12.Practice.Tests.for.the.SAT_2015-2016_1128p

Section 21
Practice Test Twelve
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The prevailing negative opinions that continued
(40) to constrain women musicians, especially composers,
during this century can be traced back to
the previous one. Many prominent eighteenthcentury
writers believed that women did not
possess the intellectual and emotional capac-
( 45) ity to learn or to create as artists. The influential
social and educational philosopher Jean-Jacques
Rousseau, for example, asserted that "women,
in general, possess no artistic sensibility . .. nor
genius." Furthermore, it was held to be unneces-
(50 J sary and even dangerous for women to acquire
extensive musical knowledge, as such knowledge
could only detract from the business of being a
wife and mother. Johann Campe's opinion of
female composers was representative of this view:
(55) "Among a hundred praiseworthy female composers
hardly one can be found who fulfills simultaneously
all the duties of a reasonable and good
wife, an attentive and efficient housekeeper, and a
concerned mother."
(60) Most nineteenth-century men and women
seemed to agree with these sentiments. Women
who performed publicly or attempted creative
work therefore suffered not only societal censure
but internal conflicts about the propriety and
( 65) sensibility of their own aspirations. Even the great
Clara Schumann, who was exceptional in that she
was encouraged both by her husband and by the
musical public to compose, entertained doubts
about her creative ability. In 1839 she wrote, "I
(70) once believed that I possessed creative talent, but I
have given up this idea; a woman must not desire
to compose." Standard views on proper feminine
behavior were so firmly entrenched that this
mother of eight could not recognize the signifi-
(75) cance of her own accomplishments.
Schumann was in fact a trailblazer-one of the
very first female composers to construct a largescale
orchestral work. In the early nineteenth
century, the "art song" was considered to be the
(80) "safe," appropriate genre for women composers.
The art song was a type of chamber music and
as such fit comfortably into a domestic environment-the
woman's domain. Women composers
also gravitated to the art song as a medium for
(85) musical expression because its composition did
not require the intensive training (often denied to
women musicians) that the more intricate sonata
or symphony did. Schumann defied convention,
however, when she composed the "masculine"
(90) orchestral piece Piano Concerto in A Minor.
Although not among those considered her finest, the
work demonstrated to the women musicians who
followed Schumann that female musical creativity
could slip loose from the bonds of society.
14. The primary purpose of the passage is to
(A) highlight the achievements of a woman composer
in the 19th century
(B) investigate why women were held to be incapable
of artistic creation
(C) discuss the obstacles confronting women
musicians in the 19th century
(D) criticize 19th-century men for stifling the
musical talent of women
(E) compare the status of 19th-century women
musicians to their predecessors
15. It can be inferred from the passage that the overall
effect of the "political and social currents in
Europe" (line 2) was to
(A) lower music to the rank of popular culture
(B) establish the equality of women to men
(C) break down barriers between the middle and
the upper class
(D) improve the economy of European countries
(E) dampen the interest in music among the
upper class
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