If Music Be The Food Of Love...Play On!
Added: 30 Aug 2023
Author: One Stop Trivia
Music rounds are ever popular in quizzes. In the past I have done music knowledge rounds, but quickly came to realise the music intro rounds are more popular. They give a change from the quiz master reading out questions. People can get to listen to some songs that there is a good chance they will enjoy, and depending on the age spread for your quiz, and the tracks you include, can transport them back to their youths as only music can do!
With music rounds, I like to put the effort in before the quiz so that I do not have to spend a lot of time faffing around with lots of files on my phone. I like to be able to plug my phone into the sound system, hit play, then sit back! To this end, I create a single file with all the tracks and correct spacing on it in advance, and just let the players know how it will work (this gives me a bit of a break too!).
When creating my music rounds, I try to make sure there is a good mix of music across genres, decades, and styles, and I want to make sure they are songs that should be well enough known to be recognisable to the audience. I have a few favourite songs I'd love to include, but they are from local bands who only have a relatively small reach (so far), so they would not be any good for a quiz as it is unlikely that any players will have heard of them.
There is a selection of pre-made music rounds available here including a few free ones to try. The format I use normally is 12 songs, 30 seconds of intro, and then a 10 second gap between tracks. After going through once, there is a 30s gap and then it plays through again, but with 20s clips from different parts of the song. The free versions have less tracks, and no repeat.
Each of the pre-made quiz packs we have available includes a music round, the basic versions not having the 2nd time round part of the file.
And to add to this, if you want to make your own music rounds, but find that finding the songs, downloading them from wherever, and then editing them to the parts you want is too much of a hassle, we have just added a number of packs of music intros into our quiz resources section, each containing 40 intros, already cut to 30s files. These are all sorted by decade, and available at low prices, so check them out now!
