Music Exam Answers

THESE ARE (SUPPOSEDLY) ACTUAL ANSWERS FROM STUDENTS ON MUSIC EXAMS:

The principal singer of nineteenth century opera was called pre-Madonna.

It is easy to teach anyone to play the maracas. Just grip the neck and shake him in rhythm.

Gregorian chant has no music, just singers singing the same lines.

Sherbet composed the Unfinished Symphony.

All female parts were sung by castrati. We don't know exactly what they sounded like because there are no known descendants.

Young scholars have expressed their rapture for the Bronze Lullaby, the Taco Bell Cannon, Beethoven's Erotica, Tchaikovsky Cracknutter Suite, and Gershwin's Rap City in Blue.

Music sung by two people at the same time is called a duel; if they sing without music it is called Acapulco.

A virtuoso is a musician with real high morals.

Contralto is a low sort of music that only ladies sing.

Diatonic is a low calorie Schweppes.

Probably the most marvelous fugue was the one between the Hatfields and the McCoys.

A harp is a nude piano.

The main trouble with a French Horn is that it is too tangled up.

An interval in music is the distance from one piano to the next.

The correct way to find the key to a piece of music is to use a pitchfork.

Agitato is a state of mind when one's finger slips in the middle of playing a piece.

Refrain means don't do it. A refrain in music is the part you'd better not try to sing.

I know what a sextet is but I'd rather not say.

Most authorities agree that music of antiquity was written long ago.

My favorite composer was Opus. Agnus Dei was a woman composer famous for her church music.

Henry Purcell was a well-known composer few people have ever heard of.

Johann Sebastian Bach wrote a great many musical compositions and had a large number of children. In between he practiced on an old spinster which he kept up in his attic.

Rock Monanoff was a famous post-romantic composer of piano concerti.

From: ronald.dysvick@sap.com (Ronald Dysvick)

Reputed to be the winners of the "worst analogies ever written in a high school essay contest":

The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't. (Springfield)

McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup. (Silver Spring)

From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie,
surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and "Jeopardy" comes on at 7 p.m. instead of 7:30. (Washington)

Her hair glistened in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze. (Woodbridge)

Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center. (unknown)

Bob was as perplexed as a hacker who means to access T:/flw.quid55328.com/aaakk/ch@ung but gets T:/flw.quidaaakk.com/ch@ung by mistake. (Landover Hills)

Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever. (unknown)

He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree. (Baltimore)

The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease. (Silver Spring)

Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like "Second Tall Man."

Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 pm traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph. (Arlington)

The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after a Dr. on a Dr. Pepper can. (Madison, Ala.)

They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth. (Syracuse)

John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met. (Alexandria)

The thunder was ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken backstage during the storm scene in a play. (Alexandria)

His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without ClingFree.

The red brick wall was the color of a brick red Crayola Crayon. (unknown)