Just to put closure on this string, the remaining questions are as follows:
Composers
1. Each of these two composers usually kept a gun handy and nearby. Who were they, and what was the reason in each case?
These questions on composers were of a trivia nature, and thus a bit obscure. the two composers in mind were 1) Puccini; who had a passion for duck hunting and kept a shotgun nearby. The other, Sibelius; had a passion of a somewhat different nature: Luftwaffe.
3. This composer/performer, in his younger days, performed several works which he claimed were newly discovered compositions of the masters of previous periods. It was later found that he was the actual composer. Who was he.
Answer, Fritz Kreisler, whose works have ever since performed by almost all solo violinists (including Heifetz).
4. These two countrymen each died as result of accidents; one on a bicycle and the other (indirectly) after the debilitating effects of an automobile accident. Who were they?
First, Ernest Chausson, who riding a big-wheel bike, ran into a wall, and the other, Maurice Ravel, who was badly injured in an auto accident. He lived several years after, but died as result of an operation intended to correct the problems of the accident.
Orchestral Works
7.The composer produced this symphony, as a student at age seventeen, which was then forgotten and unpublished for almost a century. Since then, however it has become a concert favorite,and was even used in a ballet. By the way, Mozart also produced a breakout symphony at age 17, though his was not as popular as the one of our subject composer. Who was our subject composer and what symphony was it?
Answer: Georges Bizet and the work was his Symphony (Number One) in C Major. If you are not familiar with this work, I'd recommend hearing it at least once. It shows us what a seventeen year-old can do. The only other work I can think of, of similar popularity is (part of) Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream.
Opera
11. Which Operatic overture, by what composer, caused quite a stir simply because it was started with a "drum roll"?
Answer: Overture to "La Gazza Ladra" (The Thieving Magpie), by Gioacchino Rossini.
13. A scene in what opera, by which composer, is described as taking place on a desolate plain outside New Orleans? (Huh! I didn't know there was a desolate plain anywhere near New Orleans?)
Only this one Operatic question was apparently obscure. Answer: "Manon Lescaut" (Act 4), by Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini.
15. A certain well-known Operatic singer, according to a protege and successor, was described as functionally, nearly blind, and to avoid embarrassing accidents during a performance, would pace off all distances on-stage before a performance. Who was this person?
This last question was another trivia type. According to Joan Sutherland, the person in question was Maria Callas.
KM
