Famous Composers Quiz

Well Known Work	Composer	Country
Moonlight Sonata		Germany
Firebird		Russia
William Tell		Italy
Toccata and Fugue in D Minor		Germany
Clair de Lune (Suite bergamasque)		France
Marriage of Figaro		Austria
Minute Waltz		Poland
Appalachian Spring		USA
Totentanz		Hungary
1812 Overture		Russia

Well Known Work	Composer	Country
The Surprise Symphony		Austria
Piano Concerto in A minor		Norway
Boléro		France
Piano Concerto No. 2		Russia
Finlandia		Finland
Messiah		Germany
The Planets		England
Canon in D		Germany
On The Beautiful Blue Danube		Austria
Pictures at an Exhibition		Russia

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There are 36 comments for this game.
(Warning: comments may contain spoilers)

Famous Composers Quiz

by SporcleAdmin

Created Jul 22, 2008 in Music
Featured Jul 22, 2008
Game Plays 68,629

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	Bonnie A:	Sep 16th, 2008 at 03:36 GMT		8 points
	Although a few of my favorites were missing, like Brahms and Schubert, this isn't a bad list. Maybe we'll see one just for opera composers.

	davidr:	Oct 31st, 2008 at 01:31 GMT		15 points
	So, Russians who've written at least two piano concerti? Prokofiev, Rachmaninov, Rubinstein, Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky spring immediately to mind; a little Googling gives Balakirev, Glazunov, Kabalevsky, Medtner, Shchedrin and Tcherepnin, too.

	magister:	Nov 1st, 2008 at 21:20 GMT		6 points
	If we're going to go on Russians, a quick fun one would be "The Five."

	Lulu:	Nov 16th, 2008 at 12:40 GMT		5 points
	Could we have a 'famous composers 2' quiz with Saint-Saëns, Brahms, Mendelssohn etc. please?

	loki1983:	Jan 22nd, 2009 at 08:05 GMT		1 point
	Including Pachebel but not any of Lulu's composers or davidr's is blasphamy. Sure he's famous, but maybe a "great" quiz should trump his inclusion

	BigThing:	Feb 15th, 2009 at 00:19 GMT		6 points
	The key word is "famous". I think this quiz is a good mix of obvious and less obvious answers. In that light it's also perfectly clear that Rachmaninoff is prime candidate for "well known for his 2nd piano concerto". And of course it's nice to spray names that you would have liked included (because then you'd get them and others might not) so Bartok, Dvorak, Verdi, Satie, Pärt. But this is a very good quiz aimed at a large demographic.

	sophicmuse:	Jun 14th, 2009 at 01:27 GMT		21 points
	That's quite a Lizst you've got there.

	michelplatini:	Sep 4th, 2009 at 21:25 GMT		1 point
	I forget copland, and I lost a couple of minutes to write Tchaikovsky!

	icing:	Oct 12th, 2009 at 04:49 GMT		3 points
	I'm going to bed! I'm so disgusted that I couldn't remember Hadyn ... I've only got about 20 CDs of his stuff! Does anyone else find themselves just wanting to scream out loud at these things, sometimes, because you can't think of a name? Pffft!

	pottedstu:	Oct 15th, 2009 at 12:06 GMT		3 points
	This is one of those quizzes where spelling is what makes it hard. I struggled with Copland and Grieg and couldn't get Mussorgsky or Pachelbel right at all.

	mtc:	Oct 31st, 2009 at 09:41 GMT		0 points
	@icing And because you misspelled Haydn?

	s1rnight:	Nov 14th, 2009 at 23:16 GMT		1 point
	well that was painfully easy (/smug)

	dark_chocolate:	Dec 29th, 2009 at 22:04 GMT		1 point
	sequel please! so many more that u could use!

	twojacks:	Feb 5th, 2010 at 04:56 GMT		4 points
	There was no Haydn the clever, once I got a Handel on the idea, I laid Bach, de-Straussed and finished the Liszt. (sorry it's late and I am tired)

	Tyrael:	Apr 24th, 2010 at 02:07 GMT		-3 points
	Not bad, but I am of the opinion that there are many notable and conspicuous absences from this list of Famous Composers. In addition to figures already mentioned, what of, for instance, Wagner, Richard Strauss, Mahler, Paganini, and one whom I believe to be among the foremost of the great composers of violin music, Vivaldi?

	ensiform:	May 5th, 2010 at 03:34 GMT		7 points
	Should have made the answers be in order. This is just a "name some composers!" quiz.

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	marsviking:	May 12th, 2010 at 16:39 GMT		0 points
	i thot totentanz sounded like wagner

	Chevron42:	May 31st, 2010 at 04:27 GMT		6 points
	Tchaikowsky should be an acceptable transliteration of Tchaikovsky's cyrillic russian name

	14111184:	Aug 31st, 2010 at 12:06 GMT		2 points
	So many Russians wrote 2 or more piano concerti!

	Anonymous42:	Jan 11th, 2011 at 05:42 GMT		2 points
	It's an okay list, overall...but the quiz lost a star from me because of the inclusion of Pachelbel (and the exclusion of so many other truly great composers).

	bicyclerace:	Feb 27th, 2011 at 20:05 GMT		2 points
	you could make it more challanging by taking away the country-that way you'd have to really know famous pieces without using where they're from as a clue- which would mean only named pieces could be used...hmm, well whatever

	chiefyratain:	Feb 28th, 2011 at 19:36 GMT		1 point
	marsviking - Actually I'm quite sure it is Mussorgsky, I saw Pictures last month at Powell Symphony Hall, I've still got goose bumps from it

	bondquizace:	Apr 25th, 2011 at 05:05 GMT		0 points
	Way too much time for this one. Good list, though. I didn't expect there to be any I hadn't heard of, but Holst and Sibelus are new ones. And chiefyratain is correct. I ought to know after taking 3 semesters of Music History under a Russian professor.

	CorellonL:	May 9th, 2011 at 22:54 GMT		2 points
	Shostakovich works just as well for Piano Concerto No. 2 from Russia, and I'm sure there are countless others I'm not thinking of off the top of my head. Similarly, Piano Concerti in A Minor.

	madmogs:	May 21st, 2011 at 19:10 GMT		1 point
	Piano Concerto No. 2. PIANO CONCERTO NO. 2. You are effin kidding me. What numpty thought that one up? They can't know very much about classical music.

	Tama52h:	May 30th, 2011 at 17:50 GMT		0 points
	o come on, no telemann???

	Imperium:	Jun 25th, 2011 at 21:30 GMT		4 points
	For Rachmaninov, a better and more distinctive one would be the 'Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini. It's about as well known as his 2nd Piano Concerto (the two often appear together on CDs), and isn't the name of a piece with Wikipedia pages for 13 seperate artists, and probably a hundred others.

	oklaclarinet:	Apr 8th, 2012 at 04:17 GMT		3 points
	I'm not normally one who complains about time, but 10 minutes seems like way too much time for this quiz.

	Dantelle:	May 29th, 2012 at 13:35 GMT		0 points
	Could "Haendel" please be accepted as an alternative to "Handel"? Because "Handel" is totally wrong. The composer's name is "Georg Friedrich H_ä_ndel". I typed and typed in "Haendel" and it wouldn't be accepted despite it's technically correct.

	loopyluna:	Jun 2nd, 2012 at 14:43 GMT		1 point
	I'm playing 2 of these pieces at the moment. Guess which ones I missed?

	holytriplem:	Jun 21st, 2012 at 16:27 GMT		-1 points
	copeland not copland

	gregoire:	Jul 13th, 2012 at 19:43 GMT		1 point
	Good quiz, I don't know much about composers, but my music appreciation class in college helped me get 11 of these. Really surprised Liszt is the least guessed, I am not aware of any other major composers from Hungary, would think you music guys would nail that one!

	xiaoyuhuang43:	Sep 27th, 2012 at 04:15 GMT		1 point
	Ahh! Misspelled Mussorgsky.

	sirwootalot:	Nov 28th, 2012 at 02:56 GMT		2 points
	You really need to change Handel to "England" - he may have been ethnically German, but he wrote nearly everything of his in England and for/about English people and settings. Similar to how Berlioz was ethnically Hungarian, but was so French in his style and substance that his ethnicity is an anecdote.

	kyleharvison:	Mar 27th, 2013 at 22:40 GMT		1 point
	Not one mention of Gustav Mahler......IDIOT!!