Composers Datebook 2006 Quiz | Other Music

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. A new opera had its premiere at the Paris Opera on March 16, 1894. It was titled "Thais," and was based on a novel by the French author, Anatole France Who composed this opera?

Answer: Massenet

The other three wrote operas too, but not this opera.

2. Which of these artists made his last recordings on September 16th, 1920?

Answer: Enrico Caruso

On September 16, 1920, the great Italian tenor Enrico Caruso made his last records in Camden, New Jersey

On September 16, 1977, opera diva Maria Callas dropped dead of a heart attack in Paris.

On September 16, Samuel Barber's opera, "Anthony and Cleopatra," opened but closed within days.

Not a lucky day for opera!

Berlin and Gershwin were beginning their careers as Caruso was ending his.

3. On July 8, 1882, George Percy Aldridge Grainger was born in Brighton, Victoria. Although born in Australia, Grainger died in America, at the age of 79. Where did Granger die?

Answer: New York in 1961

Grainger counted among his friends the Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg
and the British composer Frederic Delius. He shared their keen interest in folk music themes. These appeared in his compositions.

4. Best known for his waltzes, Strauss was in his mid 40s when he began composing operettas. This was his third and opened on April 5, 1874. Can you name this batty Strauss production?

Answer: Die Fledermaus

Strauss, father, son, brothers, all have composed beautiful music. "The Telephone" by Edward Strauss, 1902, was played in 2006 at the Vienna New Year's Day Concert and during the performance of this lively polka, the conductor's cell phone was made to ring.

Frederick Morton wrote of this beautiful, yet troubled, world in his "A Nervous Splendor" which had such witty prose that I wanted it never to end.

5. If you had attended the opening night of the musical, "Girl Crazy," on October 14, 1930, in New York City, you would have seen the Broadway debut of this popular actress?

Answer: Ethel Merman

This musical contains a favorite song of mine, "I Got Rhythm"

The musical co-starred Ginger Rogers. Zech added that "in the pit orchestra that night was the Red Nichols ensemble, which included among its players Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa, Glen Miller, Jimmy Dorsey, and Jack Teagarden -- gentlemen who would all go on to become famous band leaders in their own right. The composer, George Gershwin, conducted them that night!"

6. On March 31, 1837, the Princess Cristina Belgiojoso-Trivulzio, scored the social coup of the season at her Parisian salon. It was a recital to aid Italian political refugees but was seen as a contest between the two leading virtuoso pianists of the day: Sigismund Thalberg and this Hungarian. Can you name him?

Answer: Liszt

Thalberg began with his "Fantasy on Themes" from Rossini's opera "Moses." Liszt played one of his own fantasias. It was decided they both had won.

7. "A General History of Music" was written by the 18th-century British musicologist Charles Burney. Where was he born?

Answer: Shrewsbury

The first volume of his "General History of Music" was published in 1776, and the last in 1789. His history tells the story of music from ancient Egypt and Greece through to his own time.

8. Had you lived in New York City in the latter half of the 19th-century and wanted entertainment on April 3, 1871, you could have seen at Lina Edwin's Theater, a musical burlesque entitled "Pluto," which the New York Times billed as a condensed and lightened version of this French composer's racy operetta, "Orpheus in the Underworld," Who was the composer in question?

Answer: Offenbach

There were several other entertainment options for that day

Zech tells us, speaking over appropriate background music as always,that "for the more serious sort, the American staged premiere of Richard Wagner's opera 'Lohengrin' (could be seen) at the Stadt Theater. The Times noted that Wagner's opera was 'brought out in Germany some 20 years earlier, but was unknown here in its entirety until now.

"At Broadway's Minstrel Hall, direct from Japan, twenty star performers from Satsuma's Japanese Circus Troupe offered 'varied and interesting' entertainment."

9. On April 18, 1800, Beethoven appeared in Vienna as piano accompanist for the popular Bohemian virtuoso Johann Wenzel Stich, who went by the more marketable Italian stage name of Giovanni Punto. What instrument did the virtuoso play?

Answer: horn

The saxophone had not yet been invented.

The viola de gamba was a Baroque instrument.

Beethoven's "Horn and Piano Sonata" which I heard on NPR-affiliate radio station, WRKF, on April 29, 2000, at 12:12a to 12:19a CDT (approx) is an elegant conversation between the horn and piano. It was a fortepiano which has a delicate sound and is less forceful than the modern piano.

10. We're almost done with our musical tour. Where was Louis Moreau Gottschalk born?

Answer: New Orleans

April 17, 1849, marked Gottschalk's return to the Salle Pleyelle. He performed some of his own compositions including "Bamboula," named after a deep-voiced Afro-Caribbean drum. Gottschalk had been born in New Orleans, and was exposed from childhood to Cuban and Haitian rhythms and music. The Parisian audiences gave Gottschalk a standing ovation. His piano pieces antedate both the rhythms and colors of American jazz.

Gottschalk died relatively young while on tour in Rio de Jenero.

I discussed him on my blog with audio background. Visit www.teleread.org/blind

Did you notice that the first letter in each correct answer: M E N D E L S O H N spells a variant of a noted composer's last name?

Source: Author biblioholik

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor Bruyere before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.

Composers Datebook 2006 Trivia Quiz

John Zech hosts this interesting daily NPR segment which inspired this quiz. Everything musical is fair game.

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