，人们试图改进Les Paul模型；好吧，要修改它，我应该说。

三、Electric Guitar托福听力问题：

Q1:1.What does the professor mainly discuss?

A.Musical genres that feature the electric guitar

B.Technological advances that made electric guitar possible

C.The popularity of rock-roll music

D.The evolution of the electric guitar

Q2:2.What does the professor say about the sailors who were stationed in Hawaii after the Spanish-American War?

A.They helped popularize steel guitar music among the people of Hawaii.

B.They were among the first to play the steel guitar in musical groups.

C.They introduced the steel guitar to the mainland United States.

D.They altered the second of the steel guitar by redesigning its slide.

Q3:3.Why does the professor mention that the steel guitar was played horizontally?

A.To show how it influenced musical styles such as jazz and blues

B.To explain one way of distorting the sound of a guitar

C.To emphasize the versatility of acoustic guitars

D.To explain the need to amplify the sound of acoustic guitars

Q4:4.What distinguished Les Paul's guitar from electric guitars that preceded it?

A.It had a solid body.

B.It was played with a sliding steel rod.

C.It relied on distortion to create special effects.

D.It projected sound toward the audience rather than the ceiling.

Q5:5.What can be inferred about the woman who mentioned Jimi Hendrix?

A.She previously did not understand the significance of Les Paul's contribution to the development of electric guitar.

B.She enjoys listening to music played on an electric guitar more than the professor does.

C.She prefers listening to electric guitar music that is played with no distortion or special effects.

D.She is convinced that Hendrix's style was influenced by Les Paul's guitar design.

Q6:6.What does the professor mean when he states that Jimi Hendrix's"reinvented the electric guitar"?

A.Hendrix simplified the guitar design to make it easier to play.

B.Hendrix discovered and corrected defects in previous guitar designs.

C.Hendrix redesigned the guitar to make it louder.

D.Hendrix manipulated the guitar to create a distinctive sound.

四、Electric Guitar托福听力答案：

A1:正确答案：D

A2:正确答案：C

A3:正确答案：D

A4:正确答案：A

A5:正确答案：A

A6:正确答案：D