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Classical Music Trivia Questions
Composers, periods, famous works and the stories behind them. 16 questions with answers, and a game you can play now.
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Classical music is the one round where the answers have not moved in two hundred years, which makes it ideal for a printed quiz you intend to reuse. The questions here stay on firm ground: who wrote what, which period a composer belongs to, and the pieces whose nicknames stuck so firmly that most people do not know the real title.
No question asks you to recognise a passage, since that needs sound. This is a round about names, dates and the odd biographical fact that turns out to be true.
All 16 classical music trivia questions with answers
Opera as an art form began in which country?
Answer: ItalyEasyThe earliest surviving operas were written in Florence around 1600.
Who composed the Ninth Symphony that includes the Ode to Joy?
Answer: BeethovenMediumIt was the first major symphony to bring a choir into the final movement.
How many musicians are in a string quartet?
Answer: FourMediumNormally two violins, a viola and a cello.
Which composer wrote The Four Seasons?
Answer: Antonio VivaldiMediumEach of the four concertos was published with a matching poem.
Who composed the opera The Magic Flute?
Answer: MozartMediumIt premiered in Vienna in 1791, the year he died.
Which composer kept writing music after losing his hearing?
Answer: BeethovenHardHis deafness began in his late twenties and grew steadily worse.
What is the highest female singing voice type?
Answer: SopranoHardContralto is the lowest of the standard female voice types.
Who composed the Brandenburg Concertos?
Answer: Johann Sebastian BachHardSix concertos, dedicated to a German margrave who seems never to have used them.
Which Russian composer wrote the ballets Swan Lake and The Nutcracker?
Answer: TchaikovskyHardHe also wrote the 1812 Overture, cannon and all.
Who composed the ballet The Rite of Spring, whose 1913 premiere caused a near-riot?
Answer: Igor StravinskyMediumThe Paris premiere was staged by Diaghilev's Ballets Russes with choreography by Nijinsky.
Which composer wrote the oratorio Messiah?
Answer: George Frideric HandelMediumHandel composed it in 1741 and it was first performed in Dublin in 1742.
Which Polish-born composer is known almost entirely for his piano works?
Answer: Frederic ChopinMediumChopin spent most of his adult life in Paris and died there in 1849.
How many symphonies did Beethoven complete?
Answer: NineMediumSketches for a tenth exist, but he died in 1827 without finishing it.
Which composer wrote the four-opera cycle The Ring of the Nibelung?
Answer: Richard WagnerHardThe complete cycle was first performed at Wagner's own theatre in Bayreuth in 1876.
Which Czech composer wrote the New World Symphony?
Answer: Antonin DvorakHardHe wrote it in 1893 while directing the National Conservatory of Music in New York.
Whose Symphony No. 94 is nicknamed the Surprise Symphony?
Answer: Joseph HaydnHardHaydn wrote 104 numbered symphonies and is often called the father of the symphony.
Answer key
- Italy
- Beethoven
- Four
- Antonio Vivaldi
- Mozart
- Beethoven
- Soprano
- Johann Sebastian Bach
- Tchaikovsky
- Igor Stravinsky
- George Frideric Handel
- Frederic Chopin
- Nine
- Richard Wagner
- Antonin Dvorak
- Joseph Haydn
How to play
- Pick a mode: multiple choice, true or false, a 60-second sprint, or the daily quiz.
- Answer with a tap, or press 1 to 4 on a keyboard. The right answer appears straight away with a line explaining it.
- Finish the round to see your score, copy the result grid, and step up a difficulty.
- Hosting a night? The full classical music trivia questions list and a separate answer key are printed below, and the print layout drops the game and keeps the paper.
The wider round
These come from the music set, which has 100 questions across 6 themes, plus tiebreakers and host notes. Music trivia