Klarinet Archive - Posting 000607.txt from 1995/03

From: Ed Browning <EBrowning@-----.COM>
Subj: Math Quiz
Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 15:31:14 -0500

Someone named Alyssa Wright posted this "Math Quiz" on CompuServe
today. She says it came from an unknown source, and it was passed
around her orchestra last week. I found it on the ACMP board. I thought you
might enjoy it:

1. Wilson is tired of paying for clarinet reeds. If he adopts a
policy of playing only on rejected reeds from his colleagues will he
be able to retire on the money he has saved if he invests it in mutual
bonds, yielding 8.7%, before he is fired from his job? If not,
calculate the probablitity of him ever working in a professional
symphony orchestra again!

2. Jethro has been playing the double bass in a symphony
orchestra for 12 years, three months and seven days. Each day, his
inclination to practise decreases by the equation: (total days in the
orchestra) x 0.0076. Assuming he stopped practising altogether four
years, six months and three days ago, how long will it be before he is
completely unable to play the double bass?

3. Wilma plays in the second violin section, but specializes in
making disparaging remarks about conductors and other musicians. The
probability of her making a negative comment about any given musician is 4
chances in 7, and for conductors is 16 chances out of 17. If there are 103
musicians in the orchestra and the orchestra sees 26 different conductors
each year, how many negative remarks does Wilma make in a two-year period?
How does this change if five of the musicians are also conductors? What if
six of the conductors are also musicians?

4. Horace is the General Manager of an important symphony
orchestra. He tries to hear at least four concerts a year. Assuming
that at each concert the orchestra plays a minimum of three pieces per
concert, what are the chances that Horace can avoid hearing a single work by
Mozart, Beethoven or Brahms in the next ten years?

5. Betty plays in the viola section. Despite her best efforts
she is unable to play with the rest of the orchestra and, on average,
plays 0.3528 seconds behind the rest of the viola section, which is
already 0.16485 seconds behind the rest of the orchestra. If the
orchestra is moving into a new concert hall with a reverberation time
of 2.7 seconds, will she be able to continue playing this way
undetected?

6. Ralph loves to drink coffee. Each week he drinks three more cups of
coffee than Harold, who drinks exactly one third the amount that the entire
brass section consumes in beer. How much longer is Ralph going to live?

7. Rosemary is unable to play in keys with more than three sharps or flats
without making an inordinate number of mistakes. Because her colleagues in
the cello section are also struggling in these passages she has so far been
able to escape detection. What is the total number of hours they would all
have to practise to play the complete works of Richard Strauss?

------- End of Forwarded Message

Ed, ebrowning@-----.com
Member: acmp-list@-----.EDU (Amature Chamber Music Players)
klarinet@-----.bitnet (Clarinettist's Network)
Jackson Symphony Orchestra
Jackson French Quarter Dixieland Band