Invention in C major

Here I bring you the second invention (number 1st for ordering them). I'm planning to do 15 as Bach to improve as composer, but obviously these won't be as good as his, so don't expect too much!

Hello there! 

This does not remind me a lot of Bach, to be honest. He had a particularly intricate style of writing, much denser than other composers from his period. Because you quoted him and his style as your goal, I'll taylor my feedback in a particular way. What I say isn't necessarily a problem, but I think it strays your furder from your goal. 

First, I'd say that this composition stays in the middle of beign polyphonic and homophonic, as in many passages the voices serve as a simple accompaniment.

You can see this happening in the baroque period, for sure. Listen to this passage by Telemann, for instance:

It is a fugatto passage in the central section of his ouverture. The counterpoint is very simple, and there are parts in which the music simply becomes homophonic. That being said, even in the sections in which the "secondary" voices are playing accompanimental stacatto notes, you can see they have a particular shape to what they are playing. This makes so that a very simple counterpoint tighter and "better-built".

You cold also opt for a less contrapunctal texture, and dive into a more homophonic texture anyways. 

I'm definitely not saying it is easy by any means, but I think this is something to work on. 

I believe the small section that starts on M.15 demonstrates a good way on how to do this. It has harmonic cohesion, none of the voices feel left out, and sounds really nice. 

Also, a quick tip when it comes to doing this kind of exercises, is extracting a theme/motif/section from a piece of music from the period you want to write in, instead of writing it yourself. This guarantees that you have good material from the start. Once you get more comfortable in the style, then you can try and write your own ideas. 

Well, I hope this wasn't too pedantic, and I hope it actually helped you in any way.

All the best!

I like this one too!  This time you included a dominant-level statement of the motif in the exposition.  Your episodes venture into F major and A minor territory and you build some nice sequences and canonic imitation between the two voices.  I also agree with @Jean Szulc that your material sometimes seems accompanimental because it's so triadic and just outlining chords.  To counteract this kind of impression in a melody you could try including some passing tones or neighbor tones or appoggiaturas or escape tones in between the chord tones of your main motif.  For the counterpoint to the main motif you should also come up with something with a unique rhythmic and intervallic identity rather than just repeating one note, to help your voices be more independent for a polyphonic texture.  Although I'd personally be wary of doing too much model-writing (meaning using Baroque examples as the basis for your composition) because it might keep you from writing original melodies or making unique musical decisions.  This invention is clearly your own despite it's weaknesses and I'd love to hear more of that!  Thanks for sharing.

5 minutes ago, PaperComposer said:

This invention is clearly your own despite it's weaknesses and I'd love to hear more of that!

Agreed 100%. This was something I was trying to say, but didn't know how to put it. You sumarized it really well : )

2 hours ago, PaperComposer said:

I like this one too!  This time you included a dominant-level statement of the motif in the exposition.  Your episodes venture into F major and A minor territory and you build some nice sequences and canonic imitation between the two voices.  I also agree with @Jean Szulc that your material sometimes seems accompanimental because it's so triadic and just outlining chords.  To counteract this kind of impression in a melody you could try including some passing tones or neighbor tones or appoggiaturas or escape tones in between the chord tones of your main motif.  For the counterpoint to the main motif you should also come up with something with a unique rhythmic and intervallic identity rather than just repeating one note, to help your voices be more independent for a polyphonic texture.  Although I'd personally be wary of doing too much model-writing (meaning using Baroque examples as the basis for your composition) because it might keep you from writing original melodies or making unique musical decisions.  This invention is clearly your own despite it's weaknesses and I'd love to hear more of that!  Thanks for sharing.

 

Thanks a lot! I will try to remake this invention with the ideas you provided me!