Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. This may be a trick question: Was Bach's "Musical Offering" a commissioned work?
2. For whom did Bach write the "Musical Offering"?
3. What was the reason for Bach's writing the pieces of the "Musical Offering"?
4. It is known that the dedicatee introduced Bach to a rather large collection of pianos. But what was this nobleman's instrument?
5. Bach himself composed the main theme of the "Musical Offering".
6. The music proper: what is the first piece in the set?
7. The puzzles: how many are there?
8. Two of Bach's puzzles have a Latin inscription accompanying them, the first is number 4 in the manuscript: "Notulis crescentibus crescat Fortuna Regis." What does this enigmatic phrase mean?
9. The last of Bach's puzzles in the Musical Offering is inscribed: "Ascendenteque Modulatione ascendat Gloria Regis." What does this mean?
10. The word "Ricercar" litterally means "to research" or "to study." It was this word which Bach used as a title to his fugues, rather than "fuga" which means to fly. But Bach also made the word "Ricercar" into an acrostic pun for the dedicatee. What was Bach's first inscription on the 6-part Ricercar of the Musical Offering?
Source: Author
Arpeggionist
This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor
Bruyere before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.