TriviaPark.com has just released a brand-new quiz on the redoubtable Elon Musk, whose numerous enterprises mix high technology with a clear view of the long term consequences of technological trends, positive and otherwise. In ten questions our new quiz covers some of the best-known aspects of Musk’s life and work — the electric cars, the rockets, and a lot more. We hope you’ll give the Elon Musk quiz a try and let us know what you think!
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December 10, 2017
The Elon Musk Trivia Quiz
November 16, 2011
The Neapolitan
All good things must come to an end. So must all long and arduous ordeals, and it’s a good thing. Today’s question is the one that completes our new music theory quiz for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com, and frankly it’s kind of a tough one. But if you don’t know the answer, what better way to hone your intuition than by forging blindly into:
Ice-cream is not the answer
To a classical musician, who or what is ‘The Neapolitan’?
- A celebrated composer, Domenico Scarlatti, born in Naples
- A concert hall in Vienna where Mozart’s greatest works were introduced
- A distinctive-sounding chord, the ‘Neapolitan sixth’
- An opera of Gioachino Rossini, his last, tragically incomplete
Answer
November 14, 2011
Broken Globe
There’s already a Shakespeare quiz at TriviaPark.com, so today’s question may have to fit in somewhere else. It concerns an event that to Will Shakespeare would have been both a drama and a tragedy. Find out more, as we play…
Guess the catastrophe
William Shakespeare’s professional home for most of his career was The Globe, a celebrated London theater that unfortunately did not outlast even him. It met its demise in 1613, three years before Shakespeare’s own death. How was The Globe destroyed?
- Collapsed: the upper stands gave way when a record crowd rioted during a dull show
- Demolished: to build a luxury villa, Rochester Hall, on the same site
- Incinerated: when cannon-fire used in Shakespeare’s Henry VIII ignited the straw roof
- Torn apart: by a Protestant mob outraged by supposed ‘code-words’ in certain plays
Answer
November 13, 2011
Rhythm fascination
Today we come to the second-last question in the music theory quiz we’re putting together for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. Looking at the meter — the rhythmic pulse — of some common musical forms, we ask:
Who’s got the time?
Which of the following musical forms typically uses six-eight rhythm?
- A Baroque minuet
- A Celtic jig
- A Scott Joplin piano rag
- A Sousa march
Answer
November 9, 2011
Guido
Today’s question is the eighth of the 10-question music theory quiz that’s currently under construction for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. We cast our minds back to the Italian city-state of Arezzo just about a millennium ago, and ask:
What did Guido do?
Guido d’Arezzo was an 11th-century Benedictine monk who is celebrated for an important contribution to the history of music. What did he do?
- Invented the clarinet
- Revolutionized musical notation
- Was the first to combine voice and instruments in the same work
- Wrote the melody that became the song Greensleeves
Answer
The microtone
Today’s question is the seventh in a 10-question music theory quiz for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. If you have a taste for slightly out-of-the-way musical jargon, you may already know the answer to:
What is a microtone?
Which of the following definitions most accurately captures the meaning of the word ‘microtone’?
- A separation of pitch smaller than a semitone
- A short musical work stating a single melodic idea
- A sound too brief or too quiet to register fully with an audience
- A special microphone for recording tones
Answer
November 7, 2011
To the Manor appointed
Whether England still swings like a pendulum do, as Roger Miller sang in the sixties, we don’t know, but it definitely marches to a different drummer. And that leads us to today’s new question for TriviaPark.com, which concerns a high-falutin’ and quintessentially English…
Job search
Every now and then someone applies for the post of ‘steward and bailiff of the Manor of Northstead’ in Yorkshire, England. Why would they do so?
- In order to get out of doing something else
- In order to join Mind Your Manors, a British reality TV show
- In order to qualify for membership in the House of Lords
- In order to set the decrepit Manor to rights at last
Answer
November 6, 2011
An instrument for Erik
Carrying on today with question 6 of what will ultimately be a 10-question music theory quiz for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com, we look at a delightful and enigmatic French composer, and ask:
What do you play Satie on?
The French composer Erik Satie (1866-1925) is well-known for the humorous and eccentric style of many of his compositions, which are chiefly for which instrument?
- Glockenspiel
- Piano
- Violin
- Voice
Answer
November 4, 2011
The concertmaster
We finish the week half-way through our 10-question music theory quiz, now in preparation for TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com. Unlike some of the more technical questions in this quiz, today’s should fall within the general knowledge of many non-musicians, as we enquire about:
The concertmaster’s instrument
In every symphony orchestra there is one musician, second in rank only to the conductor, known as the concertmaster (or, in England, the leader). The concertmaster rank always belongs to the orchestra’s principal player of a particular instrument. Which one?
- Clarinet
- Oboe
- Piano
- Violin
Answer
November 2, 2011
The beautiful tongue
Question 4 in our developing TriviaPark.com and AheadWithMusic.com music theory quiz concerns the use of the Italian language for expression markings and other musical terms. Fats Waller’s arrangement of the jazz standard Stardust is said to feature the tongue-in-cheek instruction tempo di sturb de neighbors, but our tone is a little more serious as we discuss:
Dying away
The Italian language has given us a widely-used lexicon for indicating expression in music. For example, the usual terms for ‘soft’ and ‘loud’ are the Italian words piano and forte. Sometimes Italian offers almost too much choice. The directions espirando, morendo and perdendosi all roughly mean ‘dying away’ — slowing down and fading out. Three of the words below also mean ‘dying away’. Which one is the exception?
- Calando
- Incalzando
- Mancando
- Smorzando