ANNOUNCER: Section 1. You will hear a woman telephoning for information about a festival. First, you have some time to look at questions 1 to 7. You will see that there is an example that has been done for you. On this occasion only, the conversation relating to this will be played first.

ROB: Good morning, Stretton Festival box office. How can I help you?

MELANIE: Oh, hello. My family and I are on holiday in the area, and we've seen some posters about the festival this week. Could you tell me about some of the events, please?

ROB: Of course.

MELANIE: First of all, are there still tickets available for the jazz band on Saturday?

ROB: There are, but only £15. The £12 seats have all been sold.

ANNOUNCER: The man says that tickets are available for 15 pounds, so 15 has been written in the space. Now we shall begin. You should answer the questions as you listen, because you will not hear the recording a second time. Listen carefully and answer questions 1 to 7.

ROB: Good morning, Stretton Festival box office. How can I help you?

MELANIE: Oh, hello. My family and I are on holiday in the area, and we've seen some posters about the festival this week. Could you tell me about some of the events, please?

ROB: Of course.

MELANIE: First of all, are there still tickets available for the jazz band on Saturday?

ROB: There are, but only £15. The £12 seats have all been sold.

MELANIE: OK, and the venue is the school, isn't it?

ROB: Yes, that's right. The secondary school. Make sure you don't go to the primary school by mistake.

ROB: And there's an additional performer who isn't mentioned on the posters. Carolyn Hart is going to play with the band.

MELANIE: Oh, I think I've heard her on the radio. Doesn't she play the oboe or flute or something?

ROB: Yes, the flute. She usually plays with symphony orchestras, and apparently this is her first time with a jazz band.

MELANIE: Well, I'd certainly like to hear her.

MELANIE: Then the next thing I want to ask about is the duck races. I saw a poster beside a river. What are they exactly?

ROB: Well, you buy a yellow plastic duck, or as many as you like. They're £1 each, and you write your name on each one.

ROB: There'll be several races depending on the number of ducks taking part. And John Stevens, a champion swimmer who lives locally, is going to start the races.

ROB: All the ducks will be launched into the river at the back of the cinema. Then they'll float along the river for 500 meters, as far as the railway bridge.

MELANIE: And are there any prizes?

ROB: Yes. The first duck in each race to reach the finish wins its owner free tickets for the concert on the last night of the festival.

MELANIE: You said you can buy a duck. I'm sure my children will both want one.

ROB: They're on sale at a stall in the market. You can't miss it. It's got an enormous sign showing a couple of ducks.

MELANIE: OK, I'll go there this afternoon.

MELANIE: Now could you tell me something about the flower show, please?

ROB: Well, admission is free, and the show is being held in Bythwaite Hall.

MELANIE: Sorry, how do you spell that?

ROB: B-Y-T-H-W-A-I-T-E. Bythwaite.

MELANIE: Is it easy to find?

ROB: Yes. It's right in the centre of Stretto . It's the only old building in the town, so it's easy to recognize.

MELANIE: I know it. I presume it's open all day.

ROB: Yes, but if you'd like to see the prizes being awarded for the best flowers, you'll need to be there at 5 o'clock.

ROB: The prizes are being given by a famous actor, Kevin Shapeless. He lives nearby and often takes part in community events.

MELANIE: Gosh, I've seen him on TV. I'll definitely go to the prize-giving.

ANNOUNCER: Before you hear the rest of the conversation, you have some time to look at questions 8 to 10. Now listen and answer questions 8 to 10.

MELANIE: I've seen a list of plays being performed this week, and I'd like to know which are suitable for my children.

ROB: How old are your children?

MELANIE: 5 and 7. What about “The Mystery of Muldoon”?

ROB: That's aimed at 5 to 10 year olds.

MELANIE: What about something for my husband and me?

ROB: You might like “Fire and Flood”. It's about real events that happened in Stretton 200 years ago, but it might be frightening for childre .

MELANIE: And finally, what about “Silly Sailor”?

ROB: That's a comedy suitable for all ages. In fact, it won an award at the Stretton Drama Festival a couple of months ago.

MELANIE: OK, well goodbye, and thanks for all the information.

ROB: Goodbye.

ANNOUNCER: That is the end of section 1. You now have half a minute to check your answers.

ANNOUNCER: Section 2. You will hear a guide at an art museum talking to a group of visitors. First, you have some time to look at questions 11 to 16. Now listen carefully and answer questions 11 to 16.

GREG: Good morning, and welcome to the museum — one with a remarkable range of exhibits, which I'm sure you'll enjoy. My name is Greg, and I'll tell you about the various collections as we go around.

GREG: But before we go, let me just give you a taste of what we have here. For one thing, we have a fine collection of 20th and 21st century paintings, many by very well-known artists. I'm sure you'll recognize several of the paintings.

GREG: This is the gallery that attracts the largest number of visitors, so it's best to go in early in the day before the crowds arrive.

GREG: Then there are the 19th century paintings. The museum was opened in the middle of that century, and several of the artists each donated one work to help start the museum.

GREG: So they're of special interest to us. We feel closer to them than to other works.

GREG: The Sculpture Gallery has a number of fine exhibits, but I'm afraid it's currently closed for refurbishment. You'll need to come back next year to see it properly.

GREG: However, a number of the sculptures have been moved to other parts of the museum.

GREG: Around the World is a temporary exhibitio . You've probably seen something about it on TV or in the newspapers.

GREG: It has created a great deal of interest because it presents objects from every continent and many countries, and explains their social context — why they were made and who for.

GREG: Then there's the collection of coins. This is a specialist collectio , because all the coins come from this country and were produced between 2,000 and 1,000 years ago.

GREG: Many of them were discovered by ordinary people digging in their gardens and then donated to the museum.

GREG: All our porcelai and glass were left to the museum by its founder when he died in 1878.

GREG: According to the terms of his will, we're not allowed to add anything to that collection. He believed it was perfect in itself.

ANNOUNCER: Before you hear the rest of the talk, you have some time to look at questions 17 to 20. Now listen and answer questions 17 to 20.

GREG: Now here's some more practical informatio . Most of the museum facilities are downstairs in the basement.

GREG: When you go down the stairs and reach the bottom, you'll find a sitting area with comfortable chairs and sofas, where you can rest.

GREG: We have an excellent restaurant serving food all day. To reach it, go straight ahead across the sitting area, then turn right into the corridor. The restaurant door will be facing you.

GREG: If you'd prefer a snack, we also have a cafe. When you reach the bottom of the stairs, go straight ahead, turn right into the corridor, and the cafe is immediately on the right.

GREG: For families with children, there are baby-changing facilities. Cross the sitting area and continue straight ahead along the corridor on the left. The facilities are on the left-hand side.

GREG: The cloakroom, where you should leave coats, umbrellas, and large bags, is on the left side of the sitting area.

GREG: It is through the last door before the corridor.

GREG: There are toilets on every floor, but in the basement they are the first rooms on the left when you come downstairs.

GREG: If you have anything to leave in the cloakroom, please do that now, and then we'll start our tour.

ANNOUNCER: That is the end of section 2. You now have half a minute to check your answers.

Joanna's psychology study

ANNOUNCER: Section 3. You will hear a student called Joanna talking to her new supervisor about some research she has done on psychology and music. First, you have some time to look at questions 21 to 26. Now listen carefully and answer questions 21 to 26.

SUPERVISOR: Hi, Joanna. Good to meet you. Now, before we discuss your new research project, I'd like to hear something about the psychology study you did last year for your master's degree. So how did you choose your subjects for that?

JOANNA: Well, I had six subjects, all professional musicians, and all female. Three were violinists, and there was also a cello player, a pianist, and a flute player.

JOANNA: They were all very highly regarded in the music world and had done extensive tours in different continents. Quite a few had also won prizes and competitions.

SUPERVISOR: And they were quite young, weren't they?

JOANNA: Yes, between 25 and 29. The mean age was 27.8. I wasn't specifically looking for artists who had produced recordings, but that's common these days and they all had.

SUPERVISOR: Right. Now you collected your data through telephone interviews, didn't you?

JOANNA: Yes. I realized interviewing leading musicians would only be possible over the phone because they're so busy. I recorded them using a telephone recording adapter.

JOANNA: I had been worried about the recording quality, but it worked well. I managed at least a 30-minute interview with each subject, sometimes longer.

SUPERVISOR: Did doing it on the phone make it more stressful?

JOANNA: I thought it might, but the interviews were quite informal. They actually seemed very keen to talk. Using the phone didn't reduce the quality of data—if anything, it improved it.

SUPERVISOR: Interesting. And you were looking at how performers dress for concerts.

JOANNA: That's right. My research examined how musicians see their role and how that relates to the clothing they choose to wear.

JOANNA: But that focus didn't appear immediately. At first I was interested in the impact of clothing on the audience, and whether different instrumentalists—for example a violinist or flute player—might adopt different styles of dress.

SUPERVISOR: It's interesting that the choice of dress is usually up to the individual.

JOANNA: Yes, you'd expect strict rules in orchestras, but actually that's quite rare.

ANNOUNCER: Before you hear the rest of the discussion, you have some time to look at questions 27 to 30. Now listen and answer questions 27 to 30.

SUPERVISOR: You only had female performers in your study. Was that because male musicians worry less about fashio ?

JOANNA: Many men are influenced by fashion, but socially they have more limited choices. If they moved outside these expectations, audiences might react negatively.

SUPERVISOR: Popular music is different. Have you read Mike Frost's article about clothing in popular music?

JOANNA: No.

SUPERVISOR: He argues that many female performers wear less feminine clothing, such as jeans instead of skirts, to avoid being seen as trivial.

JOANNA: But it might also be because such clothes are more practical. Pop concerts are often very energetic performances.

SUPERVISOR: That's a good point. I was also interested in the effect of the audience on performers' clothing choices.

JOANNA: The musicians I interviewed said this was very important. They believed audiences had certain expectations, and performers tried to fulfill them to show respect.

SUPERVISOR: So they weren't afraid of appearing to have made an effort to look good.

JOANNA: In the past audiences also had expectations about how they themselves dressed, but that is no longer common in the UK.

SUPERVISOR: True.

JOANNA: I also became interested in what sports scientists are doing regarding performance clothing.

SUPERVISOR: Musicians are physically vulnerable because their movements are intensive and repetitive. Sports clothing could help protect them.

JOANNA: Yes, but musicians rarely think about that. They only avoid clothing that restricts movement.

SUPERVISOR: So where do you plan to go with your next research?

JOANNA: I was thinking of doing a study using an audience including…

ANNOUNCER: That is the end of section 3. You now have half a minute to check your answers.

ANNOUNCER: Section 4. You will hear part of a lecture about a way of reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. First, you have some time to look at questions 31 to 40. Now listen carefully and answer questions 31 to 40.

SPEAKER: As we saw in the last lecture, a major cause of climate change is the rapid rise in the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere over the last century.

SPEAKER: If we could reduce the amount of CO₂, perhaps the rate of climate change could also be slowed down.

SPEAKER: One potential method involves enhancing the role of the soil that plants grow in with regard to absorbing CO₂.

SPEAKER: Rattan Lal, a soil scientist from Ohio State University in the USA, claims that the world's agricultural soils could potentially absorb 13% of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

SPEAKER: This is equivalent to the amount released in the last 30 years, and research is continuing into how this might be achieved.

SPEAKER: Lal first came to this idea not through interest in climate change, but through concern for the land and the people dependent on it.

SPEAKER: Carbon-rich soil is dark, crumbly and fertile, and it also retains water.

SPEAKER: But erosio can occur if soil is dry and contains insufficient carbo , which is bad for people trying to grow crops or raise animals.

SPEAKER: In the 1970s and 1980s, Lal studied soils in Africa that lacked organic matter and had become extremely hard, almost like cement.

SPEAKER: There he met a pioneer of global warming research, who suggested that carbon from the soil had moved into the atmosphere.

SPEAKER: For millions of years, carbon dioxide levels were regulated by a natural partnership between plants and soil microbes.

SPEAKER: Plants absorb CO₂ from the air and convert it into sugars and other carbon-based substances.

SPEAKER: Some of these substances remain in the plant, while others transfer to fungi and microbes in the soil, storing carbon there.

SPEAKER: The invention of agriculture around 10,000 years ago disrupted these natural processes.

SPEAKER: When humans began plowing soil and draining the natural topsoil, they exposed buried carbon to oxyge , releasing it as carbon dioxide.

SPEAKER: In some areas, grazing animals have removed vegetation completely, also releasing carbon into the air.

SPEAKER: Large amounts of carbon have therefore been removed from the world's soils and transferred into the atmosphere.

SPEAKER: Researchers now believe that even modest changes in farming practices could help reduce atmospheric carbon.

SPEAKER: One approach is regenerative agriculture, which aims to improve soil fertility and keep soil moist.

SPEAKER: Methods include keeping fields planted all year and increasing the diversity of crops.

SPEAKER: These strategies can significantly increase the amount of carbon stored in soil.

SPEAKER: In California, soil scientist Whendee Silver is conducting research on a large cattle farm.

SPEAKER: Her team is studying how compost made from agricultural and garden waste affects carbon storage.

SPEAKER: In Australia, soil ecologist Christine Jones is testing another method.

SPEAKER: She and several farmers are cultivating perennial grasses that stay green all year to increase soil carbon.

SPEAKER: Projects like these may show how farmers and land managers can help reduce greenhouse gases.

SPEAKER: In countries like the United States, changing long-standing farming practices may require a major system change.

SPEAKER: Rattan Lal argues that farmers should receive financial rewards not only for producing food, but also for storing carbon in soil.

ANNOUNCER: That is the end of Section 4. You now have half a minute to check your answers.