We spent a lot of time sightseeing in Beijing.
我们花了很多时间在北京观光。

This wooden chair is not comfortable.
这张木椅坐起来不舒服。

In a true play of might makes right, a mature ghost crab threatens a juvenile on the sands of Loango National Park. The park, too, is waging its own battles against poachers, oil companies, and piles of litter. In one day, trash collectors gathered 535 plastic bottles, 560 intact flip-flops, 4 refrigerators, and 2,240 other bits of debris from 1,640 feet (500 meters) of beach.

All That Jazz
“爵”代风华

You may have heard of Kenny G, but what do you really know about jazz? Jazz is a genuinely American art form that has blossomed into a worldwide phenomenon. It is certainly much more than mere background music.

Jazz comes in a wide variety of styles, and has several defining features. The most important of these is improvisation. Jazz musicians do not follow a set piece of music note by note, but make up melodies and chord changes as they play. Such improvisation is based on a musician's creative impulses, and is often inspired by interactions with the other players or the audience. It is this energetic feedback and element of anticipation that gives jazz its incredible dynamism. A piece is never played the same way twice.

The originators of jazz were African-Americans in the early 20th century who fused African rhythms with European ideas of harmony and melody. Jazz's use of rhythm is unique in that it is “syncopated”; that is, the rhythm is irregular. Jazz is also polyrhythmic, which means many rhythms revolve around one basic one.

Another musical genre created by African-Americans, the blues, has heavily influenced jazz as well as rock and roll. About one third of jazz is in blues form with twelve measures in a song and uses ---blue notes,” the flatted third, fifth, and seventh notes of the musical scale.

Jazz has inspired everything from slang such as “cool” and “jazzy”; to dance styles such as tap and swing; to art forms such as filmmaking and beat poetry. Its dynamic nature and strong individual performers have also given rise to different branches of jazz.

Early jazz was centered in New Orleans and had trumpeter Louis Armstrong as its first great soloist. The '30s and '40s saw jazz's sound grow more forceful and invigorating, inciting people to dance. The master of this “big band” or “swing” style was Duke Ellington, thought to be one of America's greatest composers in any genre.

“Bebop” appeared in the 1940s. It introduced more complex melodies, harmonies, and rhythms, as well as more expressive drumming. In the late '40s, Miles Davis ushered in “cool jazz”' s smoother, more harmonic sound. The last of the classic jazz styles, “hard bop,” was more soulful, and sometimes borrowed from R&B and gospel themes.

Later strains of jazz include “fusion,” “bossa nova,” and “funk.” “Smooth jazz,” with Kenny G at its forefront, has proved the most commercially viable form of jazz, although purists scoff at its slick production and lack of improvisation. Regardless of the jazz you have been exposed to, a wealth of it still awaits you. In this era of boy bands, jazz reminds us of what a sublime and rewarding experience listening to music can be.

1. improvisation n. 即兴演出或创作
2. impulse n. 冲动，兴致
3. fuse v. 结合
4. measure n. （此指）小节
5. invigorating a. 令人振奋的
6. strain n. 家系、曲
7. purist n. 纯粹主义者
8. sublime a. 卓越的

你也许听说过凯丽·金，但是对爵士乐你真的了解多少呢？爵士乐是一种地道的美国艺术形式，它已经发展成为一种风靡全球的现象。爵士乐绝不仅仅只是背景音乐。

爵士乐以多种风格出现，具有几种可用作定义的特点。其中最重要的一种是即兴演出。爵士乐手不会按照固定的乐谱一个音符一个音符地演奏，而是在演出的时候自编旋律及变化和弦。这样的即兴演出基于乐手的创作冲动，通常是由与其它乐手或与观众间的互动激发起来的。正是这种充满活力的回应和充满期待的成分赋予了爵士乐不可思议的活力。一首乐曲绝不会有两次相同的演奏。

爵士乐的创始人是20世纪初期的非洲裔美国人，他们将非洲的节奏融入欧洲的和声和旋律的概念中去。爵士乐采用“切分”的演奏是很独特的；也就是说，节奏是不规则的。爵士乐也是多重节奏的，即多种节奏围绕一个基本节奏而进行。

非洲裔美国人所创的另一种音乐类型──蓝调，对爵士乐和摇滚乐都有深远的影响。大约有三分之一的爵士乐采用蓝调形式，一首歌有12小节，使用“蓝音”，即把第三、五、七个音阶降半音（如Ｃ大调的Ｅ、Ｇ、Ｂ）。

爵士乐激发了各种灵感，如：从俚语中的“酷”和“奔放”两个词，到舞蹈风格中的踢跶舞和摇摆舞（即兴爵士舞），以及电影制片和节拍诗等艺术形式。爵士乐富有活力的性质和有很强感染力的个人表演者也导致了不同流派爵士乐的产生。

早期的爵士乐以新奥尔良为中心，并有出色的首席独奏者小号手路易斯·阿姆斯特朗。30和40年代的爵士乐的乐音变得更加强有力、更加振奋人心，把人们跳舞的情绪调动起来了。“大乐团”和“摇摆乐”的大师艾灵顿公爵，被公认为美国各种音乐类型中最伟大的作曲家之一。

“咆哮爵士”出现在20世纪40年代。它引入了更复杂的曲调、和弦与节奏，还有更富有表现力的爵士鼓。40年代后期，迈尔士·戴维斯开创了乐音更流畅、更和谐的“酷派爵士乐”。最新风格的古典爵士乐“硬式咆哮爵士”就更加热情洋溢了，它有时还会从节奏蓝调和福音书中取材。此后的爵士曲调包括“融合爵士乐”、“波萨诺瓦爵士乐”，以及“方克”。

尽管纯粹主义一派嘲笑它的作品媚俗且缺乏即兴创作，凯丽·金为先锋的“轻柔爵士乐”却证明了它是最具商业竞争力的爵士乐类别。除了你曾接触过的爵士乐，它还有大量的爵士等待着你去发掘。在这个男孩乐队当道的年代，爵士乐让我们记起在聆听音乐时，那种超凡而愉悦的体验是多么美好。

Waiting On The World To Change

这首《Waiting on the World to Change》是John Mayer发行的个人的第三张全新专辑《Continuum》当中的主打单曲。在7月底的Billboard Hot 100单曲榜中首次上榜就名列当周第25位，是当周Hot 100单曲榜中打榜成绩最好的新单曲算是受到不错的评价。据悉，《Continuum》将于9月12日通过Columbia公司发行  

关于这张专辑，John Mayer解释说：“这次曲风是以抒情蓝调和灵魂乐为主，是一张重新发现自我、探索人性的专辑。”专辑还将特别收录John Mayer上张Live专辑中的《Vultures》和《Gravity》两首单曲的录音室版本，以及翻唱Jimi Hendrix的 《Bold As Love》。此张专辑也继续和Steve Jordan, Pino Palladino合作..  

Waiting On The World To Change－－John Mayer

me and all my friends  
we're all misunderstood  
they say we stand for nothing and  
there's no way we ever could  
now we see everything that's going wrong  
with the world and those who lead it  
we just feel like we don't have the means  
to rise above and beat it  

so we keep waiting  
waiting on the world to change  
we keep on waiting  
waiting on the world to change  

it's hard to beat the system  
when we're standing at a distance  
so we keep waiting  
waiting on the world to change  
now if we had the power  
to bring our neighbors home from war  
they would have never missed a Christmas  
no more ribbons on their door  
and when you trust your television  
what you get is what you got  
cause when they own the information, oh  
they can bend it all they want  

that's why we're waiting  
waiting on the world to change  
we keep on waiting  
waiting on the world to change  

it's not that we don't care  
we just know that the fight ain't fair  
so we keep on waiting  
waiting on the world to change  

and we're still waiting  
waiting on the world to change  
we keep on waiting waiting on the world to change  
one day our generation  
is gonna rule the population  
so we keep on waiting  
waiting on the world to change  

we keep on waiting  
waiting on the world to change  

歌手简介：

在去年发行了一张现场专辑之后，John Mayer终于交出了他个人三年来的首张录音室专辑《Continuum》。在发行首周，《Continuum》以30万张的单周销量获得了本周Billboard 200专辑榜的亚军。Mayer的上张录音室专辑是2003年的《Heavier Things》，曾获得当年Billboard 200专辑榜冠军，发行首周的销量达到31万7千张。虽然在发行首周的Billboard 200专辑榜中屈居亚军，但这张《Continuum》在发行首周的Top Rock专辑榜和Top Internet专辑榜中都如愿获得了冠军。
                 John Mayer这几年的进步是歌迷有目共睹的。在2003年的专辑《Heavier Things》之后，他不断的在一些Blues，Jazz大师级音乐人的专辑中出现，这其中包括布鲁斯吉他大师巴迪·盖（Buddy Guy），B.B. King和爵士融合钢琴大师赫尔比·汉考克（Herbie Hancock）。当然John Mayer在这些传奇音乐人的专辑中不只是仅仅助阵演唱那么简单，他还亲自演奏了吉他，与这些前辈音乐家切磋技艺，这对于John Mayer这一代的音乐人是十分难得的。
         从一出道，才华横溢的John Mayer就被很多行家看好。但直到这张《Continuum》的面世，我们才真正感受到这位音乐才子的成熟。总的来说，《Continuum》是一张吉他出色，充满灵性而又非常悦耳的专辑。而无论是这张专辑的曲风，还是John Mayer的唱腔都能体现出他受Blues，Jazz和老式R&B音乐的影响都是非常重的。开场曲《Waiting On The World To Change》，民谣曲风的《The Heart Of Life》，慢版流行布鲁斯小调《Slow Dancing In A Burning Room》都是十分动听的曲目。其中，《Slow Dancing In A Burning Room》中的吉他演奏简直与这首歌曲的名字一样煽情。通过钢琴伴奏的《Dreaming With A Broken Heart》以及略带Jazz曲风的结束曲《I'm Gonna Find Another You》，很多以前不是John Mayer歌迷的听众或许都会被他所打动。此外，《Bold As Love》是John Mayer翻弹吉他巫师吉米·亨德里克斯（Jimi Hendrix）的名曲。虽然Mayer的版本在很多人心目中远不能同原版相比，但年轻一代的音乐人敢于尝试这种类型的曲子本身就是值得鼓励的，何况，John Mayer的演绎本身也是相当棒的。
                 在这张《Continuum》中，日趋成熟的John Mayer首次担任专辑的制作人。而无论从各方面来说，这张《Continuum》都是John Mayer最为出色的一张专辑，他也已经成为了他这一代音乐人中的佼佼者。