I've also always wanted to learn the Palestrina-style. I think I could benefit from his methods.
Sorry for being late to the party! I would NEVER EVER call myself an expert on the matter but now I've studied that style "with a serious attitude" for around 6 years, so at least I know the basics. This may seem ironic or sarcastic, but in fact it's quite the opposite: learning that kind of polyphony is a very slow process - it may be frustrating at times, but in the end it pays off IMMENSELY (in other words, yours is a really good choice!).
Let me start by saying that you have a natural attitude towards
feeling what is "cadential" from a voice leading perspective - and here comes the important part -
without thinking too much about chords: you seem to understand well wheter a phrase is *asking for* a resolution or is *providing* an answer, and your answers are often sober while still proving a floor of cantability, so to speak.
That's good.
Of course, as you can imagine, studying the technique on a deeper level would speed up the rate of progress significantly, but I also understand that starting to go in the details here on a forum post would be stupidly unpractical. So I though about an experiment that could actually prove useful despite the limits we have right now - take it as a mini-game, if you will.
This is a famous work by Palestrina called Sicut Cervus, from the Youtube channel Smalin. IT'S NOT A SCORE, but rather in m.a.m. proprietary format, which is incredibly similiar to midi. I hope you'll find this detail helpful.
This is the game: try to transcribe just the upper line and the lower line using your ear (you can help yourself with vsts), then fill the inner parts until you feel they "make sense".
Now confront your result with what you see on video: it hasn't to be perfect and the single notes have absolutely no meaning - instead, try to focus on two things:
melodic profiles and rests/voice entries.
This kind of counterpoint has an enormous set of incredibly strict rules, but through this experiment you should get at least a very good grasp of what people were expecting to get from a good performance.
Have a good listening, and I hope I wasn't too annoying - but I simply couldn't resist with such a direct request!