学进去

One cannot discuss Chinese music without mentioning the guqin, one of the four arts—along with go, calligraphy（书法）and painting. It first appeared over 3,000 years ago and stands for China’s solo musical instrument tradition.

At first, the guqin had only five strings（弦）, meaning the five elements（元素）of metal, wood, water, fire and earth. Later, in Zhou Dynasty, King Wen of Zhou added a sixth string for his son. King Wu of Zhou, added a seventh string to encourage his army to fight with the Shang.

Ambience was important in playing the guqin. Usually, it was practiced in a quiet setting and never for public performance. Ancient artists enjoyed performing by a stream in the mountains. The sound of the guqin mixed with the echoes（回音）from the mountains, until the musician felt he was at one with nature. Playing it in snow was also an enjoyable activity for ancient artists, who believed the instrument was the purest of its kind in the world. Also, a night with moonlight was considered wonderful for playing the guqin. Wang Wei（701—761）, a highly talented man of the Tang Dynasty, liked playing it in a bamboo forest on nights with moonlight most.

Guqin pieces are usually three to eight minutes long, with the longest being Guangling Verse, which is 22 minutes long. Other famous pieces include Plum Blossoms in Three Movements, Wild Geese Landing on the Sandbank and Eighteen Songs of a Nomad Flute.

Nowadays, there are fewer than one thousand well-trained guqin players and perhaps no more than fifty living masters. The original number of several thousand pieces has greatly reduced to only one hundred works by today. The guqin and its music was added to the list of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity（人类非物质文化遗产）in 2003.

1．Today, the guqin has ________ strings.

A．four

B．five

C．six

D．seven

2．What’s the meaning of the underlined word “Ambience” in Paragraph 3?

A．演奏技巧

B．环境氛围

C．天气状况

D．弹奏曲目

3．According to the passage, playing the guqin ________ is a right choice.

A．at a quiet restaurant	B．at a welcome party
C．in a peaceful yard with flowers	D．on a dark night with rainstorm

4．According to the passage, which of the following is TRUE?

A．The guqin has a history of less than 3000 years.

B．The strings mean metal, wood, water, fire and stone.

C．The longest guqin piece is Guangling Verse.

D．The guqin is very popular and many people can play it.

5．What does the passage mainly talk about?

A．The guqin and its music.	B．The guqin and its players.
C．Four Chinese traditional arts.	D．The development of guqin music.