Worksheet: The Sound of Music - English Class 9

Multiple Choice Questions

Q1: Where was the Shehnai played traditionally?
(a) In wedding ceremonies
(b) In temples
(c) Auspicious ceremonies
(d) All of these

Q2: Who banned pungi from the royal residence?
(a) Jahangir
(b) Emperor Akbar
(c) Shah Jahan
(d) Emperor Aurangzeb

Q3: Name India's highest civilian award that Ustad Bismillah Khan was awarded in the year 2001.
(a) The Padmashri
(b) The Padma Bhushan
(c) The Bharat Ratna
(d) The Padma Vibhushan

Q4: From whom did Bismillah Khan learn shehnai?
(a) Akbar Ali
(b) Ali Bux
(c) Ghulam Ali
(d) Ali Ahmed

Q5: What does the title of the text The Sound of Music denote?
(a) The sound of a particular instrument
(b) The sound of a song
(c) The life in music
(d) The sound of various musical instruments

Q6: When did Evelyn feel everything so dark in life?
(a) When she was advised to go to a deaf school
(b) When she performed poorly at the examination
(c) When she failed in her music audition
(d) When she was advised to use hearing aids and go to the deaf school

Q7: The instrument of shehnai was brought to the ________ stage in the history of Indian music by Ustad Bismillah Khan.
(a) classical
(b) western
(c) folk
(d) popular music

Q8: What was the source of inspiration for Bismillah?
(a) Royal Palaces
(b) Red Fort
(c) Ganga Ghats
(d) None of these

Q9: When did Bismillah get his first big break as a Shehnai performer?
(a) 1945
(b) In 1938, when All India Radio came into existence
(c) 1987
(d) 1989

Q10: Who was Ali Bux?
(a) Bismillah’s grandfather
(b) Bismillah’s maternal uncle
(c) Bismillah’s friend
(d) Bismillah’s father

Short Answer Questions

Q1: How old was Evelyn when she went to the Royal Academy of Music? Why was she nervous on her way to the academy?
Q2: Why was Evelyn Glennie going to face a bigger challenge at the prestigious Royal Academy of Music in London?
Q3: Who advised Evelyn’s parents to take her to a specialist? Why?
Q4: “Everything suddenly looked black”. Why did Evelyn feel this way?
Q5: How did Evelyn’s teachers respond when she expressed her desire to play a xylophone?

Long Answer Questions

Q1: “If you work hard and know where you are going, you’ll get there,” remarks Evelyn Glennie. What does it reveal about her character?
Q2: Evelyn is an inspiration to all. Justify.
Q3: Evelyn did not succumb to her disability. Comment.
Q4: Evelyn is very down-to-earth and does not succumb to hero worship. Comment.

Reference to Context

Q1: Evelyn Glennie’s loss of hearing had been gradual. Her mother remembers noticing something was wrong when the eight-year-old Evelyn was waiting to play the piano.
“They called her name and she didn ’t move. I suddenly realised she hadn ’t heard, ” says Isabel Glennie.
(a) Who is Isabel Glennie?
(b) Why did Evelyn Glennie not move to play the piano?
(c) When was her deafness first noticed?
(d) How did Evelyn lose her hearing?

Q2: It was her first day at the prestigious Royal Academy of Music in London and daunting enough for any teenager fresh from a Scottish farm. But this aspiring musician faced a bigger challenge than most.
(a) Who is referred to as the ‘aspiring musician’?
(b) How old was this ‘aspiring musician’ when she went to the Royal Academy of Music?
(c) What was likely to ‘daunt any teenager’?
(d) Why did she “a bigger challenge than most”?

Q3: She never looked back from that point onwards. She toured the United Kingdom with a youth orchestra and by the time she was sixteen, she had decided to make music her life.
(a) Who is ‘she’?
(b) What does ‘that point’ refer to?
(c) Where did she go with a youth orchestra?
(d) What was her age when she decided to make music her life?