Little free counterpoint quiz

[Sorrano]

This time I will pay closer attention to harmonic direction. This sort of thing could be a catalyst, so I appreciate your quiz!

[Quijote]

OK, here's another short 2-part Free Counterpoint exercise ('Common Practice' style). The given lower part (the Cantus Firmus) is for alto instrument to which an upper part should be added note against note.
Good luck!

[Sorrano]

One question on the second measure, is the g supposed to be natural?

[Quijote]

Yes, the minim (worth 2 beats) is a G natural.

[Chris]

There is nothing in your Violin I part that 'confirms' G minor. By 'confirmation' I mean I would expect some sort of implied V7-I with an F# ... somewhere.
I'll post my annotations of your working a bit later and I look forward to your ... counterpoints. Nothing better than when students ask questions of me rather than sit there and accept what I say in bovine fashion!

OK, my replies:

Now, let me preface this by saying I have long heard about all these "rules" of harmony and counterpoint. I have asked every music teacher I have ever had for a list of them, and no one has been able to deliver. I assume they are listed in a text book on the subject. If such a list exists on the Internet, I would dearly love to know about it. So all I have ever gone on is what sounds good to me and the few rules I always hear about (like avoiding parallel fifths), which are usually confirmed by not sounding that great anyway. So...

Exposed 4th: Is this really a problem? It goes by so fast that I can't believe this would produce any noticeable negative effect. Rather, it seems like the listener would process the two separate melody lines here and absorb the overall harmony (G major) in the second half of this measure.

Modulating sequence here: OK, it seems you were looking for, starting in the fourth measure, F, B-flat, E-flat, A-flat. To be honest, I thought you were laying a trap for us here. Because that's the obvious thing to do, but it also doesn't sound that good. As I said, it sounds like some kind of exercise, chugging through the circle of fifths. I also don't like it because that's a lot of major chords in a row for something that is in C minor and very short. It winds up giving an overall impression of something that starts in a minor key, jumps to major and stays there, and then goes back to the minor to finish up. I wanted something more balanced here that would remind us we are in a minor key. So my solution was F, B-flat, G minor, A-flat add 6. To me this seems to fit the cantus firmus just as well, especially since the last beat in the B-flat part adds the minor 7th (A-flat), which seems to take us nicely enough to G-minor in this case.

"padding"; harmonically unclear: Is it really? The first measure contains F and A natural which seems to establish F major well enough to my ear. Then the cantus firmus itself seems to take care of the B-flat major especially because it adds the 7th, so I don't think there can be much confusion as to what is happening there. Then in the next measure I have the G and D together, which granted does not hammer home G minor, because there is no minor third, but to me the overall minor tonality of the piece takes your ear there more than anywhere else. Now, that could just be me, because that's how I'm thinking about it, and I don't really know how to imagine how other people are hearing it. But I am also kind of appealing to a counterpoint principle here that I have heard before, which is to give priority to the horizontal rather than the vertical dimension. I like these melodies and I think they go well together, so whatever chords actually do or do not show up as a result are of secondary importance.

Unresolved 7th: This seems like the "exposed 4th" above in that it seems to pass too quickly to matter, just serving a melodic function.

Unresolved tritone: Same

Parallel fifths: B natural to F natural is not a fifth

Implied 7th unresolved: Same as above again. I wouldn't hold long on something like this, but when the notes are this short it just seems like a brief interesting dissonance that doesn't beg for any specific resolution or at least is trumped by the G major leading you home to C minor.

Could have been decorated: Actually, I interpreted the instructions to mean this should be a single note, but even had I not done that I think I would have made this choice. This is a nice strong C minor theme, and it seems a stronger and more appropriate ending to have the octave Cs.

I can see that your solution does avoid these things, but it seems to me to come at a cost. You are forced to skip around a lot to avoid some notes that are apparently undesirable and get all the notes in there that sufficiently establish the chords you are trying to get across, but it makes for a line that seems more like accompaniment than a good melody in its own right and a suitable partner for the cantus firmus.

The thing I most like about yours compared to mine is, as I said, when you went up to the high C, and I wish I had thought of that. I will have to go back and listen, though, to see if these exposed thingies and unresolved whatsits are more problematic than I initially gave them credit for. But I don't think I'm ever going to see your F/B-flat/E-fat/A-flat sequence. Having those four major chords in a row there just cannot be the best thing to do. There has to be some way to get something else in there to break that up, even if what I did was not the way to do it.

[Quijote]

Thanks for the 'counterpoints' Chris, I'll get back to you later with my full replies / my double-counterpoints to your counterpoints.

[Quijote]

In the meantime, here is the Blue Baron's working of the second (A minor) counterpoint exercise. I'll reserve comment for now.

[Sorrano]

Thanks for the 'counterpoints' Chris, I'll get back to you later with my full replies / my double-counterpoints to your counterpoints.

Don't you mean subject and countersubject?

[Peter]

In the meantime, here is the Blue Baron's working of the second (A minor) counterpoint exercise. I'll reserve comment for now.

There is an appalling schoolboy error in my effort for which I have apologised to the Baron - I'm hoping my grovelling will be enough for him to allow my correction!

[Sorrano]

With apologies to the good Don, my own efforts may be a week or so in coming; my schedule has not been conducive to good study habits lately.

[Quijote]

There is an appalling schoolboy error in my effort for which I have apologised to the Baron - I'm hoping my grovelling will be enough for him to allow my correction!

How curious, here is an article I read today on such a topic !
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/...dents-students

[Quijote]

With apologies to the good Don, my own efforts may be a week or so in coming; my schedule has not been conducive to good study habits lately.

No problem Sorrano, when you can, no pressure, no stress!
[He's lying. He'll deduct points for work handed in late. Ed.]

[Quijote]

OK, now I'm going to reply to Chris's points above. As it's quite a long posting I'm going to break it up into bite-sized chunks, so please bear with me ...

[Quijote]

OK, my replies:

Now, let me preface this by saying I have long heard about all these "rules" of harmony and counterpoint. I have asked every music teacher I have ever had for a list of them, and no one has been able to deliver. I assume they are listed in a text book on the subject. If such a list exists on the Internet, I would dearly love to know about it. So all I have ever gone on is what sounds good to me and the few rules I always hear about (like avoiding parallel fifths), which are usually confirmed by not sounding that great anyway. So...

I am surprised none of your previous teachers could not deliver, or at least provide the titles. Here are two of my "bibles" on the subject:
a) Free Counterpoint, William Lovelock, A. Hammond & Co;
b) Polyphonic Composition, Owen Swindale, Oxford University Press.
Those then would be my two suggestions, though I also have counterpoint treatises by Arnold Schoenberg and Walter Piston (easily available from Amazon and so on ...). The Schoenberg I find too dry, and the Piston is not to my taste mainly because of the American terminology (no offense meant).
I can't tell you if a "list" (magic recipe?) exists on the Internet but I'll upload now (if I can, I'll check if it worked in a moment...) an elementary counterpoint book I found on the web; I don't use it, but maybe you'd like to have a look?
Going on what 'sounds good' is never a bad idea, but the problem right there is that the counterpoint course I teach is based on counterpoint Bach and later composers would have been familiar with integrating 'rules' that needed to be respected. Thus, though a bare fourth (in 2-part counterpoint) may sound perfectly consonant to our ears, it needs to be considered as a dissonance and approached/treated according to these 'rules'.

The PDF of the counterpoint treatise I have is too big. Here's the link where you can download it (legally so, as far as I can tell) :
http://docentes2.uacj.mx/museodigita...unterpoint.pdf

[Sorrano]

The Piston is what served as my primary harmony source. There was another book that I recall using, but do not remember either the title or the author, but I am sure that it was full of American terminology (snigger). It's been a very long time since I have had a good review, so all of this is very helpful to me and I appreciate the pdf link. I can see, as well, that I will have to dig out my Bach Chorales and start taking a more in depth look at them. If anything this thread has awakened some desires within me and maybe something can come from this.