A Complete Guide to Writing Four-Part Harmony (Counterpoint)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 19 มิ.ย. 2024
- This is the second video in my four-part series on four-part harmony (also called four-voice counterpoint). If you've ever tried to study species (Palestrina) counterpoint and found it too slow and painful, well, you might like this video! My goal is to teach you not only the process and rules of Bach counterpoint (four-part chorale harmonization), but also tell you the reasons why I think those rules exist, and hopefully have a bit of fun with it! There are several places in the video where I will invite you to try some examples on your own. Hopefully by the end of the video, you will have a good grasp of the principles of writing four-part Bach-style counterpoint. Of course, you'll still have to practice it a bunch to get good at it -- which is why I'll be working through a full example in part 3!
And in case you're wondering, yes, I've published a score video to the aria too:
• Ontological Aria: And ...
Chapters:
0:00:00 Introduction
0:04:48 Process
0:11:18 Rules for Single Chords
0:37:33 Rules for Voice Leading
1:02:55 Rules for Lines
1:12:00 Exercises
1:20:18 Aria (and Conclusion) - เพลง
This is a gem on TH-cam. Thank you!
Thank you so much for watching! I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I have absolutely no formal training. I can't read sheet music, I know very little music theory aside from the fundamentals of scales and a little bit about modes and time signatures. I basically do all my work by ear. I work in a DAW and if it sounds good I go with it.
All that said, the way you structured this and presented the examples, I was still able to follow along. Being able to explain something so well that someone with no real knowledge of music theory can easily understand it is amazing. Having the audio examples of each exercise was a huge help for me in that too.
Wow, I'm so glad it was helpful! I've actually thought about doing a "learn to read music in an hour" type video. It's really not too difficult once you understand the basics. (Of course, being able to read complex music quickly takes practice, but so does anything complex.) My grandfather actually wrote a little booklet many years ago called "Rational Rhythmic Reading" that taught kids to read by clapping rhythms first. I wonder if I have a copy somewhere. Anyway, that might be the approach I take...not sure. If you think that would be helpful, let me know!
@@EricGalluzzo That could be a really good idea. With how you explain things both simply and thoroughly, it would be a great resource as opposed to a lot of the "learn music fast!" videos that try to cram the topic in 10 minutes.
Thanks Eric! More theatrical than I was expecting LOL😆. We will see how I can reuse your lessons in my church music transcriptions.
Ha! Yes, I decided to have a little fun with it. I was worried it would be awfully boring to just present a ton of rules and exercises otherwise. Good luck in your transcriptions!
@@EricGalluzzo Many blessings to you👍🙂
Loving this series!
Glad to hear it! If you have any questions, or if there are topics that are still vague that you think I should cover in more detail in the next video, do let me know! My plan is that the next video will be just me sitting down and working through some random chorale harmonization and showing how I address the multiple problems that I pointed out in this video but didn't really mention how to solve; and the video after that will be turning that four-part harmonization into an orchestral setting (kind of the reverse process from my first video).
@@EricGalluzzo That sounds like fun. I studied/am still studying theory in college, and this series is helping me refresh some of those concepts and learn some new solutions to some of the common 4-part writing problems.
Oh...Damn! this is a very treasure to me. Big Big thanks Sir !!!! I'm from Myanmar thanks to You much. Only after your this video, I'm crystal clear to this. You are amazing Guy, I place you as my teacher from now on.
Wow, thank you! I'm so glad you found this useful. 🙂
47:33 the licccc!
Almost! The first measure would have to be D-E-F-G for it to be the licc. 😉
@@EricGalluzzo it's just not a literal quote, the licc is e-e-e-e-e-ry-where
Thank you for this.
You're most welcome!
I thought this series was great content, to the extent that I liked and subscribed.
I think I remember you talking about rules in the context of one's actions having consequences. That seems like a useful mental model for rules. Certainly, "A tends to cause B" (as long as it's worded in such a way as to always be true) is indisputable enough to be called a rule, IMO. There are plenty of those kinds of rules in music, and in life in general. And with those kinds of rules, they're impossible to break (unless you create a new universe for yourself that works differently). And it becomes untrue to say "there are no rules". When people say "there are no rules" (like you did here), they're talking about the "thou shalt not" kind of rules. And that kind of rule is really unhelpful, because it tells you nothing (except what the speaker wants). The consequence-kind-of-rule tells you everything, and lets you decide what to do with that info.
Now, as good as this content is, I think it would be more effective if it were re-organized. First, just a general approach to using your audience's time. As fun as the antics in that intro are, I personally would cut that out, and anything similarly expensive in time. You want to be always looking to shave half a second off here and there, if you want to reach the largest possible audience. So spending a long few minutes with a gimmick like that will be utterly delightful to 10% of the population; while the other 90% won't have the patience for it, and they'll go looking for another video. Lots of folks on TH-cam say things like "without further ado". But saying that is further ado. Anyone whose instinct tells them to cut those three words out is going to have a healthy attitude in general to using their audience's precious time. And they'll use it well; and they'll retain their audience. For the material covered in this particular video it's way too long. I'd say 20-30 mins max. I'm forcing myself to be patient with this video because I want to hear several folks' take on the rules (yours, for example, differ from several other authorities that I've seen, so it's interesting). If I weren't so interested in this stuff, then there's no way I'd spend 1:24 on this (plus repeats).
And then during the examples between around the 20 and 30 minute marks, you say things like "so don't do that if you can avoid it". But nobody who doesn't already know this stuff will get any value from that advice. They'll have no idea what being-able-to-avoid-it means or might possibly look like. And if you don't understand a piece of advice, then you're very very unlikely to remember it. Some people, like myself, wil have spent many, many, many hours doing exercises. So those folks will know exactly what "if you can avoid it" means and looks like. They'll think about the rule precedence, the tradeoffs, the taste, the choices, the esthetics, the painting-themselves-into-a-corner moments, and the rewinds-and-re-dos that they experienced while they were deciding whether or not they could "avoid it", and/or whether or not they wanted to. But the audience for this video (people who don't already know this stuff) will have no idea what "if you can avoid it" means, so that's wasted. And that got me thinking that this video isn't organized in the right sequence.
In education in general, the following is wise advice: introduce a new idea with an instance of it. Become comfortable with an example or two (or three) of the thing, and then define the general concept. The particular before the general; the concrete before the abstract.
But in this video you jump straight into the general. That's why the audience will struggle to internalize it. What I think is necessary is to first show some chord-connection exercises. Some easy ones first, so that we get experience with things going well. Then, as things get more challenging, we can see a concrete case where, say, R335 is preferable to RR35, and why. And what the alternative would be, and why that's less preferable. Once we've gotten a few examples under our belt, *then* we can start inferring patterns and rules. You might even find, as some folks do, that all of the doubling rules can simplify into "doubling scale degree 1^, 4^, and 5^ is generally preferred." That single rule can replace several doubling rules that talk in terms of chord factors.
Thank you for the feedback! I will say that I agree with most, but not all, of your comments. I definitely agree that my videos are too long, and that I often use many words when fewer will do. As you can tell, I tend not to script my videos precisely in advance, but I have a general outline of what I want to cover, and then I show people the "real process" of how to accomplish it. Since I am naturally rather long-winded, that leads to long videos like this one (although this video was more scripted than most of them).
The reason I introduced the silly antics at the beginning is that I discussed with two people how I could make a dry video on four-part harmony more interesting and accessible, and both independently advised me to write a fun song about it. In hindsight, while I think they were right, the silly aria probably could have been a separate video, as it did add some time to the overall length. And in fact I did make it into its own video as well after the fact.
However, I think the biggest time sink in this video was all the exercises, which I really do not want to get rid of. Too many TH-cam videos say "here, do this" without any way for the viewer to evaluate whether they're "doing this" correctly - something I am explicitly trying to counteract. And I would contend that the rules themselves are mostly sound as well. For example, I checked out Tom Pankhurst's chorale guide recently and his rules mostly line up with mine. I tried to go from simple rules to complex rules without assuming any knowledge of the latter when covering the former - and I did reorder them a couple times until I had them in an order I was happy with.
Having said that, I was more verbose than necessary when covering all the examples. And frankly, I think I am covering too much in a single video. As you said, hardly anyone wants to watch a video that is nearly an hour and a half long. But covering all of four-part harmony is a big task. So perhaps splitting this up into several smaller videos would have been the wise thing to do.
Thank you for watching, and please feel free to send feedback about any other videos of mine that you may watch. I will take your comments into account and try to be more brief in future!
@@EricGalluzzo Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Eric! Just some more ideas from me: but I don't want to take up your time, so don't worry about replying. And also I realize that these are your (free) videos, so you should make them how you feel best. :)
So, I don't know how this content could be dry. Sure, if lonely folks (not particularly interested in this topic) are just looking for something to entertain them for an hour, then a fun song would be good for them. For folks who're genuinely interested in learning this stuff (like I am), then I'd say that enthusiasm and brevity are priorities. And surely it's those folks you made the video for. So including a song is counter-productive, since it's inimical to brevity. And, yes, I harp on brevity because I think that's where TH-cam videos in general have most room for improvement. :) I'm all for reducing the sticker shock when you look at the length of a video before deciding whether or not to watch it.
The section on parallels is excellent. Any explanation involving the overtone series is pure gold, and very interesting. And letting us hear the flute + oboe examples is a very high-quality idea, too. That section is around 12 minutes. But what about this for an idea? Just say "Parallel octaves: if two voices are an octave apart in a chord, and in the following chord they've both *moved* (they have to move for this consequence to apply) by the same interval in the same direction, then that tends to make the two voices sound more like one. This applies to simple and compound octaves, and simple and compound fifths (nothing else)." And then reserve the examples (and maybe exercises) for a supplementary (and clearly optional) sister video.
Ordinarily I'd say that breaking one video down into several just hides the issue (if you have to watch them all for it to make sense). But imagine taking the first couple paragraphs (the essentials) of each story in a newspaper, and publishing that in a digest paper. Then having the rest of the content of each story in a supplement. That's the kind of idea I'm thinking of for this kind of content (short, mandatory, "essentials" videos; then long, optional, "supplementary" ones). :)
Yes, student exercises are essential for this material. I'm just not sure that video is the best format for them. A document with exercises, then another doc with answers, might work better.
By the way, there's a Facebook discussion group called "Piano performance and theory"; it'd be great to have you as a member of that.
A suggestion for another video: It would be helpful to see, how you harmonize a fast moving melody over different chords. For example for 1st & 2nd Flute or 1/2 fluegelhorn. I'm not shure, if I can use the the bach style method there as well, and if - how? Or ist it possible to use only minor triads/diatonic notes?
Or another video: How to evolve a 2. melody, a side melody for tenor instruments and how to harmonize that.
Thanks for the suggestion! What do you mean by fast-moving? Most harmonizations don't change chords more often than once per beat (usually quarter note), or very occasionally twice per beat, even if the melody moves quite fast. But you can absolutely use Bach-style counterpoint to harmonize that - Bach himself does that all the time (check out his Brandenburg Concerti, for example). You just have to determine what the important melody notes are on each beat, and harmonize those.
What do you mean by a "2. melody"? A countermelody which is used to accompany another melody? Or a separate, independent melody?
Unironically you have a really beautiful voice
Why thank you, sir! I used to sing in my school choir because it was required if you wanted to be in the orchestra. So I learned a bit there. Then I sang in my church choir for a good while, which was fun.
Another fine video! Normally doubling a minor third should be considered fine from what I've heard, because it's not in the overtone series and thus doesn't dominate the other chord tones. I am a bit perplexed by your liberal use of second inversion chords because classically they are not allowed outside the cadential, passing or neighbor chord uses right? Bach would never for example start out with it, it should be considered a double suspension outside the function of a passing chord and thus you must double the bass to avoid parallels. It might also be mentioned that classically seventh chords in first and second inversion are very good because they contain no dissonant intervals and don't even need to be prepared, they are included in the rule of the octave. I'm not sure about whether parallel fifths are a problem if one of them is diminished, I think it sounds fine but maybe it wouldn't be done. Cheers!
Really good points, thanks for the comment! I have definitely heard that the third should not be doubled - and it does at least stick out to my ears when it is - but then again, maybe that's because I've been so conditioned against it! About second inversion chords, you're right that they're typically used as a cadential 6-4, but I wasn't ever taught a rule that they could only be used thus. I would agree, though, that Bach would almost always start on the root to firmly establish the tonic before moving elsewhere. And I was taught that diminished fifth parallels are still parallels. Why that is, I'm not sure, because I would agree that they still sound perfectly independent in that case since the diminished fifth isn't in the overtone series.
Hello Eric, I tried to solve every exercise. The one I had biggest problems with is the "supension". Actually I don't know how to build a suspension chord or where exactly the clash is. I can't hear any disturbance in the sound examples, to me it sounds good.
A suspension is where you hold a note over from the previous beat which forms a temporary dissonance, but then that note moves down a step to "resolve" (i.e. form a normal chord). For example, you might have a G7 chord with an F in the soprano, moving to a C major chord. You could hold that F over into the C major chord and then move it down to an E. That would be a suspension. However, if you already have an E playing in the chord when you hold the F over, then you have both an E and an F, which form a minor second, a pretty acute dissonance. So in that case, you would want to make sure the other voices are only singing Cs and Gs. Does that make sense? 🙂
Except the last sentence I can follow, yes. What do you mean with "the other voices" ? Would this be right? (G7 -> Cmaj +susp. --> Cmaj)
S: F F E F F E
A: D E C or D E C
T: B G G B C C
B: G C C G G G
@@unbelievable7936 The first one would be correct except that on the second chord you have an F in the soprano and an E in the alto, which clash. So the alto should sing a C instead of an E.