50 free Handel's Messiah trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Handel's Messiah is the most performed choral work in the English-speaking world, and almost everything people think they know about it is worth checking. This quiz covers the real story: the wealthy, argumentative librettist who stitched the text together from the King James Bible and the Prayer Book psalter, the 24 days in the late summer of 1741 in which Handel wrote the music, the letters SDG at the end of the manuscript, the Dublin charity premiere at which ladies were asked to leave their hoops at home, the cool London reception, the Foundling Hospital performances, and the story of King George II standing for the Hallelujah chorus that nobody can actually prove. It also covers the music itself: the three parts and what each is about, the Pifa and the French-overture Sinfony, why the trumpets are held back, which key the work aspires to, the Italian love duets Handel recycled into famous choruses, and the two centuries of ever-larger performances, from Mozart's reorchestration to the 2,000-voice Crystal Palace festivals, before scholars brought the work back to Handel's own scale. Easy questions ask when it premiered and what a Hallelujah is for; hard ones get into Corelli fugues, Gaetano Guadagni and Watkins Shaw. It suits choir members, music students, church musicians and anyone who sings along every December. Every answer has been checked against the Wikipedia articles on Messiah, its parts, Handel and Charles Jennens, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which year did Handel compose Messiah?
1741
He wrote it in about three and a half weeks that summer; 1685 is his birth year and 1759 the year he died.
Q 02On what date was Messiah first performed?
13 April 1742
The premiere was in Dublin; the London premiere followed a year later at Covent Garden, to a much cooler reception.
Q 03Who compiled the libretto of Messiah from the King James Bible and the Coverdale Psalter?
Charles Jennens
A wealthy landowner and devout Anglican, Jennens had earlier supplied the text for Saul.
Q 04Handel became a naturalised subject of which country in 1727?
Britain
He had lived in London since 1712; Messiah was his sixth work in the English oratorio genre he took up in the 1730s.
Q 05The Hebrew word 'Messiah' means what?
The Anointed One
In New Testament Greek the equivalent is 'Christ', the title given to Jesus of Nazareth.
Q 06Handel was born in 1685 in which German town?
Halle
He settled in London in 1712 and became a naturalised British subject in 1727.
Q 07Which unusual honour had Handel received in London by 1741, most unusual for a living person?
A statue in Vauxhall Gardens
He also held a court pension from George II and the office of Composer of Musick for the Chapel Royal.
Q 08Which 1728 hit by John Gay and Pepusch mocked Handel's Italian stage works and signalled London's changing taste?
The Beggar's Opera
It heralded a spate of English-language ballad operas and pushed Handel towards oratorio.
Q 09What was Handel's first English oratorio, written around 1718 and revived in London in 1732?
Esther
Its success at the King's Theatre led to Deborah and Athalia; Oxford undergraduates reportedly sold furniture to afford tickets in 1733.
Q 10What was Handel's last Italian opera, performed three times in early 1741 before he abandoned the genre?
Deidamia
Rinaldo had been the opera with which he introduced Italian opera to London 30 years earlier, in 1711.
Q 11How many days did Handel take to compose the music of Messiah?
24
He began on 22 August 1741 and finished on 14 September, then started his next oratorio, Samson, within a week.
Q 12What did Handel write at the end of his manuscript of Messiah?
SDG — Soli Deo Gloria
The letters mean 'To God alone the glory' and helped feed the legend that he wrote it in a fever of divine inspiration.
Q 13How did the librettist regard the speed with which Handel composed Messiah?
As careless negligence
Relations remained strained: Jennens urged improvements and Handel stubbornly refused.
Q 21The opening Sinfony of Messiah is written in what style?
A French overture
It is in E minor for strings alone, and the librettist thought it contained passages 'far unworthy of Handel'.
Q 22Which key, associated with light and glory, does Anthony Hicks say Messiah 'aspires towards'?
D major
It is the key of the trumpet movements and of the triumphant ending.
Q 23Besides "Glory to God", the Hallelujah and the finale, which Messiah movement uses trumpets?
The trumpet shall sound
Percy Young argues that this rarity is exactly what makes the brass entries so thrilling.
Q 14Which institution holds Handel's autograph manuscript of Messiah?
The British Library
Its 259 pages show blots and scratchings-out, but remarkably few errors for a document of that length.
Q 15For which instruments, besides strings and continuo, is Handel's original Messiah scored?
Two trumpets, timpani and two oboes
Later arrangers, from Mozart onwards, added flutes, clarinets, horns and trombones.
Q 16The choruses "For unto us a child is born" and "All we like sheep" were adapted from what?
One of Handel's Italian love duets
Nò, di voi non vo' fidarmi had been written only weeks earlier, in July 1741; recycling was standard practice for Handel.
Q 17How many parts is Messiah divided into?
Three
Their structure approximates Handel's three-act operas, with Jennens subdividing each part into 'scenes'.
Q 18Which is the only 'scene' in Messiah taken from the Gospels?
The annunciation to the shepherds
Part I otherwise consists of Old Testament prophecies, mostly from Isaiah, in words from Luke's gospel for the shepherds.
Q 19Part II of Messiah concentrates on which subject and ends with which chorus?
The Passion of Jesus, ending with Hallelujah
Part III then covers Paul's teaching on the resurrection of the dead and Christ's glorification in heaven.
Q 20What is the pastoral instrumental interlude at the mid-point of Part I called?
The Pifa
It takes its name from the pifferari, shepherd-bagpipers who played in the streets of Rome at Christmas.
Q 24The Hallelujah chorus passage 'For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth' borrows from a fugue by whom?
Corelli
The third subject is based on the Lutheran chorale 'Wachet auf' by Philipp Nicolai.
Q 25What is the oratorio's longest single item, an alto aria partly sung unaccompanied?
He was despised
At the Dublin premiere a clergyman reportedly leapt up after Susannah Cibber sang it and cried, 'Woman, for this be all thy sins forgiven thee!'
Q 26Which soprano solo opens Part III and is one of the few numbers Handel never revised?
I know that my Redeemer liveth
It is in E major and its first two notes form the 'ascending fourth' some scholars hear throughout the work.
Q 27Which chorus actually closes Messiah?
Worthy is the Lamb / Amen
Percy Young points out that Hallelujah, for all its 'contagious enthusiasm', is not the climax of the work.
Q 28At which Dublin venue was Messiah first performed?
The Great Music Hall, Fishamble Street
The hall had been built in 1741 for a charity that released imprisoned debtors.
Q 29Whose invitation brought Handel to Dublin for the 1741–42 season?
The Duke of Devonshire
The duke was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; Handel's violinist friend Matthew Dubourg, his bandmaster, looked after the orchestra.
Q 30Where did the choir for the Dublin premiere come from?
St Patrick's and Christ Church cathedrals
The forces were sixteen men and sixteen boys, several of the men taking solo parts.