Quiz on musical albums

On this day in 1877, Thomas Edison announced the invention of the phonograph, the first device to record and play sound. This week’s quiz is all about musical albums.

1 Which album by the rock group Police was heavily inspired by and named after Jung’s theory about “meaningful coincidences” of events that have no actual relationship?

2 In the history of Indian albums, the highest-selling titles of each decade were always from the world of Hindi music. Which 2010 album, which included six songs recorded by AR Rahman, recorded the highest sales of the last decade, and was the first non-Hindi album to lead in 10 years?

3 Which album, one that follows a day in the life of a shepherd from Kashmir, was one of the first Indian ones to become well known abroad? It was a collaboration between classical musicians Brij Bhushan Kabra, Hariprasad Chaurasia and Shivkumar Sharma.

4 Which iconic rock album of the late ’60s, dedicated by Pete Townshend to Indian spiritual leader Meher Baba, was about a deaf, mute and blind boy who was an expert at a particular sport?

5 Hugely popular Icelandic musician Bjork dedicated her 2011 album Biophilia to someone she regarded as a ‘rock star’ while growing up. The person, not from the world of music, is one of the most revered names in the world of documentary television. Name him.

6 Till the advent of the internet, where these can easily be spotted, Indian film composers often borrowed liberally from musicians around the world without giving credit or royalty. One such pair, Laxmikant-Pyarelal, took it to a different level when they ripped not one but two songs from Guinean legend Mory Kante. Can you name the film?

7 Which Indian film soundtrack was later adapted as a stage production in 1998 with the title Fourteen Songs, Two Weddings and a Funeral?

8 Between 1968 and 1978, two albums dominated the international album charts before the advent of Saturday Night Fever. One was Carole King’s Tapestry. The other was the soundtrack of a musical that was the top album between 1968 and 1973, and then again toppled Tapestry in 1975. Which album was this?

9 Which unique album by bio-acoustician Roger Payne sold over 1,00,000 copies after its release in 1970 and helped launch a global movement?

10 In which unusual album would Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto and Mozart’s Magic Flute share space with Kesarbai Kerkar, Gregorian chants, Johny B Goode and Australian aboriginal songs?

Answers

1. Synchronicity. It was the last album released by the group before they split.

2 Puli, the Telugu film. The album was released as Komaram Puli and sold over 7.5 lakh copies.

3 Call of the Valley. Chaurasia and Sharma later composed film music as Shiv-Hari.

4 Tommy; it was also performed on stage as a rock opera.

5 David Attenborough, the British naturalist.

6 Hum; the songs were Jumma Chumma, based on Tama, and Ek Doosre Se, inspired by Inch Allah.

7 Hum Aapke Hain Koun!

8 The Sound of Music.

9 It was Songs of the Humpback Whale, recordings done by Payne, which helped launch a Save the Whales movement and later led to a global moratorium on commercial whaling.

10 The Golden Record, which travelled with the Voyager spaceship; the tracks were selected by a committee chaired by Carl Sagan.

Joy Bhattacharjya is a quizmaster;

Twitter: @joybhattacharj