For each blank in the following passage there are four words or phrases marked A, B, C and D. Fill in each blank with the word or phrase that best fits the context.
Music is nice, people seem to say, but not important. When students and parents are asked to rate subjects according to their importance, the music arts are 50 at the bottom of the list. Too often, music is viewed as mere entertainment, but certainly not an education which should be first taken into account. This view is 51 . In fact, music education is beneficial and important for all students.
Music tells us who we are. Because music is an expression of the beings who create it, it 52 their thinking and values, as well as the social 53 it came from. Rock music 54 a lifestyle just as surely as does a Schubert song. The jazz influence that George Gershwin and other musicians introduced into their music is obviously American because it came from American musical 55 . Music expresses our character and values. It gives us identity as a society.
Music provides a kind of feeling that cannot be 56 any other way. 57 can explain how the sun rises and sets. The arts explore the emotional meaning of the same phenomenon. We need every possible way to discover and 58 to our world for one simple but powerful reason: No one way can get it all.
The arts are forms of thought as powerful in what they communicate as mathematical and scientific symbols. They are ways we human being “talk” to each other. They are the 59 of civilization through which we express our fears, our curiosities, our hungers, our discoveries, our hopes. The arts are ways we give form to our ideas and imagination so that they can be 60 others. When we do not give children 61 to an important way of expressing themselves such as music, we 62 from them the meanings that music expresses.
Science and technology do not tell us what it means to be human. The 63 do. Music is an important way we express the meaning and value of peace and love.
So music education is far more 64 than people seem to realize.
50. A. embarrassedly B. doubtfully C. unavoidably D. unexpectedly
51. A. aggressive B. shortsighted C. reasonable D. instructive
52. A. reflects B. promotes C. dominates D. changes
53. A. position B. benefit C. standard D. environment
54. A. takes in B. stands for C. makes up D. looks through
55. A. instruments B. families C. traditions D. seasons
56. A. acquired B. understood C. abandoned D. noticed
57. A. Music B. Entertainment C. Mathematics D. Science
58. A. stick B. refer C. lead D. respond
59. A. means B. languages C. features D. achievements
60. A. compared with B. imposed on C. shared with D. drawn from
61. A. solution B. access C. entrance D. direction
62. A. take away B. set aside C. draw up D. work out
63. A. musicians B. teachers C. courses D. arts
64. A. enjoyable B. wasteful C. necessary D. negative
