60 free Frédéric Chopin trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Frédéric Chopin trivia quiz covers the composer who wrote almost nothing without a piano in it and almost never played in public. The easy questions cover the nationality, the instrument, the famous lover, the city he lived in for eighteen years and the age at which he died. From there it moves through the life: the French father who insisted on Polish at home, the polonaise written at seven, the diamond ring from a Tsar, the passport that read 'in transit to London via Paris', Schumann's 'Hats off, gentlemen!', the friendship and rivalry with Liszt, and the winter in a Valldemossa monastery where the Preludes were finished. The harder end covers the failed engagement to Maria Wodzińska and the envelope marked 'My sorrow', the three Mallorca doctors, the guinea-an-hour London lessons, Queen Victoria at Stafford House, the last concert at the Guildhall, Mozart's Requiem at the Madeleine, the heart preserved in alcohol, the 2017 study of the jar, and the pianist who invented the nocturne before him. Every answer was checked against Chopin's encyclopaedia entry before publishing and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Our classical music and famous composers quizzes are the natural next stop.
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Q 01In which village, 46 kilometres west of Warsaw, was Chopin born in 1810?
Żelazowa Wola
The parish record says 22 February, but the family used 1 March, now generally accepted.
Q 02From which region of France had Chopin's father Nicolas emigrated to Poland in 1787?
Lorraine
He was sixteen at the time and became so devoted to Poland that he insisted on Polish being spoken at home.
Q 03How many public performances did Chopin give after settling in Paris?
About 30
He preferred salons and his own apartment, and supported himself by teaching and selling compositions.
Q 04Who was Chopin's first professional music tutor, from 1816 to 1821?
Wojciech Żywny
The Czech-born pianist received the dedication of Chopin's earliest surviving manuscript, a polonaise of 1821.
Q 05By what age had Chopin begun giving public concerts?
Seven
He composed two polonaises the same year, 1817.
Q 06What did Tsar Alexander I give the teenage Chopin after a recital on the 'aeolopantaleon' in 1825?
A diamond ring
Weeks later he played his Rondo Op. 1, his first commercially published work, on the same hybrid instrument.
Q 07Under which Silesian composer did Chopin study composition at the Warsaw Conservatory from 1826?
Józef Elsner
His final report in 1829 read: 'exceptional talent, musical genius'.
Q 08Which singer was the 'ideal' who inspired the Adagio of Chopin's concerto?
Konstancja Gładkowska
They exchanged rings after his farewell Warsaw concert in October 1830 and apparently never corresponded again.
Q 09Which violinist's Warsaw visit in 1829 prompted a set of Chopin variations and possibly his first Études?
Niccolò Paganini
The Op. 10 Études were written between 1829 and 1832 and dedicated to Liszt.
Q 10Chopin's Op. 2 Variations, praised by Schumann, are on a duet from which Mozart opera?
Don Giovanni
'Là ci darem la mano'; he premiered it at his Vienna debut.
Q 11How did Robert Schumann conclude his 1831 review of Chopin's Op. 2, his first published article?
'Hats off, gentlemen! A genius.'
It was the first major endorsement Chopin received from an outstanding contemporary.
Q 12What broke out in Warsaw less than a month after Chopin left Poland in late 1830?
The November Uprising
His friend Woyciechowski went home to enlist; Chopin wrote 'I curse the moment of my departure'.
Q 13What did Chopin's passport endorsement say when he arrived in the French capital in 1831?
'In transit to London via Paris'
Q 21What was George Sand's real name?
Aurore Dupin
Short, dark and a cigar smoker, she initially repelled Chopin: 'Is she really a woman?'
Q 22What was Chopin's first reaction on meeting the novelist who would become his lover, in 1836?
'Is she really a woman?'
By July 1838 they were lovers; she was six years older.
Q 23On which island did Chopin and Sand spend the miserable winter of 1838-39?
Mallorca
The Catholic islanders shunned the unmarried couple, forcing them into a cold former monastery at Valldemossa.
He never did return to Poland, becoming one of the Great Emigration.
Q 14In which year did Chopin receive French citizenship?
1835
He travelled on a French passport thereafter but, per Zamoyski, always saw himself as a Pole.
Q 15Which piano maker's instruments did Chopin favour for life after Kalkbrenner introduced him?
Pleyel
His Paris debut in February 1832 was in the 'salons de MM Pleyel'.
Q 16Which wealthy banking family's patronage opened Paris salons to Chopin from 1832?
The Rothschilds
By the end of the year he was earning a handsome income from publishing and teaching.
Q 17To whom did Chopin dedicate his Op. 10 Études?
Franz Liszt
Hearing Liszt play them, he wrote 'I should like to rob him of the way he plays my studies'.
Q 18How many times did Chopin and Liszt perform together in public between 1833 and 1841?
Seven
The first was a benefit organised by Berlioz for his bankrupt actress wife; the last raised money for the Beethoven Monument in Bonn.
Q 19What did Chopin tell Liszt in 1843 after Liszt played one of his nocturnes with embellishments?
Play it as written or not at all
Liszt apologised; Chopin still called him 'my friend Liszt' in letters as late as 1848.
Q 20To whom was Chopin engaged from 1836 to 1837, until her mother cooled on the match?
Maria Wodzińska
He kept her letters in an envelope marked 'Moja bieda', 'My sorrow', in his desk to the end of his life.
Q 24How did Chopin sum up the three doctors who examined him on the island in December 1838?
One said I was dead, one dying, one going to die
He also had to wait weeks for his Pleyel piano to clear Palma customs.
Q 25Which set of pieces did Chopin finish on his 'little piano' during that winter abroad?
The 24 Preludes, Op. 28
Inspired by Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, they move round the circle of fifths through every key.
Q 26What was the name of George Sand's country estate, where Chopin spent most summers from 1839 to 1846?
Nohant
Delacroix described music wafting up from Chopin's room while nightingales sang in the garden.
Q 27How did George Sand refer to the ailing Chopin in letters to others?
Her 'beloved little corpse'
Her 1847 novel Lucrezia Floriani was widely read as a portrait of their relationship.
Q 28Which Sand family quarrel soured Chopin's relations with George Sand in 1846?
One over her daughter Solange and a sculptor
Chopin sided with Solange; the relationship ended in 1847 after nine years.
Q 29Which Scottish pupil suggested, organised and largely funded Chopin's 1848 tour of Britain?
Jane Stirling
She hoped for more than friendship; he told a friend he was 'closer to the grave than the nuptial bed'.
Q 30Which royal couple attended Chopin's first London engagement at Stafford House in May 1848?
Queen Victoria and Prince Albert
Albert, a talented musician, moved close to the keyboard to watch his technique.