Answering Voice, The - The Beginnings of Counterpoint

A Sequel to The Anatomy of Melody. The Answering Voice opens our ears and voices to a new way of understanding counterpoint. Drawing on her fifty years of composing and teaching, Alice Parker envisions a theory or composition class where everyone sings. Great melodies are the basic material: they teach us how to create great responses. Instead of a written line constructed by ancient rules, two singers play a game in song. One sings the melody in a way that invites an answer, and the other improvises an immediate response. Often the answering voice finds only one or two notes to echo. But these are the beginning of a two-part choral arrangement that grows out of the melody itself. Musicians learn how to enter fearlessly into group improvisation, then how to plan an entire arrangement based on improvised ideas. Creating that second voice is both a challenge and a delight. It is in many ways the beginning of the craft of the composer, something different from the gift. Composers, conductors, singers, instrumentalists, teachers, and students at all levels will be challenged and rewarded by this sound-based approach to theory. We write what we sing, rather than the other way around. We are making music as we learn how ideas drawn from living sound may grow into a complete setting. But you—the reader-singer—must bring the song to life before any words or printed notes can become music. Can we create an answer worthy of the song?