Counterpoint is the art of composing multiple melodies that work harmonically together but can stand on their own as unique melodies.
Learning counterpoint has been an up and down process for me, and so I wanted to have a single point on my website to bring together the core information that you need to understand how to go about learning counterpoint. This page is currently a work in progress and will change dramatically in the near future as I continue to add to it.
Writing Fluency vs Over Declarative Knowledge
The basic concepts within counterpoint are relatively simple to understand when presented clearly, but many people find writing counterpoint to be difficult. For years, I attempted to learn counterpoint with the recommended text books. But for some reason things didn’t click. I had originally tried to learn from the standard books out there on counterpoint, but it wasn’t until I read The Art of Partimento by Giorgio Sanguinetti, that things started to click.
I have a different perspective on things now. I believe the way counterpoint and harmony were taught was dramatically different than how I was taught.
Over the last few years, I’ve been investigating the Partimenti or Thoroughbass tradition. Partimenti is the Italian term for the name of short pieces usually written only with the bass line and figures above to represent the intervals that go above a given bass.
Students would learn to play standard musical vocabulary on the keyboard, things like cadences, harmonized scales, as well as singing melodies using a hexachordal (six-note) system different from our current 12 note way of thinking.
Counterpoint was specifically taught using the same vocabulary.
Below is an example from a student’s workbook, where they are writing many variations on the same sequences.
You can see in the bass line on the first system, the bass starts on C, leaps by a 3rd to E, and then back down a 2nd to D. This is called up a 3rd down a 2nd.
By looking at these 18th century counterpoint student manuscripts as well as others, I realized I was not doing enough exercises and the exercises I was doing were not the best.
Partimenti and Counterpoint Resources Around the Internet
https://appunticontrappunti.wordpress.com – This website is in Italian, but there are a bunch of really great exercises.
Hi Jon, do you have any recommendations of books about counterpoint? I find counterpoint very intimidating as a beginner.
For modal counterpoint, my favorite is Peter Schubert’s book Modal Counterpoint: Renaissance Style.
For tonal counterpoint, the Benjamin book is good, The Craft of Tonal Counterpoint, as is the The Principles and Practice of Tonal Counterpoint by Evan Jones.
Hello. Thanks for writing these blogs
My pleasure.