UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

EXERCISES HANDOUT

1. Listening: Instruments & Families of the Symphonic Orchestra

2. Wordsearch: Musical Instruments

3. Multiple choice: Musical Instruments Challenge

4. Crossword: Description of Musical Instruments

5. Revision: Guessing the instrument

6. Past Simple & Past Participle

7. Passive voice

8. Relative clauses

9. Comparative & superlative adjective

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2019-2020. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

1. LISTENING: Instruments & Families of the Symphony Orchestra

Listen to the video and complete the following information:

1. What is an orchestra?

2. How many people can play together in an orchestra?

3. Families and instruments:

3.1 The orchestra is _________________ into ______ families:

The __________________ family:

- These instruments are ________ with a tube. Air is blown into the tube and
________ produce the ___________ and ___________ sounds.
- Instruments in this family __________: Piccolo, the ________, the clarinet, the
_________ _________, the bassoon, __________ and the _________ __________.
The __________ family:
- These instruments have strings and sounds __________________ when their
strings _________ bowed or plucked.
- Instruments in this family include: the ______________, the ____________, the
___________, and the ____________________.
The __________ family:
- These instruments _____________ of brass and slides or valves produce the
different ___________.
- Instruments in this group include: The __________, the _____________, the
__________________, and the tuba.
The _______________ family:
- These instruments have sounds that _________________ when the instrument is
hit or struck.
- Instruments in this group include: The timpani, the snare ______, the
_____________, the cymbals, the Glockenspiel, and ____________________.

Depending on the type of music the orchestra is playing, they can have the harp or the piano as
__________ _____________.

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

2. WORDSEARCH: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

Look up the following instruments in the wordsearch below and use the IPA transcriptions to
pronounce them properly:
Triangle Saxophone Gong Harp Tuba Cymbals
        

Clarinet Piano Drum Oboe Bugle Synthesizer

      3

Trombone Organ Flute Violin Guitar Cello

      

Trumpet  Source: http://homeschooling.about.com

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

3. MULTIPLE CHOICE: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS CHALLENGE

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

4. CROSSWORD: DESCRIPTION OF MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

5. REVISION: GUESSING THE INSTRUMENT

(Source: http://homeschooling.about.com)

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

6. PAST SIMPLE & PAST PARTICIPLE

1. Complete each sentence with the past tense of a verb from the box. Pay special attention to
the number of syllables of the sentences and observe the sentence stress pattern.

2. Match the beginnings and ends of these rhymes:

3. Write now the word pairs rhyming in exercise 2. and transcribe the phonemes that make
them rhyme:

1. queued – food - 6.

2. 7.

3. 8.

4. 9.

5. 10.

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

4. Read the following text and underline the Past Simple & Past Participle forms you find. Then,
classify them according to the charts below:

The “Cor anglais” (UK /ˌkɔr ˈɑːŋɡleɪ/ - US /ˌkɔr ɒŋˈɡleɪ/)

The cor anglais is a transposing instrument pitched in F, a perfect fifth lower than
the oboe (a C instrument), and is consequently approximately one and a half times the
length of the oboe.

The term cor anglais is French for English horn, but the instrument is neither from England 10
nor a horn. The instrument is thought to have originated in Silesia about 1720, when a bulb
bell was added to the oboe da caccia, a Baroque alto instrument of the oboe family,
possibly by J. T. Weigel of Breslau. The two-keyed, open-belled straight tenor oboe (in
French called "taille de hautbois", i.e., tenor oboe) and more especially the flare-belled
oboe da caccia resembled the horns played by angels in religious icons of the Middle Ages
and this gave rise in German-speaking central Europe to the Middle High German name
engellisches Horn, meaning angelic horn. But engellisch also meant English in the
vernacular of the time, and so the angelic horn became the English horn, a name which
was retained, in the absence of any better alternative, for the curved, bulb-belled tenor
oboe even after the oboe da caccia fell into disuse around 1760.

(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cor_anglais)

REGULAR PAST SIMPLE / PAST PARTICIPLE

  

IRREGULAR PAST SIMPLE / PAST PARTICIPLE

Verb Stressed vowel Infinitive

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

7. PASSIVE VOICE

1. Write passive sentences in Simple Present:

a. The holes of the clarinet / to cover / by the fingers:

b. In chordophones, strings / to stretch / between two points:

c. The cello / to hold / upright:

11

2. Write passive sentences in Simple Past:

a. The snare drum / to hit / with drumsticks:

b. Cymbals / to strike / together:

c. The guitar / to strum / with a plectrum:

3. Write passive sentences in Present Perfect:

a. Violins, violas and cellos / to play / by means of a bow:

b. The double bass / to pluck / with the fingers:

c. The air / to blow / into the embouchure:

4. Write passive sentences in Future:

a. All instruments / to tune / before the concert:

b. The piece / to perform / twice:

c. All orchestra members / to require / at 6 pm for final rehearsal:

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

8. RELATIVE CLAUSES

1. Fill in the gaps with the corresponding relative pronoun in the following sentences. In some of
them, more than one answer is possible.

Defining relative clauses (giving essential information)

1. Julia’s the woman _______________plays the lute. 12

It’s a self-help book _______________teaches you how to relax before a concert.
That’s the theatre _______________I premiered my first opera.
2. Is he the cellist _______________brother works as a guest teacher at the Conservatoire?
The crotalum or finger cymbals is an instrument _________origins date back to the ancient
Greece
3. I’ve just had a call from the luthier_______________ I met at the lutherie Workshop.

This is the new strings set_______________ I bought on eBay.

Non-defining relative clauses (giving extra non-essential information)

1. This set of liturgical chants, _______________was printed in 1860, is worth millions of

pounds.
2. Last week I visited my very first oboe teacher,_______________is now giving concerts and
master classes throughout Europe.
3. Bonn, ________Beethoven was born, was the capital city of West Germany from 1949 to
1990.
4. My neighbour, _______________son goes to my son’s school, is a Choir Director.

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle
 UNIT 4: MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS – EXERCISES HANDOUT

9. COMPARATIVE & SUPERLATIVE ADJECTIVES

1. Complete the sentences with an appropriate comparative or superlative adjective.

Use an-er/-est or more/most form.

alike good confident wide relaxed forceful

1. I feel much ___________________ now that my bassoon has been fixed again.
13
2. The new viola is slightly _____________ as the old one, but it still fits easily in my case.

3. Her latest performance was brilliant, and some people now consider her to be ______________
figure in our orchestra.

4. Now that they had both had their hair cut, the twin violinists looked even __________ than
usual.

5. Singing teachers claim that physical and psychic balance is the __________________ way to
keep the neck free from tensions.

6. The last audition was quite good and I began to feel _______________ about my possibilities of
joining an international ensemble.

INGLÉS TÉCNICO – CONSERVATORIO SUPERIOR DE MÚSICA DE MURCIA

Curso 2017-2018. Profesora: María del Valle