Van Morrison
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50 free Van Morrison trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Few songwriters have been borrowed by film-makers as often as Van Morrison. His recordings play over love scenes, weddings, war stories and closing credits, and in 2007 he gathered some of the best known on the compilation Van Morrison at the Movies – Soundtrack Hits. This quiz starts there. About half the questions ask which of his songs plays in a given film, from a werewolf horror comedy to a Scorsese crime epic, or which film a given song belongs to. The rest cover the career behind the soundtracks: the Belfast childhood, the years fronting Them, the classic albums, the hit covers of his songs and the musicians he has recorded with. It is written for fans who know the hits and for film lovers who have heard that voice in a cinema and wondered what the song was. Every answer comes with a short explanation.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which 1967 Van Morrison hit, heard in Born on the Fourth of July, has he said never paid him any royalties?
Brown Eyed Girl
Brown Eyed Girl began life as Brown-Skinned Girl, and a contract Morrison signed without legal advice means, he says, that it has never earned him royalties.
Q 02Which Van Morrison song plays during a love scene in the 1981 horror comedy An American Werewolf in London?
Moondance
Moondance fits director John Landis's scheme for the film, in which every song on the soundtrack refers to the moon, from Blue Moon to Bad Moon Rising.
Q 03In which Martin Scorsese concert film does Van Morrison high-kick his way through Caravan with The Band?
The Last Waltz
The Last Waltz captured The Band's farewell show on Thanksgiving Day 1976, and as Morrison strode off Robbie Robertson called out his nickname, Van the Man.
Q 04Which British singer's 1993 cover of Van Morrison's Have I Told You Lately reached number five in Britain and America?
Rod Stewart
Rod Stewart helped turn it into a wedding favourite, though Morrison originally wrote the song as a prayer.
Q 05Which director filled his 2021 film Belfast with Van Morrison songs, earning the singer a first Oscar nomination?
Kenneth Branagh
Kenneth Branagh has called the film his most personal, and Morrison's new song for it, Down to Joy, was nominated for Best Original Song.
Q 06Van Morrison's 1960s band Them took its name from a 1954 horror film about which giant creatures?
Ants
Ants mutated by an atomic bomb test overrun the New Mexico desert in Them!, the film that keyboard player Eric Wrixon suggested as a new name for the Gamblers.
Q 07Which job did the teenage Van Morrison settle into in Belfast, later celebrating it in a 1982 single?
Window cleaner
Window cleaner was the work he took after a few short apprenticeships, and Cleaning Windows recalls how content he was on his round in the early 1960s.
Q 08Which Canadian crooner named his 2009 album after Van Morrison's Crazy Love and included a cover of the song?
Michael Bublé
Michael Bublé described the album as a record about the roller coaster ride of relationships; Morrison's original dates from 1970.
Q 09Which Pink Floyd song did Van Morrison sing with Roger Waters in Berlin in 1990, a version later used in The Departed?
Comfortably Numb
Comfortably Numb had Morrison taking David Gilmour's vocal parts at The Wall concert, backed by Rick Danko and Levon Helm of The Band.
Q 10Which honour did Van Morrison receive for services to the music industry and to tourism in Northern Ireland?
A knighthood
A knighthood came in the Queen's Birthday Honours of 2015, turning the son of a Belfast shipyard electrician into Sir Van Morrison.
Q 11Which Them song by Van Morrison, first released as a B-side in 1964, is heard in Francis Ford Coppola's The Outsiders?
Gloria
Gloria was only the flip side of the band's first chart hit, yet it became a garage-rock standard covered by Jimi Hendrix and many others.
Q 12Which Van Morrison song, heard in As Good as It Gets, became the anthem of Northern Ireland's peace movement?
Days Like This
Days Like This was used by the Northern Ireland Office as theme music for a television advert promoting the ceasefire.
Q 13Which Van Morrison song do Jim and Michelle dance to at their reception at the end of American Wedding?
Into the Mystic
Q 21Van Morrison's Wonderful Remark was first released on the soundtrack of which 1983 Robert De Niro film?
The King of Comedy
The King of Comedy was a Martin Scorsese film whose music was produced by Robbie Robertson of The Band, who also plays guitar on Morrison's track.
Q 22Which future rock star was a session guitarist when Van Morrison's band Them recorded Baby, Please Don't Go?
Jimmy Page
Jimmy Page was a London studio hand four years before Led Zeppelin, and Morrison recalled him playing rhythm guitar on one track.
Q 23Which 1987 Robin Williams film features Them's Baby, Please Don't Go, sung by a teenage Van Morrison?
Good Morning, Vietnam
Into the Mystic starts as Morrison's own recording but switches midway to a cover by The Wallflowers because of licensing.
Q 14Which American rocker took a cover of Van Morrison's Wild Night to number three on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1994?
John Mellencamp
John Mellencamp recorded it as a duet with bassist Meshell Ndegeocello, and their version also went to number one in Canada.
Q 15Which Irish traditional group recorded the 1988 album Irish Heartbeat with Van Morrison?
The Chieftains
The Chieftains teamed up with him again in 1995 for a new version of Have I Told You Lately that won a Grammy for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals.
Q 16Which British pop veteran duetted with Van Morrison on the 1989 single Whenever God Shines His Light?
Cliff Richard
Cliff Richard and Morrison sang it together on Top of the Pops after the single was held back for the Christmas market, and it reached number 20 in the UK.
Q 17Which 1968 Van Morrison album, recorded in New York with jazz musicians, includes Madame George and Cyprus Avenue?
Astral Weeks
Astral Weeks was cut in three sessions with players such as Connie Kay of the Modern Jazz Quartet, whom Morrison told to play whatever he felt like.
Q 18Which instrument did the young Van Morrison talk his father into buying after hearing jazzman Jimmy Giuffre?
Saxophone
Saxophone lessons came from Belfast jazzman George Cassidy, who lived on the same street, and Morrison played the horn on his first recording in 1963.
Q 19Which Los Angeles band was the support act for Van Morrison's group Them at the Whisky a Go Go in June 1966?
The Doors
The Doors opened for the final week of the residency, and on the last night the two bands, each fronted by a Morrison, jammed together on stage.
Q 20Which then little-known band filled in for the absent Van Morrison at his 1993 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction?
Counting Crows
Counting Crows performed his song Caravan at the ceremony, an appearance that first brought the band to public notice.
Good Morning, Vietnam included the 1964 recording on its soundtrack, and David Lynch used it again three years later in Wild at Heart.
Q 24Which band sang Van Morrison's Jackie Wilson Said on Top of the Pops in 1982 before a photo of a darts player?
Dexys Midnight Runners
Dexys Midnight Runners took their cover to number five, and the picture behind them showed darts player Jocky Wilson instead of the American soul singer.
Q 25Van Morrison wrote the score for Lamb, a film starring which Northern Irish actor as a young Christian Brother?
Liam Neeson
Liam Neeson later recited Morrison's spoken-word piece Coney Island on a 1994 tribute album that the singer helped to put together.
Q 26Which actor presented Van Morrison with a 2007 Oscar Wilde award for his contribution to more than fifty films?
Al Pacino
Al Pacino compared the singer to Oscar Wilde, calling both of them visionaries who push boundaries.
Q 27Which 1970 Van Morrison single, a tribute to a New Orleans piano star, reached number nine on the Billboard Hot 100?
Domino
Domino honours Fats Domino and is Morrison's highest-charting single, one place above his far better known 1967 debut hit.
Q 28Which 1965 Them single, written by producer Bert Berns, took Van Morrison's band to number two in the UK?
Here Comes the Night
Here Comes the Night had first been rush-released in a version by Lulu, which stalled at number 50 before Them's recording took off.
Q 29Which songwriter wrote It's All Over Now, Baby Blue, covered by Van Morrison's band Them and later sampled by Beck?
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan later sang a duet with Morrison for a BBC Arena special, and Beck built his song Jack-Ass on the Them recording.
Q 30Which guitarist teamed up with Van Morrison on the 2020 charity single Stand and Deliver?
Eric Clapton
Eric Clapton and Morrison made it a protest against Covid lockdowns, with the profits going to Morrison's Lockdown Financial Hardship Fund.