Music Hath Charms Trivia Quiz

Answer: Music that is not written down

Prehistoric (more commonly called primitive) music is the name given to all music that was made in preliterate cultures. While the music of native North Americans and the Aborigines of Australia could be called prehistoric, the term more usually refers to the music of European prehistoric cultures before the invention of writing.

Answer: Iraq

The song was unearthed at an archaeological dig at the site of Ur (the Ur of the Chaldees mentioned in Genesis in the Bible). Ur is in what is now Iraq, south of Baghdad and not far from the Persian Gulf. It was deciphered by Prof. Anne Kilmer of UC Berkeley, and she determined, surprisingly, that it was written in harmony using the diatonic scale, previously thought to have been only found in European music. Cuneiform was the system of writing developed by the Babylonians and Sumerians who inhabited much of what is now Iraq.

Answer: False

When westerners speak of classical music, they're usually referring to the great symphonies by Beethoven, the stately music of Bach, the inspired music of Mozart and so on. However, that is too narrow a definition. There are classical composers and classical music in every part of the world. North America, South America, Africa, Asia and Australasia - every culture has its own forms of classical music, and the classical music of Asian countries - that of India, China, and Japan, for instance, is centuries older than the classical music of the west.

Answer: 1400-1600

The beginning of the Renaissance period in music is not as clearly defined as the Renaissance period in other art forms, and it did not have its beginnings in Italy like painting, architecture and sculpture. Renaissance music originated in what is now northern France,Belgium and the Netherlands. The hallmark of Renaissance music is a clear, singable melody and balanced polyphony.

Answer: J.S. Bach

The three outstanding composers of the Baroque period are Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel, and Antonio Vivaldi. Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach was the son of J.S. Bach and was active during the Classic period of music which covers the latter part of the 18th century. Palestrina was a Renaissance period composer, and Beethoven was the great composer who ushered in the Romantic period of music.

Answer: Keyboard - either harpsichord or organ

Much of Baroque music was written to allow for improvisation and the keyboard opened up the possibility of modulation and playing in all keys. The accompanying instruments like the viola de gamba and the bassoon provided a basso continuo underlying the melody played on the keyboard.

Answer: Organ

Believe it or not, organs, in one form or another, have been around since roughly the 3rd century BCE. They didn't always have keyboards (the Roman water organ, for example, was played by pulling a row of levers), but parts of an organ dated 226 CE were found near Budapest, and the keys were much like those of a modern piano. References to the the harpsichord date back to the 13th century. Virginals, a type of square legless spinet, was a keyboard instrument popular during the Renaissance. Queen Elizabeth I was an accomplished virginals player. (The name derives from the rods - the virga - which produced the notes rather than the chastity of the player.) The piano came along much later, in the 18th century.

Answer: Wagner

Wagner's great opus 'The Ring of the Nibelung' was based on the Volsunga Saga, and is peopled with Norse/Teutonic heroes, malicious dwarves and Valkyries. Liszt was Hungarian and drew on traditional Hungarian folk music for much of his inspiration, just as Tchaikovsky retold old Russian folk tales in music and Dvorak used Czech traditional music in his works.

Answer: Arnold Schoenberg

Schoenberg was heavily influenced at the beginning of his career by the Romantic composers Wagner and Mahler, but later he developed the twelve-tone technique for his compositions, and passed along that technique to his students Webern and Berg, both of who made further developments to it. Together, Schoenberg, Webern and Berg are known as The Schoenberg Trinity or the Second Viennese School (the First Viennese School of composers was made up of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven).

Answer: Aaron Copland

Aaron Copland was one of America's greatest gifts to music. His haunting 'Appalachian Spring', which wove folk music into classical forms, his boisterous 'Rodeo' written for the ballet of that name, and his triumphant 'Fanfare for the Common Man' are part of the warp and weft of the modern musical fabric. Spike Lee's 'He Got Game' brought Copland's music to the attention of people who wouldn't have thought themselves classical music lovers. (Who could forget the scene of the neighbourood basketball game set to 'Hoe-Down' from 'Rodeo'?) Philip Glass is one of the more influential American composers of the late 20th century. Leonard Bernstein, who scored 'West Side Story', had a career that ran the gamut from opera, musical theatre and film scores to music for religious services, was a noted conductor as well as a composer, while George Gershwin's popular music stands side by side with his classics like 'Rhapsody in Blue', 'An American in Paris' and 'Porgy and Bess'.