Tango Trivia
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50 free Tango trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This tango trivia quiz covers the dance and the music from the port districts of Buenos Aires and Montevideo to milongas around the world. The easy questions ask which two countries share its birthplace, which squeezebox drives the sound, who its most famous singer was, which film had a blind Al Pacino gliding across a ballroom and which body added tango to its heritage list in 2009. Then it works through the history: the slave gatherings that gave it a name, the 1789 ban, the Paris craze of 1913, the Old Guard, the Golden Age orchestras and the Perón-era revival. The hard end is for people who know their ochos from their ganchos: the German dealer who named the bandoneon, the first copyrighted tango score, La cumparsita's Montevideo debut, Gardel's disputed birthplace and Medellín crash, Piazzolla's lessons with Nadia Boulanger, the head snaps that ballroom tango borrowed from pasodoble, the Seinäjoki festival, Adidas's World Cup ball and the electrotango of Gotan Project. Every answer was checked against the encyclopaedia entries on tango, tango music, Argentine tango, the bandoneon, Carlos Gardel, Astor Piazzolla and La cumparsita before publishing, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Our Argentina, ballroom dancing and Latin music quizzes are natural next stops.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Tango originated in the 1880s along which river, the natural border between Argentina and Uruguay?
Río de la Plata
It grew out of Argentine milonga, Spanish-Cuban habanera and Uruguayan candombe in the poor port districts.
Q 02In what kind of establishments was early tango most often danced?
Brothels and bars of the ports
Buenos Aires in 1914 had 100,000 more men than women, which is why men often practised the dance together.
Q 03In 2009 UNESCO added tango to which of its lists, on a joint proposal by Argentina and Uruguay?
Intangible Cultural Heritage
The approval came on 31 August 2009.
Q 04One theory derives 'tango' from shangó, god of thunder in which West African religion?
Yoruba
Rivals include Spanish tambor (drum), Portuguese tanger (to play) and the Kongo word ntangu (sun, hour).
Q 05In colonial Buenos Aires the words 'tango' and 'tambo' were used as synonyms for what?
Slave dance gatherings
A 1789 complaint by cabildo official Manuel Warnes urged authorities not to allow 'dances and gatherings as those of the tango'.
Q 06When tango spread abroad around 1900, in which city did the first European craze take hold?
Paris
By the end of 1913 the dance teachers who had introduced it were banished from the city for its 'sexual overtones'.
Q 07Under which Argentine leader's first government did tango become a matter of national pride in the late 1940s?
Juan Perón
Mariano Mores's Taquito Militar premiered during a Perón speech in 1952, sparking a row over 'cultured' versus 'popular' music.
Q 08Why did the military dictatorships' bans on public assembly in the late 1950s hurt the dance?
Men-only practice sessions counted as assemblies
Rock and roll, which needed no such gatherings, benefited indirectly.
Q 09Which tango style, born in crowded 1950s downtown clubs, uses close embrace, small steps and syncopated footwork?
Milonguero
The suburban family-club style, from Villa Urquiza and Devoto, favoured long elegant steps instead.
Q 10Which French-based group's 2001 album La Revancha del Tango helped launch electrotango?
Gotan Project
Bajofondo Tango Club followed in 2002 and Tanghetto's Emigrante earned a Latin Grammy nomination in 2004.
Q 11English ballroom tango was first codified in October 1922 to be danced at what tempo?
30 bars per minute
That is about 120 beats per minute in 4/4, and it was to be danced only to modern tunes.
Q 12Ballroom tango's head snaps, absent from Argentine tango, were introduced in 1934 under which dance's influence?
Pasodoble
They caught on in Germany and then England, delighting spectators but not competition judges.
Q 13Finnish tango is distinctive for being performed almost exclusively in what?
Minor keys
Its melancholy suits Finnish folk poetry, and it has no kicks or aerials at all.
Q 21Which instrument, a type of concertina, is the signature sound of tango ensembles?
Bandoneon
Unlike accordions it has no register switches, and its two hands have different timbres.
Q 22Which German instrument dealer gave his name to tango's signature squeezebox?
Heinrich Band
It was meant for church and popular music before emigrants and sailors carried it to Argentina around 1870.
Q 23How many of tango's signature squeezeboxes were shipped from Germany to Argentina in 1930 alone?
25,000
World War II wrecked German manufacturing and ended mass production for good.
Q 14Which Finnish town hosts Tangomarkkinat and calls itself the second city of tango?
Seinäjoki
Held since 1985, it draws over 100,000 fans a year, and the town has a Tango Museum.
Q 15Brazil's own tango tradition evolved into which dance, sometimes called 'Brazilian tango'?
Maxixe
Ernesto Nazareth and Chiquinha Gonzaga were its leading composers, and it fed into choro too.
Q 16Which Colombian city became a tango capital and was where Carlos Gardel died?
Medellín
Colombia also hosts the Colombia Tango Festival in Manizales.
Q 17For which tournament did Adidas introduce its ball named 'Tango', likely as a tribute to the hosts?
1978 FIFA World Cup
The design returned as Tango Málaga for Spain 1982 and at the 1984 and 1988 European Championships.
Q 18The first Queer Tango Festival, challenging the male-leader convention, was held in 2001 in which city?
Hamburg
In the early 1900s men often danced together anyway, because there were far more male dancers than female.
Q 19In tango from the River Plate, what is a gancho?
Hooking a leg round the partner's
The boleo, by contrast, lets momentum carry the leg into the air; both are foreign to ballroom tango.
Q 20What is the tango dancer's frame or hold called in Spanish?
Abrazo
It means 'embrace' and can range from chest-to-chest close to an open V.
Q 24A traditional tango ensemble is known as what?
Orquesta típica
It has at least two violins, flute, piano, double bass and at least two bandoneons.
Q 25The first generation of tango players in Buenos Aires is known by what name?
Guardia Vieja
The Old Guard's music was the favourite of the thugs and gangsters who frequented brothels.
Q 26The 1903 tango 'El Choclo' was first recorded by 1906 in which US city, since Argentina had no studios?
Philadelphia
Villoldo himself recorded it in Paris around 1908.
Q 27Which Afro-Argentine musician wrote the first copyrighted tango score, "El entrerriano" (1896)?
Rosendo Mendizabal
The first tango group, from the early 1870s, was the Afro-Argentine duo of Casimiro Alcorta and 'the mulatto' Sinforoso.
Q 28The Golden Age of tango is generally dated to which period?
About 1935 to 1952
It ran alongside the American big band era, with orquestas típicas of a dozen or more players.
Q 29Which bandleader was called 'Rey del compás', the King of the Beat, for his driving rhythm?
Juan d'Arienzo
'El flete' is the classic example; Troilo and di Sarli led the rival 'evolutionist' camp.
Q 30At which Montevideo café, later a Tango Museum, was 'La cumparsita' first performed?
Café La Giralda
It stood on the ground floor of the Palacio Salvo; the 1916 tune was written by Uruguayan Gerardo Matos Rodríguez.