# Applying counterpoint principles to your compositions



## vicontrolu (Apr 28, 2010)

Hi,

I´ve been digging lately on counterpoint and, even though i find it quite interesting, when i sit down and compose i cant find myself using it. I think its basically because the main melodies i use are not made with the strict rules of the cantus firmus in mind.

I know its not only me, film music is full of melodies that dont rely so much in step motion etc, so i´d like to hear about you, about how you take the old principles of counterpoint and apply it to your "modern" compositions and in which way these have improved your music.

Thanks!


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## Narval (Apr 28, 2010)

If you are talking about applying Fux's rules and way of thinking to modern composition, they probably won't work very well. They didn't work well even on Palestrina's music, from which Fux said he "extracted" them.

But rejoice! - counterpoint is far more than Fux thought it to be. To me, counterpoint is: making two or more lines work together well. In this sense, harmonizing a melody is counterpoint. Orchestrating is counterpoint too. Coming up with a drum track is counterpoint. Everything in modern music (maybe except for inventing the main theme) is counterpoint. 

You will probably be surprised to see how much counterpoint there is in a TV cartoon score, or in a commercial jingle.


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## vicontrolu (Apr 28, 2010)

thats the point. Counterpoint is used much more widely today (as you said: independent melodic lines complenting other ones). What i ask is in what sense the study of counterpoint (the strict one, Flux) helps you to improve your musical skills.

I have been always counterpointing (writing independent lines) on my own taste, but now that i´ve get a bit more deep into the purist counterpoint, i find that i just cant use it on my own compositons.


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## Nathan Allen Pinard (Apr 28, 2010)

> What i ask is in what sense the study of counterpoint (the strict one, Flux) helps you to improve your musical skills.



It never seemed practical to me at all.


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## andreasOL (Apr 28, 2010)

Hi

I've been "studying" it for a while now and it helps me write lines I would have never found by playing around on the keyboard "until it sounds good". I'm primarily a guitarist and I try to expand my writing skills (to call it this way...I'm still a beginner). Since I study this (with the help of the Percy GoetschiuòºË   ÏKîºË   ÏKïºË   ÏKðºË   ÏKñºË   ÏKòºË   ÏKóºË   ÏKôºË   ÏKõºË   ÏKöºË   ÏK÷ºË   ÏKøºË   ÏKùºË   ÏKúºË   ÏKû


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## Patrick de Caumette (Apr 28, 2010)

I think that Fux principles (XVIII century counterpoint) are extremely useful
What was considered dissonant then has changed in the 21st century (4th, b5 hen playing blues or jazz...etc) but the basic principles still apply.

Going back to those rules when you can't quite understand why a certain texture doesn't sound right always works for me...


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## Ashermusic (Apr 28, 2010)

Studying counterpoint is vital for good film scoring since it is more horizontal than vertical writing, except these days when being done by songwriters who are not trained composers.

It is not that you consciously apply the techniques, it is that they become ingrained into your writing. The first TV series I did was a short lived one called "Maximum Security" which I co-wrote with my friend, the much more experienced David Michael Frank. We each did separate cues. The contractor was the late Jules Chaiken, who contracted for everybody it seemed in those days.

After I had conducted my first batch of cues, David took me aside and told me, "Jules gave you a nice compliment. He said that your interior line writing is very good for an inexperienced composer."

That was largely due IMHO to my two years of study of species counterpoint at Boston Conservatory.

I am told that EIS teaches similar skills but I have not studied it.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Apr 28, 2010)

Jay, when did Jules Chaiken die? He was very much alive when I talked to him two years ago. That's too bad.


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## vicontrolu (Apr 29, 2010)

josejherring @ Wed Apr 28 said:


> If you're having trouble applying them then do a little experiment. Take one of your melodies and then add 1 line to them. Add a bass line. With only two lines going it will be glaringly obvious if the parts are faulty.




Thats where i am having trouble.  How am i supposed to write a counterpoint to a melody that has nothing to see with a cantus firmus? I like to start with rests, tensions..so the concept of adding a line makes no sense, cause i am, since the very beginning, out of the rules of counterpoint.




> going back to those rules when you can't quite understand why a certain texture doesn't sound right always works for me...



Thats exactly the point i´d like to reach! but i cant, for the same reason i explained at the beginning: when writing the first melody i feel i am already out of the CP rules. Could you put an easy example of how to apply counterpoint principles to a melody that is not under the CF rules please?


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## bryla (Apr 29, 2010)

Just get the app Counterpointer by Ars-Nova and take an exercise or two a day. It is like Jay says about getting it to be an integral part of your writing.


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## mducharme (Apr 29, 2010)

The problem here is a common one and is the one I frequently find, where people do not find direct connections between theory and real writing.

Species counterpoint is ultimately about seeing the possibilities in a line. Its rules can be pruned down to: consonance on strong beats, dissonance on weak beats approached and left by step only, excepting suspensions.

Harmony, on the other hand, dictates the simplest possible connections between chords, by repeated note in an inner voice wherever possible. This does not lead to interesting melodic lines and a need to embellish these voices develops.

Species is a mental exercise for getting yourself to see the melodic possibilities in any line, whether in the top voice, bottom voice, or inner voice. The danger with it is you have to force yourself to write a good melodic line that follows the rules, otherwise it is not beneficial. It is possible in many cases to write a species counterpoint exercise in 1st species that breaks no rules yet is nothing but an endless "trill", alternating between two pitches only. If you write this, it will be technically correct, but you will have learned nothing from it. When you are doing the species exercises, you want to do your best to write a singable, at least semi-interesting melody that has a clear shape and direction. Only by doing exercises like that where no rules are broken can you hope to learn from species, because that forces you to think of many different possibilities. It forces you to think outside the box, not just the obvious answer. You will find that this aspect of looking for all the different possibilities and considering the shape of the line applies directly to your harmonic voice leading.

Then you take this sense of handling consonance and dissonance, and writing good melodies that fit with other melodies properly using the species rules, and apply it to tonal harmony. When you are dealing with chords as in tonality, consonance and dissonance is determined by what is a chord tone and what is not.

The rules for handling dissonances should be "flexible" of course, in tonal harmony, because there are sometimes dissonances that you would think would not sound good but they do, for whatever reason. If however, a dissonance sounds strange, you need to ask yourself, "how is it being approached and left?" Is it on a strong beat or a weak beat?". Things of that nature.

This is what someone previously pointed out, that you can often break the rules and it sounds fine, but when something sounds wrong and you don't know why, you can usually find out by looking to see where it breaks the rules.

The Fux book itself is not the greatest. The technique he used was excellent, but there are many other counterpoint books today that use Fux's species approach but update it and add additional rules that correct some weird things he does in his book. (He didn't have access to many scores by Palestrina, so, though he was trying to emulate Palestrina style, he got some aspects wrong, and he let elements of his own personal style creep into his rules). I would recommend books like Peter Schubert's "Modal Counterpoint, Renaissance Style" 2nd edition instead of the Fux. The pedagogical approach in that text is excellent as it makes you think of all the different possibilities by actually writing them all out in short mini-exercises.


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## Ashermusic (Apr 29, 2010)

Nick Batzdorf @ Wed Apr 28 said:


> Jay, when did Jules Chaiken die? He was very much alive when I talked to him two years ago. That's too bad.



Oops, my bad, he did not pass away, just retired. Not QUITE the same thing :lol:


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## vicontrolu (Apr 30, 2010)

mducharme @ Thu Apr 29 said:


> Species counterpoint is ultimately about seeing the possibilities in a line. Its rules can be pruned down to: consonance on strong beats, dissonance on weak beats approached and left by step only, excepting suspensions.




If this is the thing, thats something i already developed by checking all the lines simultaneously on the piano roll. I also try to mix movement types (oblique, similar, etc.) but thats something i just learnt from composing. 

When something sounds wrong to me i just find the correction almost inmediately, somehow i already know where to go, but i dont think of it like "this is a disonance on strong beat, so needs to be changed". I just go there and change the note, then it sounds fine. 

I think i am starting to realize that maybe , at least with 2 lines, i am quite done with it, even though i never studied itself. Not really sure if this "automatic" approach will work with for instance 4 lines, since the possibilities are much wider.


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