Will You Do the Fandango? Trivia Quiz

Answer: salsa

Though salsa simply means "sauce" in Spanish, in the US and other English-speaking countries the word usually refers to a condiment served with Mexican or Tex-Mex foods. Salsa, which can be raw or cooked, is also a popular dip for tortilla chips, crackers or crudités, and it is often served free of charge as an appetizer in Mexican and Central American restaurants. The most common kind of salsa found in stores is pico de gallo (rooster's beak), a mix of raw diced tomatoes, onions and chilies seasoned with cilantro and lime juice. Salsa verde, on the other hand, is made from tomatillos and green chilies, and is pleasantly tangy as well as spicy.

The name "salsa" for a popular Latin dance was coined in the 1960s by Dominican musician and bandleader Johnny Pacheco, who originally used it as an umbrella term for various kinds of Cuban dance music. The dance was born a few years later as a combination of mambo and other Latin American dances and North American dances such as swing and tap - a blend of lively, "spicy" dance styles similar to the tasty blend of flavours in culinary salsa.

Answer: tango

Directed by Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci (who in 1987 won the Acadamy Award for Best Director for "The Last Emperor"), "Last Tango in Paris" premiered at the New York Film Festival in October 1972, generating controversy but also great curiosity on the part of the public. In Bertolucci's native Italy, the film was released in December 1972 to considerable commercial success - until, a week later, all copies of the film were seized by the police and the director was put on trial for obscenity. This eventually led to the destruction of most copies a few years later, as well as a conviction for the director. However, times change, and "Last Tango in Paris" was finally re-released in 1987 - again, to great success.

Though known mainly for its sexual content (including a rape scene that took an enormous toll on 19-year-old Maria Schneider's mental health), the film is a raw, unflinching portrayal of two individuals' loneliness and obsession that inevitably ends in tragedy. Bertolucci and Brando were nominated for Academy Awards in 1974, but neither won.

One of the world's most iconic dances, tango originated among the immigrant and lower-class communities in mid-19th century Argentina and Uruguay. In 2009, it was recognized by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The title of the film refers to a pivotal scene in which the two main characters, Paul (Brando) and Jeanne (Schneider), walk into a bar during a tango competition and begin to dance together.

Answer: charleston

There are a number of cities and towns in the US named Charleston, the most significant of which are the capital of West Virginia and the most populous city in South Carolina. Charleston, SC is the older of the two, founded in 1670 and named for King Charles II of England, Scotland and Ireland. Located on an inlet of the Atlantic Ocean, it is home to a busy port and a hub for various industries, as well as a major tourist destination because of its beautiful architecture and rich cultural heritage. Charleston, WV was founded in 1773, and probably named for Charles Clendenin, the father of Colonel George Clendenin, who bought the original settlement in 1786. Formerly a thriving centre for the coal industry, Charleston became the capital of West Virginia in 1885.

The jazz composition "The Charleston", composed in 1923 by James P. Johnson to accompany the dance of the same name, was inspired by the music of the Black dockworkers of the port of Charleston, SC. This lively dance became synonymous with the Roaring Twenties, and was often performed on stage by American-born dancer Josephine Baker.

Answer: quadrille

Also known as "The Lobster Quadrille", "The Mock Turtle's Song" appears in Chapter 10 of Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" (1865). The song is a parody of the well-known poem "The Spider and the Fly" (written by Mary Howitt in 1828), and has a very similar metre and rhyme scheme. In the song, a whiting invites a snail to a dance that will take place on the sea shore, and will involve being thrown across the English Channel in the direction of France. The snail, however, declines - probably aware that snails are viewed as a delicacy in that country.

One of the story's many whimsical creatures, the Mock Turtle is named for a soup made from calves' heads and feet that imitated the taste of the much more expensive turtle soup. In John Tenniel's original black-and-white illustrations for the novel, it is depicted as a turtle having the head and the back feet of a calf. In the 1999 movie adaptation of the book, the song is performed by Gene Wilder, who plays the Mock Turtle, while Scottish band Franz Ferdinand recorded the version featured on the soundtrack of Tim Burton's 2010 film.

As its name suggests, the quadrille is a dance performed by four couples in a square formation. Very popular in Europe and its colonies in the 18th and 19th centuries, it is the national dance of Jamaica, the Bahamas, Dominica and Saint Lucia.

Answer: polka

Polka dots are among the most common and enduringly popular decorative patterns found on clothing, household wares and an array of other objects. Though the word's origin is still unclear, it is believed to be associated with the Central European dance of the same name, which was particularly popular in the late 19th century. According to some sources, in the United States, where the dance had been introduced by European immigrants, the members of polka clubs throughout the country wore dotted patterns as a form of identification. In addition, polka dots are a common motif in Central European folk art. The pattern's breakthrough with the general public, however, came in the 1920s, when Norma Smallwood, the winner of the 1926 Miss America pageant, was photographed wearing a swimsuit with large polka dots.

"Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini" is a novelty song released in 1960 by American singer Brian Hyland. It tells the story of a shy girl who tries to hide from view while wearing the titular skimpy piece of swimwear at the beach.

The polka is a dance in 2/4 that originated in early 19th-century Bohemia (now part of the Czech Republic). Its name is believed to come from "půlka", the Czech word for half-step.

Answer: can-can

Post-Impressionist painter and illustrator Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901) was born into an aristocratic family from southern France. However, for most of his short life - plagued by health issues probably due to genetic disorders - he associated with the bohemian scene of Paris's Montmartre neighbourhood. Most of his works detail those decadent yet lively surroundings - in particular brothels and nightclubs such as the iconic Moulin Rouge, for which Toulouse-Lautrec produced a series of posters. Unfortunately, his profligate lifestyle took its toll on his health: he died at the age of 36 from a combination of alcoholism and syphilis.

Toulouse-Lautrec produced an impressive body of work in less than twenty years. Many of his best-known paintings and posters depict dancers such as La Goulue (Louise Weber) and her rival Jane Avril, both of them associated with the scandalous dance known as the can-can, whose modern form was born at the Moulin Rouge soon after its opening in 1889. This very physically demanding dance of obscure origin is now mainly performed by a chorus line of female dancers, but in the late 19th century it was also performed by men.

In John Huston's 1952 film "Moulin Rouge", Toulouse-Lautrec is portrayed by José Ferrer, while in Baz Luhrmann's 2001 jukebox musical "Moulin Rouge!" he is portrayed by John Leguizamo.

Answer: fandango

"Fandango!" is the fourth studio album by Texas-based trio ZZ Top. Released in April 1975 features nine tracks: the first three (side A of the original LP) were recorded live, while the remaining six are studio tracks. The live part includes a cover of Elvis Presley's classic "Jailhouse Rock", plus a medley featuring some blues classics. Album closer "Tush", the only single released from the album, is also one of the band's best-known songs, often played at the end of their live shows. An expanded and remastered edition of the album was released in February 2006, with live versions of "Tush", "Jailhouse Rock" and "Heard It on the X" as bonus tracks.

ZZ Top were formed in 1969 in Houston, Texas. For 51 years, the band consisted of guitarist/vocalist Billy Gibbons, bassist/vocalist Dusty Hill (both of them known for their long beards), and drummer Frank Beard. Hill passed away in 2021, and was replaced by Elwood Francis.

The fandango is a lively dance, similar to flamenco, which originated in the Iberian Peninsula in the early 18th century. Along with the ZZ Top album and the famous line in Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody", the dance is cited in a number of other songs - notably Procol Harum's "A Whiter Shade of Pale".

Answer: hula

The modern hula hoop is a toy hoop twirled around the waist, the neck or the limbs. First marketed in 1958 by California-based toy company Wham-O, it was reportedly inspired by similar hoop-shaped toys meant to be rolled on the ground. However, Wham-O's version was made of plastic tubing rather than bamboo cane, and was thus more lightweight. From California, the hula hoop craze spread throughout the US and beyond, beginning with the summer of 1958: 25 million hoops were sold in less than four months, and over 100 million in a mere two years.

As it always happens, the fad did not last long, and by the early 1980s hula hoops seemed to have dropped off the radar. However, thanks to the Internet, a resurgence of interest in these toys has led to the birth of a community of adult "hoopers". Now there is even a World Hoop Day, established in 2007 and celebrated on the first weekend of October.

The name "hula hoop" originated in Australia, where toy hoops were already popular before Wham-O started producing them. It comes from the Hawaiian hula, a traditional dance that uses a wide range of hip and hand movements to represent feelings or natural phenomena.

Answer: tarantella

Somewhat surprisingly, the tarantella, an upbeat folk dance from Southern Italy, and the fearsome spiders known as tarantulas have a common origin: the city of Taranto, a seaport located in the southeastern Italian region of Apulia, on the Ionian Sea. Named for the mythical Greek hero Taras, a son of the sea god Poseidon, Taranto is one of Apulia's provincial capitals. In the 17th century (or possibly even earlier), in the countryside around Taranto it was believed that the bite of a local wolf spider, later named Lycosa tarentula after the city, led to a hysterical condition known as tarantism. Its victims would engage in frenzied dancing to counteract the effects of the venom, which would be eventually expelled from the body. The name "tarantula" originally given to that wolf spider species later came to designate the large, hairy spiders (most of which are harmless to humans) so popular with horror writers and B-movie directors.

Tarantella is not a single dance, but rather an umbrella term for a group of Southern Italian folk dances. In fact, each region has its own specific name for the dance, all of which share an upbeat rhythm and the use of tambourines as an accompaniment.

Answer: waltz

Often described as Australia's unofficial national anthem, "Waltzing Matilda" is not about taking a lady named Matilda to a formal dance. In fact, its title is a slang expression for travelling on foot while carrying one's belongings in a swag, a portable sleeping bag slung over one's back. Written in the style of a bush ballad - a folk song about life in the Australian bush - "Waltzing Matilda" was written in 1895 by Australian poet Andrew Barton "Banjo" Paterson. The original tune played by Christina MacPherson was changed by Harry Nathan in 1902, and rearranged by Marie Cowan the following year.

Inspired by a visit to central-western Queensland, the song tells the sad story of a swagman, an itinerant worker that captures a jumbuck (a stray sheep) to eat it, but is caught by its owner and three mounted policemen. Rather than let himself be arrested, the swagman drowns himself in a billabong (a watering hole), which afterwards is haunted by his ghost. The song, recorded hundreds of times in Australia and elsewhere, enjoys such iconic status in the Land Down Under that it even has its own special day - Waltzing Matilda Day, established in 2012 and celebrated on 6 April, the anniversary of the song's first public performance.

The waltz is a ballroom dance in triple time that originated in the 18th century from the peasant dances of southern Germany and Austria. The best-known waltz music was composed by Austrian composer Johann Strauss II in the 19th century.