where to start with studying scores

Can someone recommend a good score to start with and a process by which to study? My interests are mainly in classical music but something out side that would work just as well.

Thanks,

Michael

What exactly do you wish to achieve by studying this score? Do you want to study something in particular?

Also, you could tell us how much theory you know, and how advanced an analysis you want to get into. Three Blind Mice could be your next step, perhaps after that, the Rite of Spring.

I want to work on orchestration, harmony, counterpoint, and form to start. I have good grasp of chords and chord leading, I am currently working on counterpoint, and I have a good grasp on how major and minor scales are formed and how they work as well as modes. I can read all clefs and have a knowledge of how instruments transpose.

well, my advice is to only focus on one of those things rather than look at everything all at once, and to start some what small and build up from there.

you said you are working on counterpoint, so start there. (I recommend ComposerOrganist's lesson threads for starters. One of them is stickied, if you haven't done them yet.)

I think though that harmony would be something you should be famaliar with early on, then form, and orchestration later. i don't know many scores... so i can't help there, but really use the SEARCH BUTTON. There are a few VERY similar threads with in two pages of this one.

I hope this helped some.

oh, and welcome. :)

I am using fux's book on counterpoint. i may just find something easy for piano and work my way up.

OK, slow down. You are studying counterpoint? How are your voice leading skills? Can you do basic part-writing in root position, first and second inversion for both triads and seventh chords? What about non-chord tones - can you analyze them?

Take it slow, most universities will not have you study counterpoint until your junior year... your first academic musical training should be in aural and theoretical skills. Many composers move too fast and miss the fundamentals by a wide margin. "Score study" is a vague term, you should invest in a textbook ("Tonal Harmony" being the norm) or a tutor.

You've got plenty of time to learn!

Is this the third topic with the same theme?

Is this the third topic with the same theme?

Yes, I don't read. :ermm:

Score study is more important than textbooks. The wealth of learning is much greater. Textbooks simply impart the basic skills. Score study demonstrates firsthand how to employ the methods in creating the Art, in all its different nuances.

The most fruitful learning a student of composition can engage in is the systematic cataloguing of every device and technique used by other composers in their scores, and the resultant gathering of deductions from observing these.

You're just trying to be a Connie Contrary for very little reasony, especially since in your own post you support why I suggest textbooks. Basic skills are essential to efficient score study. Your second paragraph is vague and lacks any sort of direction for the said "student of composition". It's odd that you choose to bash so many of the works here, yet offer poor insight as to improve one's compositional and theoretical ability.

For what it's worth, when I started I started with the more recent [chronologically] books of the Norton Scores... I read a lot about R. Murray Schaefer before I even got there though.

A lot of focus on Stravinsky and Bartok and Berio was what my teacher gave me.