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I am currently studying counterpoint in order to prepare my first year in a Faculty of music. I have diverse ressources at my disposal like The Complete Musician (Laitz), and online ressources. Unfortunately, no one in my surroundings can help me evaluate the work I do.

Therefore, my question is twofold:

  1. How does a professor evaluate a student's counterpoint?
  2. How can a student evaluate his/her own counterpoint in order to improve his/her skills on this perticular exercise in an academic context? Is it sufficient to follow rules and guidelines or do we have to take musicality into account? What would be a good strategy to train on this topic?
Labaguette
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  • Are you asking about basic species counterpoint exercises, or about a full counterpoint composition course? – Aaron Jun 11 '21 at 16:39
  • I'm asking about a full counterpoint composition course. I assume that the strategy to evaluate a counterpoint is the same for all species, the only variable being the rules that are specific to a species. (Though, I might wrong about this) – Labaguette Jun 13 '21 at 15:49
  • It's unclear whether the OP is preparing to teach and evaluate student work, or to prepare themselves for studying counterpoint and wondering how their teacher will evaluate their work. What specifically does the OP mean by "faculty?" – nuggethead Dec 10 '22 at 15:20
  • It seems to me bizarre that you have no one near who can advise you on this, yet you'll be tested on this. Can you clarify? – paul garrett Feb 20 '23 at 22:07

1 Answers1

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Maybe I'm a little late, but whatever. My opinion is based on my musicology studies and the music theory classes I attended. Since there have been many different rules and conventions about counterpoint throughout history, our professor explained to us the peculiarities of the styles of the different eras.

  1. Our professor evaluated counterpoint primarily according to the rules of the time and paid attention to things that were "forbidden" or not allowed at that time. Musicality was a pure plus in this case. We also didn't have to write counterpoint from scratch in our exams, but practiced it in our exercises.

  2. I think it would be helpful to talk to someone else about your counterpoint creation. Maybe there's some sort of discord or forum for sharing ideas. But it would also be good to follow basic guidelines and check your own work against those guidelines.

zeppeh
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