【每日阅读训练第二期——速度越障4系列】【4-14】

lesliekeys

速度
Kids, Before the Age of TV There Was a Funny Thing Called Radio

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STEVE EMBER: Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I'm Shirley Griffith. This week on our program, we bring you some laughs from old-time American radio shows.

LOU COSTELLO: "What I want to find out."

BUD ABBOTT: "I say Who's on first, What's on second, I Don't Know's on third."

STEVE EMBER: Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were two of America's funniest funnymen. Abbott and Costello appeared in theater, movies and television. But they owed much of their fame to radio, and a routine called "Who's On First?"

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Abbott plays a manager of a baseball team. Costello has trouble understanding that the players have funny nicknames, like Who.

COSTELLO: "You gonna be the coach, too?"

ABBOTT: "Yes."

COSTELLO: "And you don't know the fellows' names?"

ABBOTT: " Well, I should."

COSTELLO: "Well, then, who's on first?"

ABBOTT: "Yes."

COSTELLO: "I mean the fellow's name."

ABBOTT: "Who."

COSTELLO: "The guy on first."

ABBOTT: "Who."

COSTELLO: "The first baseman."

ABBOTT: "Who."

COSTELLO: "The first baseman."

ABBOTT: "Who."

ABBOTT: "Who is on first!"

COSTELLO: "I'm asking you who's on first."

ABBOTT: "That's the man's name."

COSTELLO: "That's who's name?"

ABBOTT: "Yes."

COSTELLO: "Well, go ahead and tell me."

ABBOTT: "That's it."

COSTELLO: "That's who?"

ABBOTT: "Yes."

STEVE EMBER: Another of America's great comedians was Fred Allen. As early as nineteen thirty-six, he had a weekly radio audience of about twenty million people. So says the Museum of Broadcast Communications in Chicago.

For almost twenty years, in the nineteen thirties and forties, Fred Allen had a radio show called "Allen's Alley." His career also included television and Broadway shows. Like many performers of his time, he started in vaudeville in the early nineteen hundreds. Vaudeville shows presented all kinds of entertainment.

He began as a juggler, someone who can keep several objects in the air at the same time. But he was presented as the "World's Worst Juggler."

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SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: After that he performed as a comedian. Vaudeville comedy acts usually contained a series of disconnected jokes. But during the Great Depression, Fred Allen had the idea of creating a series of complete stories and situations.
Every week, on the radio, he would visit an imaginary place, "Allen's Alley," where he would talk with characters like Senator Claghorn. Senator Claghorn was a politician who talked a lot but never said anything.
But some of Fred Allen's funniest programs were about his supposed longtime dispute with another radio star, Jack Benny.

STEVE EMBER: As a young man, Jack Benny played violin in a vaudeville theater in his home state of Illinois. When the United States entered World War One, he joined the Navy.
He played his violin for other sailors. But the sailors liked his jokes better than his music. So Jack Benny decided to become a comedian.

In the early nineteen thirties Jack Benny got his own radio show. It lasted for twenty-three years.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Listeners loved it when Jack Benny and Fred Allen would say bad things about each other on their shows.
But two comedians could still be friends -- or at least friendly enough to perform together. In nineteen fifty, on Jack Benny's radio program, they did a skit about an early visit to their talent agent.

STEVE EMBER: They are partners in a vaudeville act that they think is wonderful. They hope the agent will get them an appearance in a good theater. But first they have to get past his secretary.

SECRETARY: "Now, uh, what is the name of your act again?"

ALLEN: "Allen and Benny."

SECRETARY: "I thought you said it was Benny and Allen."

ALLEN: " Well, at two o'clock, our billing changes."

SECRETARY: "Well, what kind of an act do you do?"

BENNY: "Violin, clarinet and snappy patter."

SECRETARY: "And where have you played?'

BENNY: "Oh, all over."

SECRETARY: " Well, where?"

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ALLEN: "Well, just -- just tell her the important dates, Jack."

SECRETARY: "Yeah, go ahead."

BENNY: "Well, we did a week in Sow Belly, Wyoming. A week in Loose Tooth, Arizona. Three days in Stagnant Water, New Mexico. And we also played the Palace here in New York."

SECRETARY: "Sow Belly, Loose Tooth, Stagnant Water and the Palace! Well, at least you worked your way up."

ALLEN: "No, we played the Palace first."

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Finally they see the agent, Mickey Rockford, and appeal to him for a break -- a chance to become stars. But he is not interested. Still, they get him to listen to their act. They remind him that he booked them once before.

BENNY: "Mister Rockford, I'm Jack Benny. This is Fred Allen."

ALLEN: "That's right, Mister Rockford. Remember? You booked our act seven years ago."

ROCKFORD: "Oh yes, what business are you in now?"

ALLEN: "Well, we are still in show business."

BENNY: "Yes, and we thought you could book us."

ROCKFORD: "lease, fellows."

ALLEN: "Our new act is sensational. At least give us a chance, Mister Rockford."

BENNY: " Yes, all we need is one good break, you know."

ROCKFORD: "I gave you a break when I put you in Loew's Flatbush."

ALLEN: "Some break. They opened it with Fink's Mules, and Major Doughty's dogs came out, then Manny's Monkeys, then Powers' Dancing Elephants."

ROCKFORD: "So what?"

ALLEN: "By the time we came out, we looked like the last two passengers on Noah's Ark."

BENNY: "Mister Rockford, how about listening to our, our new act?"

ROCKFORD: "Oh, all right, if you insist."
BENNY: "Ready? Ready with your clarinet, Fred?"
ALLEN: "Ready."
BENNY: "Okay. One, two. Atta boy, Fred. Oh, Mister Allen ..."
ALLEN: "What is it, Mister Benny?"
BENNY: "Oh, Mister Allen, have you heard that they're making women's bathing suits out of spun glass?"
ALLEN: "Women's bathing suits out of glass? Well, that is worth looking into."
BENNY: "I'll take it, Mister Allen."
ALLEN: "If you will. [Benny plays the violin.] Uhhhhh. You know, Mister Benny, I ..."

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BENNY: " Yes, Mister Allen? Oh, pardon me."

ALLEN: "I love music."

BENNY: "So do I. Music once saved my uncle's life."

ALLEN: "How did music save your uncle's life?"

BENNY: "They played the Star Spangled Banner just as he was sitting in the electric chair. Take it, Mister Allen."

ALLEN: "[Music] I'm interpolating."

BENNY: "You don't have to finish it, you know."

ALLEN: "Oh, Mister Benny."

BENNY: "Yes, Mister Allen?"

ALLEN: "I want you to meet my new girl. Her name is Well Enough."

BENNY: "Why do you call your girl Well Enough?"

ALLEN: "Because I want the boys to leave Well Enough alone. How about the finale, mister ...?"

BENNY: "In unison? [Music] Well, Mister Rockford, what did you think of us?"

ALLEN: "Wait until he gets his head out of the drawer."

STEVE EMBER: At the same time Fred Allen and Jack Benny were making America laugh, so was Bob Hope. Hope entertained people all over the world for seventy years.
In nineteen thirty-seven, Bob Hope began a series of radio programs called the "Woodbury Soap Show." The next year, he started a radio show for the company that made Pepsodent toothpaste. His Tuesday night radio show soon became popular. Bob Hope continued doing radio shows for almost twenty years.

His success in radio led to a long-term relationship with Paramount Pictures, a major film company. The actors in his movies were also the characters on his radio shows.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: For fifty years, Bob Hope entertained members of America's armed forces. He took his radio show to military bases from the South Pacific to Greenland.
One time, after World War Two ended, he brought his radio show to soldiers waiting at a base in California to return to civilian life.

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BOB HOPE: "And one Air Force colonel got out and bought a farm. Yeah, he'd been in action so long, every morning before the chickens started laying eggs he called them into the chicken coop and briefed them.
"I knew these boys, I knew these boys, would be glad to see me here today. I said, 'Look fellows, here's the kind of clothes you'd be wearing when you get out,' and fifty guys re
enlisted. I saw some of these fellows shopping for clothes in Hollywood. They are so used to getting stuff from the supply sergeant that the clerk had to throw the suits on the floor before these guys would try them on.

"One soldier had been fighting in the jungles for years. And I don't know if it had affected him or not, but when the clerk handed him a tweed suit to try on he spent three hours searching through the fuzz for snipers."

STEVE EMBER: Bob Hope came to the United States as a child from England with his family. As a young performer, he had a song and dance act with partners for a while. But then he began to perform by himself. He sang and danced well. He also kept people laughing with his jokes which he told very fast.
In the nineteen thirties, in New York, he appeared in Broadway shows. Success on Broadway brought him a part in the movie "The Big Broadcast of 1938."

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: In that film, he sang a song with Shirley Ross called "Thanks for the Memory." It became his theme song -- the song people think of when they think of Bob Hope.

STEVE EMBER: Our program was written by Jerilyn Watson and produced by Caty Weaver. I'm Steve Ember.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I'm Shirley Griffith. Archives of programs with transcripts and MP3s are at 51voa.com. Join us again next week for THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English.

越障
Fiddling with the mind
Old, expensive violins are not always better than new, cheap ones
THOUGH individual tastes do differ, the market for art suggests that those who have money generally agree on what is best. The recent authentication of a painting by Leonardo da Vinci, for example, magically added several zeroes to the value of a work that had not, physically, changed in any way. Nor is this mere affectation. In the world of wine (regarded as an art form by at least some connoisseurs), being told the price of a bottle affects a drinker’s appreciation of the liquid in the glass in ways that can be detected by a brain scanner.
It seems, now, that the same phenomenon applies to music. For serious players of stringed instruments the products of three great violin-makers of Cremona, Nicolo Amati, Giuseppe Guarneri and Antonio Stradivari, have ruled the roost since the 17th century. Their sound in the hands of a master is revered. They sell for millions. And no modern imitation, the story goes, comes close. Unfortunately, however, for those experts who think their judgment unclouded by the Cremonese instruments’ reputations, Claudia Fritz of the University of Paris VI and Joseph Curtin, an American violin-maker, have just applied the rigorous standards of science to the matter. Their conclusion, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is that the creations of Cremona are no better than modern instruments, and are sometimes worse.
Unlike previous “blind” trials of violins, in which an instrument’s identity was concealed from the audience but not from the player himself (and which have indeed suggested that modern instruments are often as good as old ones), the one organised by Dr Fritz and Mr Curtin sought to discover the unbiased opinion of the men and women who actually wield the bow. They and their colleagues therefore attended the Eighth International Violin Competition of Indianapolis, held in September 2010, which gathering provided both a sample of testable instruments and a pool of suitable volunteers to play them.
Exactly which instruments were tested remains a secret. That was a condition of the loans, in order that an adverse opinion should not affect a fiddle’s market value. There were, however, six of them: two Stradivarii and a Guarnerius (all from the 18th century), and three modern violins made to Cremonese patterns.
A total of 21 volunteers—participants in the competition, judges and members of the local symphony orchestra—were asked to put the instruments through their paces. The catch was that they had to do so in a darkened room while wearing welders’ goggles, so that they could not see them clearly, and that the chin-rest of each violin had been dabbed with perfume, lest the smell of the wood or the varnish give the game away.
There were two tests: a series of pairwise comparisons between old and new instruments that allowed a player one minute to try out each instrument, and a comparison between all six, in which the player was allowed to play whatever he wanted for however long he wanted, subject to a total time-limit of 20 minutes.
In the pairwise test (in which players were not told that each pair contained both an old and a new instrument, and in which the order of presentation was randomised), five of the violins did more-or-less equally well, but the sixth was consistently rejected. That sixth, unfortunately for the reputation of Cremona, was a Strad.
In the freeplay test, a more subtle approach was possible. Players rated the six instruments using four subjective qualities that are common terms of the violinist’s art: playability, projection, tone colours and response. The best in each category scored one point, the worst minus one, and the rest zero. Players were also asked which violin they would like to take home, given the chance.


In this case, two of the new violins comprehensively beat the old ones, while the third more or less matched them (see chart). The most popular take-home instrument was also a new one: eight of the 21 volunteers chose it, and three others rated it a close second. Not surprisingly, the least popular instrument in the second test was the Stradivarius that did badly in the first.
The upshot was that, from the players’ point of view, the modern violins in the study were as good as, and often better than, their 18th-century forebears. Since Dr Fritz estimates the combined value of the three forebears in her experiment as $10m, and the combined value of the three modern instruments as around $100,000, that is quite a significant observation.
Human nature being what it is, this result will probably have little effect in the saleroom: the glamour of Cremona will take more than one such result to dispel it. But it does suggest that young players who cannot afford a Strad should not despair. If they end up with a cheaper, modern copy instead, they might actually be better off.

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沙发阿！大家新年快乐！

xinnono

沙发没抢到呀~

xinnono

1'54
1'29
1'45
1'26
1'38

xinnono

这篇越障重复了哦~ 昨天刚贴的不是?

shelvey

哈，楼主偷懒了~~~

myancamel

一分钟阅读量，和理解程度
272 50%
237 60%
269 40%
267 50%
266 40%

越障
艺术品行业投资热，且盲目；比如达芬奇的画，红酒等
乐器也是有这样的情况
小提琴
比赛中使用
做实验，让21名学生，测8把琴
两种试验方法
第一种最差的是一把著名的
第二种方法愿意带回家和评分高的前两个都是modern的琴
所以得出结论，新学生用新琴也不错

xinnono

啊呀, 越障换过啦?! 感谢楼主~ 差点儿错过了呢~

xinnono

interesting little article.

the price of a piece of art is often decided by the people who have money. like a painting by da vinci got more ending zeros  in an auction. similarly, people tend to appreciate the wine more if they were told that the bottle is expensive.
coming to violins. some good old companies are selling old violins for millions, for the date it was made from. however, people suspect whether it's just the reputation of the maker and how old it is. they argue that the modern violins could be as good or even better.
so they made this set of testing. 21 volunteers to play, judges from orchestra, and 6 violins (new and old). everybody in a dark room, and wearing working goggles, so that they won't see clearly; the neck rest is perfumed, so that they won't smell the wood and the paints.
two tests were involved:
1. pairwise test, each for 1 minute. then all 6 test freely total 20min. results are: 5 of them were equally well, 1 of them was rejected by almost everybody. and it turned out to be a strad.
2. asking everybody to rate violins using the common properties of violins: playability, projection, color, and response. each of them was asked to pick one that they want to bring home if given the chance. results: 8/21 chose a new one, and many others gave this one a 2nd score. and the least chosen one was the strad, as in previous test.
this testing shows that old violins might not be so good, and the new ones can sound as equal or better. if someone cannot afford an old one, he might end up having a better violin.

xinnono

觉得这篇越障文章很有意思, 就发给我一个也喜欢音乐的朋友. 他发给我一篇他最近读到的类似的文章, 是美国人写的, 里面还有音频比较. 想跟大家分享一下: http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/2012/01/02/144482863/double-blind-violin-test-can-you-pick-the-strad

一直听说the economist写的文章比较尖刻, 有它独特的英式作风. 这里一比较才真的感觉出来. 建议大家看的时候比较文风~ 其实考试的时候很多文章都是来自世界各地的作者写的~