50 free Vivaldi's Four Seasons trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Vivaldi's Four Seasons trivia quiz covers the most famous set of violin concertos ever written and the Venetian priest who composed them. The easy questions ask how many concertos there are, which instrument takes the solo, why Vivaldi was called the Red Priest, where he was born and what the goatherd's dog is doing in the slow movement of Spring. Then it moves into the details of the score: the sonnets printed alongside the music, the three-movement plan, the keys, the larger Opus 8 collection they belong to, and the Amsterdam publisher who issued them in 1725. The hard end is for people who own more than one recording: the count the set was dedicated to, the opera Spring borrows from, Bach's cantata quotation, Rousseau's flute arrangement, the first electrical recording of 1942, Louis Kaufman's Carnegie Hall session, I Musici, Neville Marriner's gold record, Nigel Kennedy's pop-marketed blockbuster, Max Richter's 75-per-cent recomposition, Piazzolla's Buenos Aires answer, and the movements that turned up in Windows 3.0, on The Weather Channel and in Frozen mash-ups. Every answer was checked against the encyclopaedia entries on The Four Seasons, Antonio Vivaldi, Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione and the recordings named before publishing, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Our classical music, Baroque composers and Venice quizzes are natural next stops.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01How many concertos make up Vivaldi's The Four Seasons?
4
Each gives musical expression to one season, and each is in three movements, fast–slow–fast.
Q 02Which instrument takes the solo part in The Four Seasons?
Violin
All twelve concertos of the Opus 8 set are for solo violin, strings and basso continuo.
Q 03In which city were The Four Seasons first published, in 1725?
Amsterdam
They appeared with eight other concertos in what was then the Dutch Republic.
Q 04The Four Seasons form the first four concertos of a set of twelve whose title translates as what?
The Contest Between Harmony and Invention
Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione may really mean 'the quality test' of both harmony and invention — an advert for Vivaldi's skill.
Q 05What opus number carries The Four Seasons?
Op. 8
Op. 3, L'estro armonico, had been his breakthrough; Op. 9, La cetra, was dedicated to Emperor Charles VI.
Q 06Unusually for the period, Vivaldi published each concerto alongside what?
A sonnet
Each poem splits into three sections matching the three movements, which is why many think Vivaldi wrote them himself.
Q 07How many movements does each of the four concertos have?
3
The pattern is fast–slow–fast, and each linked sonnet is likewise divided into three sections.
Q 08In the slow movement of Spring, while the goatherd sleeps, which instruments imitate his barking dog?
The violas
Vivaldi wrote 'The barking dog' straight into the score, one of several such instructions.
Q 09Because they depict creeks, birds, storms and drunken dancers, The Four Seasons are an early example of what genre?
Program music
Vivaldi was determined to prove that music with a narrative could be taken seriously.
Q 10The Four Seasons were composed around 1718–1723 while Vivaldi was court chapel master in which city?
Mantua
He served Prince Philip of Hesse-Darmstadt there for three years, though the concertos may date from as early as 1716.
Q 11In which key is the Spring concerto, RV 269?
E major
The other three are G minor, F major and F minor respectively.
Q 12In which key is the Winter concerto, RV 297?
F minor
Its opening Allegro non molto has been covered by everyone from Trans-Siberian Orchestra to a Finnish rhythm game.
Q 13To whom was the Opus 8 set dedicated?
Wenceslas, Count of Morzin
He was an adviser to the emperor and should not be confused with the later Count Morzin who employed Haydn.
Which publisher's workshop issued The Four Seasons in 1725?
Q 21In which city did Vivaldi die, impoverished, in 1741?
Vienna
His patron Charles VI died soon after Vivaldi arrived, and he expired in a house owned by a saddlemaker's widow.
Q 22At what age was Vivaldi ordained a priest?
25
He had begun studying for the priesthood at fifteen.
Q 23The Spring concerto borrows motifs from a sinfonia in which contemporaneous Vivaldi opera?
Il Giustino
The other three concertos are wholly original.
Q 24Which German composer used the opening motif of the Spring concerto in an aria of his cantata BWV 27?
Michel-Charles Le Cène
Roger had published Vivaldi's Opus 3 in Amsterdam in 1711; Sala printed his Opus 1 in Venice.
Q 15Roughly how long does a performance of all four concertos take?
About 40 minutes
Summer and Autumn run about 11 minutes each, Spring 10 and Winter 9.
Q 16By what nickname was Vivaldi known?
Il Prete Rosso (The Red Priest)
Il Prete Rosso — he was ordained in 1703 at 25 and had the family's red hair.
Q 17The 'red' in Vivaldi's nickname referred to what?
His hair
It was a family trait; his father Giovanni Battista was a barber turned professional violinist.
Q 18In which city was Antonio Vivaldi born in 1678?
Venice
He was baptised at home immediately by the midwife, probably because of poor health, though legend blames an earthquake.
Q 19What kind of institution was the Ospedale della Pietà, whose all-female ensemble Vivaldi wrote for?
A home for abandoned children
The girls got a musical education and the best stayed on as performers and teachers; boys had to leave at fifteen.
Q 20Vivaldi's lifelong 'tightness of the chest' is now usually interpreted as which condition?
Asthma
It stopped him playing wind instruments but not the violin.
Johann Sebastian Bach
The cantata is Wer weiß, wie nahe mir mein Ende?
Q 25Vivaldi himself re-scored the Spring Allegro as an opening sinfonia and chorus for which of his operas?
Dorilla in Tempe
He also based the aria 'Gelido in ogni vena' on the first movement of Winter.
Q 26Which Enlightenment philosopher published a flute version of the Spring concerto in 1775?
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Nicolas Chédeville had already arranged the set for hurdy-gurdy in 1739.
Q 27Nigel Kennedy's blockbuster 1989 recording of The Four Seasons was made with which ensemble?
English Chamber Orchestra
It was marketed like a pop album, with a promotional single and billboard, TV and radio ads.
Q 28Roughly how many copies has Nigel Kennedy's 1989 Four Seasons sold worldwide?
Over 3 million
It topped the UK classical chart for more than a year.
Q 29Which violinist made the first American recording of The Four Seasons in the last week of 1947?
Louis Kaufman
He then tracked down the full Opus 8 and became the first to record all twelve concertos, in Zürich in 1950.
Q 30Where was the 1947 American recording made, rushed through before the 1 January 1948 recording ban?
Carnegie Hall
It won the Grand Prix du Disque in 1950 and later entered the Grammy Hall of Fame and the National Recording Registry.