Music trivia for kids: 50 questions with answers

Here are 50 music trivia questions for children, in five rounds of ten: instruments, composers, famous pieces, music words, and the orchestra. The answers are at the bottom of the page. Use them for a family quiz night, a car ride, a classroom warm-up, or a party.

How to play

• Two teams. Take turns. A right answer scores one point.
• Quick fire. One person answers as many as they can in two minutes.
• By age. The first three questions in each round are the easiest. Children under seven can stop there.
• Pass it on. If one team misses, the other team may try for a bonus point.

Round 1: instruments

1. Which family of instruments does the violin belong to?
2. How many strings does a violin have?
3. Which family do drums belong to?
4. How many keys does a full-size piano have?
5. Which brass instrument has a slide?
6. Which is the largest string instrument that is played with a bow?
7. Which woodwind instrument plays the highest notes?
8. Which instrument plays the note that the whole orchestra tunes to?
9. Which instrument has 47 strings and seven pedals?
10. Which is the lowest brass instrument?

Round 2: composers

11. Who wrote the “Ode to Joy”?
12. Who wrote The Nutcracker?
13. Who wrote The Four Seasons?
14. How old was Mozart when he wrote his first pieces?
15. Which composer kept writing music after he lost his hearing?
16. Who wrote more than 100 symphonies?
17. In which country was Johann Sebastian Bach born?
18. Who wrote the music for the Star Wars films?
19. Who wrote The Carnival of the Animals?
20. Which Polish composer wrote almost all his music for the piano?

Round 3: famous pieces

21. In Peter and the Wolf, which instrument plays the bird?
22. In which ballet does the Sugar Plum Fairy dance?
23. In The Carnival of the Animals, which animal does the double bass play?
24. In Peter and the Wolf, which instruments play the wolf?
25. Which symphony by Beethoven starts with four famous notes: short, short, short, long?
26. In which piece does a young helper put a spell on a broom?
27. Which piece by Grieg has trolls chasing a young man through a mountain hall?
28. Which set of pieces by Holst is named for the planets?
29. In The Carnival of the Animals, which instrument plays the swan?
30. Which overture by Rossini ends with a famous gallop?

Round 4: music words

31. What does forte mean?
32. What does piano mean when it is written in music?
33. How many lines does a music staff have?
34. What does allegro mean?
35. What does crescendo mean?
36. How many beats does a whole note last?
37. Which sign makes a note a half step higher?
38. What do we call the speed of a piece of music?
39. What do we call a piece for a solo instrument with an orchestra?
40. What do we call the separate parts of a symphony?

Round 5: the orchestra and beyond

41. Who stands at the front and leads an orchestra?
42. What does a conductor hold in the right hand?
43. How many families of instruments are in an orchestra?
44. What is the leader of the first violins called?
45. What do we call a play in which the words are sung?
46. What do we call a show that tells a story through dance?
47. What is the highest kind of singing voice?
48. What is the lowest kind of singing voice?
49. What do we call a group of four players: two violins, a viola, and a cello?
50. What do we call the music written for a film?

Answers

Round 1

1. The string family
2. Four
3. The percussion family
4. 88
5. The trombone
6. The double bass
7. The piccolo
8. The oboe
9. The harp
10. The tuba

Round 2

11. Ludwig van Beethoven
12. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
13. Antonio Vivaldi
14. Five
15. Ludwig van Beethoven. Bedřich Smetana is right too.
16. Joseph Haydn
17. Germany
18. John Williams
19. Camille Saint-Saëns
20. Frédéric Chopin

Round 3

21. The flute
22. The Nutcracker
23. The elephant
24. French horns
25. Symphony No. 5
26. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, by Paul Dukas
27. “In the Hall of the Mountain King”
28. The Planets
29. The cello
30. The William Tell Overture

Round 4

31. Loud
32. Soft
33. Five
34. Fast
35. Getting louder
36. Four
37. A sharp
38. Tempo
39. A concerto
40. Movements

Round 5

41. The conductor
42. A baton
43. Four: strings, woodwinds, brass, and percussion
44. The concertmaster. In Britain, the name is “leader.”
45. An opera
46. A ballet
47. Soprano
48. Bass
49. A string quartet
50. A film score, or a soundtrack

Make your own questions

Ask each child to write three questions for the next round. Writing a good question takes as much knowledge as answering one. These pages are full of facts to draw on:

• Beethoven facts for kids
• Mozart facts for kids
• Musical instruments from A to Z
• The loudest, biggest, highest, and lowest instruments in the orchestra

Print and play

Test yourself on screen with the composer quiz. Print the composer cards for more questions.

For more ideas, see music activities for kids.