Free Grade 8 NY State Test Practice Questions

Read this, then answer the questions about it.

[1] There are two violin sections in an orchestra, and the difference between them is not skill, although everybody under sixteen believes it is.

[2] Yusuf believed it until he was fifteen, when he was moved from the back of the firsts to the front of the seconds and spent about a month being quietly furious.

[3] The seconds do not play the tune. [4] That is the whole thing, put simply and slightly wrongly. [5] What they play is the middle: the harmony under the melody, the rhythmic figure that keeps the pulse while the firsts hold a long note, the line that moves when nothing else is moving. [6] It is often more difficult than the tune and it is never the thing anybody hums afterward.

[7] It is also, in a real sense, harder to hold. [8] A melody carries itself; a listener will follow it even if it drifts. [9] An inner line has nothing pulling it along, so a section that loses its place in one is simply lost, and everybody in the hall hears something wrong without being able to say what.

[10] His stand partner, a woman named Ruth who was seventy-one and had played second violin in the same community orchestra for thirty-four years, said almost nothing for the first three rehearsals.

[11] In the fourth she stopped him during a rest.

[12] "You are listening up."

[13] "What?"

[14] "You are listening to the firsts. [15] You are following them." [16] She turned a page. [17] "Listen down. [18] The celli have the shape of this. [19] We are with them, not with the tune."

[20] Yusuf tried it in the next passage and something rearranged itself. [21] He had been hearing the piece as a melody with accompaniment, which is how you hear music from the outside. [22] From the inside it was several things happening at once, and the second violins were where two of them met.

[23] What changed was not his opinion of the seconds, which he had never really formed, but his idea of what an orchestra was. [24] He had thought of it as a large instrument playing one thing. [25] It turned out to be a room full of people each playing a different thing on purpose, and the tune was simply the part that happened to be audible from the cheap seats.

[26] He stopped being furious somewhere in November and did not notice for weeks that he had.

[27] In March the orchestra played a piece with a long section where the firsts rest entirely. [28] Playing it, Yusuf understood that there were maybe two hundred people in the hall and possibly four of them could hear what the seconds were doing. [29] Ruth had been doing it for thirty-four years anyway.

[30] Afterward he asked her whether she had ever wanted to move up.

[31] Ruth said she had been asked twice and had said no twice, and that people always assumed this was modesty, and that it had never once been modesty.

Read this, then answer the questions about it.

[1] There are two violin sections in an orchestra, and the difference between them is not skill, although everybody under sixteen believes it is.

[2] Yusuf believed it until he was fifteen, when he was moved from the back of the firsts to the front of the seconds and spent about a month being quietly furious.

[3] The seconds do not play the tune. [4] That is the whole thing, put simply and slightly wrongly. [5] What they play is the middle: the harmony under the melody, the rhythmic figure that keeps the pulse while the firsts hold a long note, the line that moves when nothing else is moving. [6] It is often more difficult than the tune and it is never the thing anybody hums afterward.

[7] It is also, in a real sense, harder to hold. [8] A melody carries itself; a listener will follow it even if it drifts. [9] An inner line has nothing pulling it along, so a section that loses its place in one is simply lost, and everybody in the hall hears something wrong without being able to say what.

[10] His stand partner, a woman named Ruth who was seventy-one and had played second violin in the same community orchestra for thirty-four years, said almost nothing for the first three rehearsals.

[11] In the fourth she stopped him during a rest.

[12] "You are listening up."

[13] "What?"

[14] "You are listening to the firsts. [15] You are following them." [16] She turned a page. [17] "Listen down. [18] The celli have the shape of this. [19] We are with them, not with the tune."

[20] Yusuf tried it in the next passage and something rearranged itself. [21] He had been hearing the piece as a melody with accompaniment, which is how you hear music from the outside. [22] From the inside it was several things happening at once, and the second violins were where two of them met.

[23] What changed was not his opinion of the seconds, which he had never really formed, but his idea of what an orchestra was. [24] He had thought of it as a large instrument playing one thing. [25] It turned out to be a room full of people each playing a different thing on purpose, and the tune was simply the part that happened to be audible from the cheap seats.

[26] He stopped being furious somewhere in November and did not notice for weeks that he had.

[27] In March the orchestra played a piece with a long section where the firsts rest entirely. [28] Playing it, Yusuf understood that there were maybe two hundred people in the hall and possibly four of them could hear what the seconds were doing. [29] Ruth had been doing it for thirty-four years anyway.

[30] Afterward he asked her whether she had ever wanted to move up.

[31] Ruth said she had been asked twice and had said no twice, and that people always assumed this was modesty, and that it had never once been modesty.

Read this, then answer the questions about it.

[1] There are two violin sections in an orchestra, and the difference between them is not skill, although everybody under sixteen believes it is.

[2] Yusuf believed it until he was fifteen, when he was moved from the back of the firsts to the front of the seconds and spent about a month being quietly furious.

[3] The seconds do not play the tune. [4] That is the whole thing, put simply and slightly wrongly. [5] What they play is the middle: the harmony under the melody, the rhythmic figure that keeps the pulse while the firsts hold a long note, the line that moves when nothing else is moving. [6] It is often more difficult than the tune and it is never the thing anybody hums afterward.

[7] It is also, in a real sense, harder to hold. [8] A melody carries itself; a listener will follow it even if it drifts. [9] An inner line has nothing pulling it along, so a section that loses its place in one is simply lost, and everybody in the hall hears something wrong without being able to say what.

[10] His stand partner, a woman named Ruth who was seventy-one and had played second violin in the same community orchestra for thirty-four years, said almost nothing for the first three rehearsals.

[11] In the fourth she stopped him during a rest.

[12] "You are listening up."

[13] "What?"

[14] "You are listening to the firsts. [15] You are following them." [16] She turned a page. [17] "Listen down. [18] The celli have the shape of this. [19] We are with them, not with the tune."

[20] Yusuf tried it in the next passage and something rearranged itself. [21] He had been hearing the piece as a melody with accompaniment, which is how you hear music from the outside. [22] From the inside it was several things happening at once, and the second violins were where two of them met.

[23] What changed was not his opinion of the seconds, which he had never really formed, but his idea of what an orchestra was. [24] He had thought of it as a large instrument playing one thing. [25] It turned out to be a room full of people each playing a different thing on purpose, and the tune was simply the part that happened to be audible from the cheap seats.

[26] He stopped being furious somewhere in November and did not notice for weeks that he had.

[27] In March the orchestra played a piece with a long section where the firsts rest entirely. [28] Playing it, Yusuf understood that there were maybe two hundred people in the hall and possibly four of them could hear what the seconds were doing. [29] Ruth had been doing it for thirty-four years anyway.

[30] Afterward he asked her whether she had ever wanted to move up.

[31] Ruth said she had been asked twice and had said no twice, and that people always assumed this was modesty, and that it had never once been modesty.