Hi Guys,
Today, a quick look at creating contrapuntal/counterpoint lines/music with the guitar pick.
I put together a little guitar “Etude” [Study] for this purpose:
ANALYSIS
The first thing to do, is to outline the harmony that will be used.
The key, is to keep it simple, melodic and song like.
Here, is how I mapped out the harmony for this little plectrum etude:
EXAMPLE 1:
As you will notice, as you play through this, it is quite basic and melodic in its structure.
The next thing I did was to employ a [High to Low to high ] two part counterpoint approach.
Also, I put the last note [off beat] in the high part in order to push the music along.
EXAMPLE 2:
To compliment this, I then put the answering phrase as a fragment of scale in the bass.
EXAMPLE 3:
To keep this going, I needed some resonance for the next part as the scale would now need to be in the treble.
For this, I exploited the open A string:
EXAMPLE 4:
From here, I moved to chord IV [Gmajor] using the same compositional devices that I employed at the beginning of the etude.
EXAMPLE 5:
This worked out well, as it left me with the open A string once again for resonance and a powerful dominant arpeggio to establish the key at the cadence:
EXAMPLE 6:
FULL FIRST PART:
At this point I felt that I needed to get to a new key, to avoid monotony.
So, due to the tempo and nature of the etude it would be an abrupt modulation to be spelt out through contrary motion technique.
EXAMPLE 7:
To create contrast, I applied some imitation.
For this, I once again made use of the registers of the guitar.
High to low to high to highest:
EXAMPLE 8:
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