[music]

Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. As I said before the news, as we've been doing every day during the membership drive, we have a 10-question quiz to break things up and have a little fun in the middle of the show. Get two in a row right and win a Brian Lehrer Show baseball cap or Brian Lehrer Show pro-democracy tote, your choice. Today's 10-question quiz is a music history quiz. We'll get into a few different genres. Who wants to play? 212-433-WNYC. Our lines have filled up. As people finish up, you can get in at 212-433-9692. Let's start with Ellen in Montclair. Hi, Ellen. You're on WNYC. Ready to play?

Ellen: Yes. Hi, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Question number one, the staff notation system, that's how we write sheet music, was created around 1000 A.D. The staff is a set of those five horizontal lines that indicate the pitch of musical notes. What genre of music was it originally created for? The beginning of symphonic music, choral music so many singers at once could follow along, or Gregorian chant?

Ellen: Gregorian chant.

Brian Lehrer: Gregorian chant is right. Guido d'Arezzo, an Italian monk, is credited with inventing the staff notation system around 1000 A.D. Let's see. Question number two. True or false? Jazz legend Duke Ellington was a jazz ambassador for the State Department, making trips overseas representing the US Government. True or false?

Ellen: True.

Brian Lehrer: True is right. So the genre of music known as the fanfare played. Yes. Starting in 1956, President Eisenhower's State Department enlisted jazz musicians to promote "American values" abroad in opposition to racially charged Soviet propaganda, according to PBS. Do you want the Brian Lehrer Show baseball cap or pro-democracy tote?

Ellen: This is a really tough choice, but I will take the tote.

Brian Lehrer: Ellen, hang on. We will take your address off the air. David in Huntington, ready to play?

David: Yes, I am. Good morning.

Brian Lehrer: Good morning. Question number three. Who is the first rapper to win a Pulitzer Prize for music? Jay Z, Kendrick Lamar, Eminem, or Tupac?

David: Ooh, tough. I'm going to go with Jay Z.

Brian Lehrer: Sorry, it was Kendrick Lamar. Jay Z was, of course, a good guess for all that he's done. Kendrick Lamar made history back in 2018 when he became the first non-classical or jazz artist to win the Pulitzer Prize for music. Tom at the Jersey Shore, ready to play? Hi, Tom.

Tom: Yes, Brian. How are you today?

Brian Lehrer: Doing all right. Question number 4 in this 10-question music history quiz. Who is the most awarded artist in all of Grammy history? Quincy Jones, Beyonce, George Solti, or Chick Corea?

Tom: I have to go with Beyonce.

Brian Lehrer: Is right, with 35 Grammys. Though all four artists, however, are in the top four of most-awarded Grammys of all time. We mentioned all four of those, but yes, she's number one. Question number five, for the cap or the pro-democracy tote. In 1991, Kurt Cobain wrote the grunge hit Smells Like Teen Spirit. What does Teen Spirit actually refer to? I'll give you a hint. It's a brand of something. Smells Like Teen Spirit. Teen Spirit is a brand of something. Of what?

Tom: I didn't follow Nirvana closely enough. Smells like something. Is that the last hint?

Brian Lehrer: That's the last hint. Yes, but I mean smells like something. There aren't that many things in the world that are manufactured to have smells. That's my last hint.

Tom: Manufacture. Smells like-- knowing the band, I was leaning towards drugs. I want to say marijuana.

Brian Lehrer: No, the answer is deodorant. Sorry, Tom, but thanks for giving it a try. Yep, from the Guardian, the phrase "Smells Like Teen Spirit" had been scrawled on the wall of Cobain's apartment by Kathleen Hanna, the lead singer of the band Bikini Kill. Hanna wrote this as a joke because her bandmate Toby Vale, who happened to be Cobain's girlfriend at the time, was a fan of the Teen Spirit deodorant. Teen Spirit was manufactured by the Menon Corporation, which had developed a line of very popular, somewhat alternative deodorants for men. There you go. Smells Like Teen Spirit. Now you know. How about Pete in Cranford? Hi Pete, ready to play?

Pete: Hi, Brian. A big fan, and I am ready, thanks.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you for that. Question number six. Of the following well-known classical composers, who was the most prolific in composing symphonic music and writing symphonies? Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn or Schubert? The most prolific, wrote the most of them, or total output? Total number of compositions, I guess, really. Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn, or Schubert?

Pete: I'm going to go out on a limb and go with Haydn.

Brian Lehrer: Haydn happens to be right from Britannica. Haydn was an extremely prolific composer. His total output includes 108 symphonies, one of which number 106 is lost and one of which number 105 is actually a symphony concertante. We won't go into the difference. Beethoven, for all he's renowned for, his symphonies composed only nine. Of course, they were amazing. Mozart composed 41, Schubert completed 7. Haydn-- Did you have a sense of that or did you just eeny, meeny, miny, moe?

Pete: I just knew Beethoven. I had no clue. I just took a wild guess. I know Beethoven died at a relatively young age, and I'm like, "You know what? Let me just-- what do I know?" I'm not a classical music historian, but there you go.

Brian Lehrer: You got that one right. Switching genres. For the cap or the pro-democracy tote. Whitney Houston's 1992 hit I Will Always Love You holds a Guinness World record for being the longest-running number-one single by a female artist in the United States, but it wasn't written by her. It was written by somebody else really, really famous. Now, the woman who wrote it.

Pete: What song again? Wasn't it the Dolly Parton song? What was the song?

Brian Lehrer: You gave us the right answer, so cue the fanfare. The question was, Whitney Houston's 1992 hit I Will Always Love You was written by who? Yes, the answer happens to be Dolly Parton who wrote it about 20 years earlier.

Pete: You took me back to my college days. I think I lost a bet. I said that Whitney Houston wrote this. No, no, it was a remake. I lost [crosstalk]--

Brian Lehrer: Very good. Lost the bet, but consider that loss in investment in getting either a Brian Lehrer Show baseball cap or a Brian Lehrer Show pro-democracy tote. Which one do you want?

Tom: I'm going to go with the hat. I'm very appreciative. Thank you so much, Brian. You guys, you do a great service for us listeners.

Brian Lehrer: You're very kind, Pete. Hang on. We're going to take your address off the air. Aja in Bergen County. You're ready to play?

Aja: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Question number eight. Of the following musicians, who is considered the father of country music, as we switch genres again? Gene Autry, Jimmie Rodgers, Johnny Cash, or Willie Nelson, the father of country music.

Aja: Willie Nelson?

Brian Lehrer: Not Willie Nelson. Sorry, Aja, thanks for giving it a try. By the way, are you named after the Steely Dan album?

Aja: I am, yes. Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, my goodness. Wow. Spelt the same way, right, A-J-A?

Aja: Yep. My parents were big fans. Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you for your call. Sorry, you couldn't win the music contest. How about that? Somebody named after a Steely Dan album. The answer was Jimmy Rodgers. From the Country Music Hall of Fame website, Jimmie Rodgers, known professionally as the "The Singing Brakeman" and "America's Blue Yodeler", was in the first class of inductees honored by the Country Music Hall of Fame and is widely known as the father of country music. Let's go to Tom in Nyack. Hi, Tom. Ready to play?

Tom: I guess so.

Brian Lehrer: Back in 1967, question nine, the pop rock band the Monkees played Forest Hill Stadium in Queens during their first-ever US Tour. Who was their opening act? Hint. Unless you know this one, this is-- Coming from Queens, I know that this is a legendary Queen's thing that makes people laugh. Opening for the Monkees is an unusual opening act for the group. The artist actually flipped off the crowd before walking off stage. Think like iconic, like much bigger and more serious than the Monkees. There's your hint. 1967.

Tom: I feel like I should know this. [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: Maybe he wasn't quite well-known enough yet to be a headliner over them at that time. You want to take a guess?

Tom: '67. Billy Joel.

Brian Lehrer: Sorry. The answer, believe it or not, was Jimi Hendrix. Jimi Hendrix. How's that for a weird show? Jimi Hendrix opening for the Monkees. Sorry, Tom. Yes. According to Mental Floss, that website, Hendrix played just 8 of the 29 scheduled tour dates in that opening for the Monkees Tour. Then on July 16, '67, he flipped the Forest Hills audience off, threw down his guitar, and walked away from Monkeemania. Very different crowd. All right, last one. We'll go up to New Paltz and give Max a shot. Max, because we're at question 10, you only have to get one right and you'll win one of those prizes.

Max: All right.

Brian Lehrer: Here we go. This year, Bob Dylan's biopic A Complete Unknown became a huge box office hit. What was Dylan's name before he moved to New York City and changed it to Dylan?

Max: Oh, my gosh, I have absolutely no idea.

Brian Lehrer: Sorry about that. Sorry, we had to end on a loss. Robert Zimmerman. Dylan changed his name back in 1961 for professional purposes. Thanks to all of you. I'm glad we got to give away a few Brian Lehrer Show baseball hats and Brian Lehrer Show pro-democracy totes. That's our 10-question quiz for today. Hope you had fun.

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