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Morning all, I am going to produce some learning material on here as part of my own studies to share & promote knowledge relating to baroque counterpoint. I have acquired the not inexpensive book, Baroque Counterpoint by Chistoph Neidhofer & Peter Schubert that I am thinking of translating into a workable guide on here. Disseminating this is as much for my learning as for the potential benefit of others. I am thinking of uploading one class per week. Stay tuned for these.

18th Century theoriest, Johann Mattheson, discusses the importance of imitation in counterpoint. He contrasts this with "melody and accompaniment", in which the melody is simply supported with corresponding harmony. He states that without imitation, music sounds "wooden". It is imitation that brings music to life through dialogue, the reason being that: we relate to musical dialogue like our own social world. Obviously, our social experiences are not singular but at least bi-directional. The usefulness of imitation extends beyond its aesthetic appeal; it is also a critical tool for developing a musical idea. From personal experience, producing a convincing dialogue/conversation in my own writing helps me consider where it might go next. Mattheson goes on to state that, for experienced composers, imitation becomes instinctive which is particularly useful in improvisation: against a given melody, thinking how it can be imitated becomes central to its corresponding solution. I conceived a melody of my own to practice this. Try to do the same: produce a short melody and consider how it might be imitated. Figure 1: a melody with basic accompaniment: Figure 2: the melody with imitation In my attempt, the imitation follows the rhythmic pattern of the melody a like a canon but without faithfulness to its script. Note that the bass is still primarily supportive of its harmony, following the voice leading outline shown in figure 1. Importantly, I used the do-re-mi schema (1-2-3) as the basis for this simple idea for it facilitates stepwise contrary motion in the bass (here this was useful in bar 3 where the bass rises to the Bb against the melody that descends to D. Making use of such schemas (see Robert Gjerdigen's 'Music in the Galant Style') can be useful for this sort of thing.