Questions About Music to Ask
32 music questions for a real conversation rather than a taste test: what is on repeat right now, what played in the house growing up, first concerts, karaoke picks, the artist you have never got, and the song you would want played at your funeral. They work with a stranger at a party or with someone you have known for years.
The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
What have you had on repeat lately?
Why ask it
Better than asking about favourites, because recent listening is easy to recall and usually more honest. Favourite artist answers get curated; what someone actually played this week rarely does.
What was the last album you listened to all the way through?
Why ask it
Many people will realise they cannot remember, which is itself a good conversation about how listening has changed. Those who can name one usually have a reason attached, a drive, a flight, a habit.
What did your parents play in the house when you were a kid?
Why ask it
This gets a warmer and longer answer than asking about influences, and it tends to arrive with a room, a car, or a chore attached to it. Notice whether they still listen to it or have spent years avoiding it.
What was the first music you bought with your own money?
Why ask it
The purchase pins it to an age and a place in a way that a favourite never does. Embarrassment about the answer is common and usually the point at which the conversation loosens up.
What was your first concert?
Why ask it
Almost everybody has one and almost nobody has been asked recently. Follow with who took them, since the answer is frequently a parent or an older sibling and that opens up more than the band does.
What is the best show you have ever been to?
Why ask it
Asking for the best rather than the most recent forces a judgement, and the reasons given are usually about the crowd or the circumstances rather than the musicianship. That is where the actual story is.
Is there a song you cannot hear without thinking of one particular person?
Why ask it
This gets past the catalogue and into their life, while still leaving them in control of how much to say. If the answer comes instantly with no name offered, do not press for the name.
What would get you onto a dance floor you had no intention of visiting?
Why ask it
Framing it as involuntary gives people licence to name something they would otherwise defend or hide. It also usually gets a laugh, which makes it a good recovery if an earlier question landed heavily.
What is your karaoke song?
Why ask it
The interesting split is between people who have one ready and people who have never been. Ask what happened the last time either way, because the story is more entertaining than the title.
Which album do you think more people should hear?
Why ask it
This gives them the pleasure of recommending rather than being assessed. Ask what it sounds like rather than pretending to know it, since faked recognition ends this conversation faster than admitted ignorance.
Is there something you loved at fifteen that you would still defend now?
Why ask it
The question separates nostalgia from a real ongoing opinion, and asking them to defend it invites an argument that is fun rather than tense. The defence is usually about a specific detail: a drum sound, a line, a run of three songs.
What is a song you love and would rather not admit to?
Why ask it
Offering to go first here almost always unlocks it. What people are embarrassed by tells you which crowd they think they are performing for, which is more revealing than the song itself.
Which famous artist have you never got, however many times you have tried?
Why ask it
Rare permission to be negative, and people enjoy it. The valuable follow-up is whether they have genuinely tried, because there is a difference between a considered dislike and a position inherited from a friend at school.
Is there a cover you prefer to the original?
Why ask it
This is one of the few music questions that reliably produces disagreement without anyone taking offence. It also shows whether they listen to arrangement and delivery or mainly to songs.
What do you put on to concentrate, and what do you put on when you cannot sleep?
Why ask it
Asking about function rather than taste gets past the identity performance entirely. The two answers are often nothing alike, and people frequently notice that for the first time as they say it.
Have you ever stopped listening to someone because of something they did?
Why ask it
A genuinely open question with no correct answer, and the reasoning is the interesting part rather than the verdict. Let them land wherever they land instead of steering it towards agreement.
What is a lyric you have never forgotten?
Why ask it
Asking for the line rather than the song gets you something specific enough to actually discuss. Expect a pause, and let it run, because most people need a moment to retrieve one.
Do you play anything, or did you quit something you wish you had kept up?
Why ask it
The second half is why this works: abandoned instruments are far more common than current ones, and the story of quitting usually involves a teacher, a parent, or a specific year. Do not turn it into encouragement to take it up again.
Is there a song you can no longer listen to because of what it is attached to?
Why ask it
Ask this only once the conversation has warmed up, and accept a short answer. A breakup, a funeral, or an illness may sit behind it, and the point is to acknowledge it rather than to open it.
What would you want played at your funeral?
Why ask it
Keep this for late in the conversation, because it lands as a joke or as something serious depending on how the previous twenty minutes went. Either way people have usually thought about it, and the reasoning behind the choice is the real answer.
What song fixes a bad mood every time?
Why ask it
Reliability is the point. A song that works every time is usually one somebody is slightly embarrassed by, which makes the answer honest.
Which song puts you back in one specific room?
Why ask it
Ask for the room, not the feeling, and you get a scene: a car, a kitchen, a particular summer. Vaguer versions of this question get vaguer answers.
Which song do you skip every time, and why is it still on the playlist?
Why ask it
The second half is the good part. Nobody deletes the song, which usually means somebody else put it there.
What have you discovered in the last year that surprised you?
Why ask it
Asks about current taste rather than a personal canon, which is where most music conversations get stuck. Recent finds are easy to share afterward.
Who would you go back in time to see play?
Why ask it
Keep it to seeing a performance rather than meeting the artist. The night and the venue somebody picks says as much as the name.
Have you ever left a gig early?
Why ask it
A cheerful way into the negative opinions people usually keep quiet, and it tends to produce a story rather than a verdict. Anyone who says they never have is telling you something about loyalty or about stamina.
Which song can you never skip when it comes on?
Why ask it
A sharper question than asking for a favourite, because it is about behaviour rather than opinion. The answer is often something they would never list as a favourite, which is usually the more honest data point.
Do you follow the words, or is it all sound to you?
Why ask it
Listeners divide fairly cleanly here and are often surprised to be asked. Lyric people can quote whole verses of songs they dislike; sound people frequently cannot tell you what their favourite song is even about.
What would you put on with your parents in the car?
Why ask it
A question about negotiation rather than taste, and the answer maps their family. Some people have one safe artist that spans three generations; others describe an hour of silence, which is its own answer.
Who has put you on to something you would never have found on your own?
Why ask it
Turns the conversation towards people rather than catalogues. Answers name a sibling, an ex, a colleague with the office speakers, and the music arrives attached to whatever that relationship was.
What is the last thing you heard that you did not get at first and then did?
Why ask it
The rarest kind of listening, since most of us decide within thirty seconds and move on. If they have an example, ask what made them go back; that is normally a person, a film, or a room, not the record itself.
What did you used to be snobbish about and have since let go of?
Why ask it
Almost everyone has abandoned a position on pop, country or a whole decade, and describing that shift means describing who they were trying to be at the time. A blank denial here usually means the snobbery is still live.
Keeping a music conversation going
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
What makes these work
- Ask about a moment rather than a preference. First concert, last album finished, and what played in the car all get stories; favourite band gets a noun.
- Answer your own question too, and go first if the question is at all exposing. A one-sided interview about taste starts to feel like an audition.
- Play the song if you can. Thirty seconds of the actual track does more than five minutes of describing it, and it hands the conversation back to them.
- Follow the person, not the genre. Why they kept listening to something for fifteen years is more interesting than the record itself.
What kills it
- Pretending to know an artist you have never heard of. It always shows, and it teaches the other person to stop naming things.
- Correcting a fact, a date, or a band member. Being right about the lineup is worth less than the story you interrupted.
- Ranking their answer against yours. The moment it becomes a comparison of taste, most people retreat to safe choices.
- Explaining why the thing they love is derivative. There is no version of this that improves the conversation.
- Firing off five questions in a row. Pick two, follow whatever they say, and leave the rest for another time.
Adapting to the situation
- With a stranger at a party, stay in the first eight questions. On repeat, first concert, and karaoke are all low risk and easy to answer over noise.
- On a date, the parents question and the one about a song tied to a person tend to open things up without demanding much.
- With someone who plays or works in music, skip the favourites and ask what they are working on and what they listen to that is nothing like it.
- In a group, ask everyone the same question and go round. Karaoke songs and guilty favourites work far better as a round than as a one-to-one.
- With an older relative, go straight to what they listened to at twenty and what they had to buy it on. It is often the best conversation on this list.