Counterpoint

By Walter Piston

Book Overview

In Counterpoint--for many years one of the most highly regarded texts in the field--the principles by which the contrapuntal element has operated in the works of composers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centures are presented. The counterpoint studied is the harmonic, rhythmic, instrumental style so well represented by the music of Bach. For it is this style that most of the composers who came after Bach, including those of our own time, have regarded as the ideal of contrapuntal technique. Piston's method in Counterpoint is to discover how music has been written rather than how it should be written. This book, in contrast to most traditional studies, states principles and gives rules that are based on actual observations of the practice of composers rather than those invented by the theorist. It offers examples drawn from the works of standard composers rather than those constructed by the author. The literature of the last three hundred years is examined to form the logical basis for this study. Throughout the book, exercises are provided that call for the writing of music and that are intended to clarify the principles under discussion.

Walter Piston, one of America's outstanding composers, created for this book an approach to the study of counterpoint that is stimulating and helpful to an understanding of the music of all times.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0393097285
• ISBN13: 9780393097283
• Release Date: February 1947
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.3" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Good

Not as good as Kennan's. Also the edition and style are really old. Doesn't have the same stature as Piston's Harmony.

The Broader View

Probably the most inspirational and thought-provoking counterpoint textbook. Walter Piston notes that all music is contrapuntal to some degree. He admonishes students not to make a 'fetish' of counterpoint, and discusses appositely (if tersely) the problem of twentieth-century counterpoint. I recommend this book to all musicians, but I would probably prefer to teach counterpoint with Kent Kennan's textbook.Also recommended: PENTATONIC SCALES FOR THE JAZZ-ROCK KEYBOARDIST by Jeff Burns