Week 13 — Drill Studio · Two Voices, Heard from Inside

Course: MUS 155 Aural Skills I · Kenosis College
Instructor: Professor Hemsworth
Unit: Learning Unit 13 of 15 (Week 13) · two sessions per week
Objectives: SLO 1 · SLO 2 · SLO 3 · SLO 4
Drill Studio 13 · 20 points · Drill-studio group · In session, both meetings (session 1 and session 2) · documented make-up path below, full credit, submit by the end of the week
Format: the room becomes two rooms. Rounds in two groups, lines held against counter-lines, and — session 2 — a handoff: your week-15 final music, two weeks early.

Named in Music Theory I: progression norms, the four motion types, parallel and hidden fifths and octaves, crossing and overlap and range, tendency tones, writing a second voice. An hour later you stand inside those rules and hear why they exist.

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Part 1 — The big picture

Every rule the theory class wrote down this morning is an ear fact first. Two voices are only two voices while they move independently; the moment they lock into parallel fifths or octaves, your ear stops hearing a duet and starts hearing one voice in makeup — hollow, rigid, thickened. This week you prove that from inside the texture: you sing a round, you hold a line while another line argues with you, and you feel the two pulls every chart leans on — ti rises, the chordal seventh falls. Scope note, honestly: we stay in harmony-vocal, countermelody, and bass-line territory all week; counterpoint proper waits for MUS 158.

Part 2 — The rounds (both days)

The round is the oldest two-voice teacher there is: everyone learns ONE line, and the canon builds the texture for free. Session 1's round, learned in unison first. Here is the opening pair of phrases — the stepwise climb and the answering thirds:

KEY: F major    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
| F4/q G4/q A4/q F4/q | F4/q G4/q A4/q F4/q | A4/q Bb4/q C5/h | A4/q Bb4/q C5/h |

The third phrase runs quicker — eighth notes turning around the top before stepping home:

KEY: F major    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
| C5/e D5/e C5/e Bb4/e A4/q F4/q | C5/e D5/e C5/e Bb4/e A4/q F4/q |

And the tolling last phrase, do dropping to low sol and back — sing the leap cleanly and the whole round locks:

KEY: F major    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
| F4/q C4/q F4/h | F4/q C4/q F4/h |

Session 2's round moves to the compound lilt — one line, two groups, two bars apart:

KEY: C major    METER: 6/8    CLEF: treble
| C4/q. C4/q. | C4/q D4/e E4/q. | E4/q D4/e E4/q F4/e | G4/h. | C5/e C5/e C5/e G4/e G4/e G4/e | E4/e E4/e E4/e C4/e C4/e C4/e | G4/q F4/e E4/q D4/e | C4/h. |

Part 3 — Hunts, holds, and pulls

Motion types by ear (session 1). Professor Hemsworth plays two lines at once; you name how they move — contrary, oblique, similar, or parallel — with two hands before you say the word.

The parallel-fifths hunt (session 1). The same tune twice, different second line each time. One version is two independent voices; one is a single thickened voice. Your vote, then your reasons. You will hear the hollowness before you can define it — that's the design.

Sing one against one (both days). The week's core hold. You sing one line of a two-voice frame while the piano plays the other; then you swap. Frame A, in C — thirds walking together, then a contrary cadence where your ti rises home:

KEY: C major    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
U: | E4/h G4/h | F4/h A4/h | G4/h B4/h | C5/w |
L: | C4/h E4/h | D4/h F4/h | E4/h D4/h | C4/w |

Frame B moves the same game into E minor — same shape, darker color, and the raised ti (D♯) pulling the upper line's last step home:

KEY: e minor    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
U: | G4/h B4/h | A4/h C5/h | B4/h D#5/h | E5/w |
L: | E4/h G4/h | F#4/h A4/h | G4/h F#4/h | E4/w |

Tendency-tone singing (session 2). Both pulls in one sung line — up the dominant shape, the seventh falls, ti rises:

KEY: G major    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
| D4/q F#4/q A4/q C5/q | B4/q F#4/q G4/h |

Then you'll hear the pulls violated at the piano and point at the exact note that refused to resolve.

Outer-voice dictation preview (session 2). Two bars, two staves — bass and melody, slow, three hearings, bass first. A preview of Unit 14's centerpiece; today the win is simply keeping two lines apart on paper.

Solo hearings. Inside the one-against-one segments, 6–8 students per session hold a line alone against the piano — the standing rotation that reaches every voice about every two and a half weeks at a full section of 36; in a small room, everyone, both days.

Part 4 — YOUR PREPARED FINAL MATERIAL (distributed session 2)

These four melodies are the prepared final half of the week-15 performance: at the final you sing one of them (your choice) plus one at-sight melody. You get them now, two weeks early, because the break sits between Unit 14 and the final — the break is study time, not decay time. One melody a day, ten minutes, voice alone; the Unit 14 break protocol will build them in.

PF1 — G major, 4/4. Stepwise frame with one clean fifth drop, one sixth reach, and the low-register turn through ti:

KEY: G major    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
| G4/q A4/q B4/q C5/q | D5/h. B4/q | C5/q A4/q B4/q G4/q | A4/h D4/h | D4/q E4/q F#4/q G4/q | B4/q G4/q E4/h | C5/q A4/q F#4/q A4/q | G4/w |

PF2 — D minor, 3/4. Waltz frame; natural le leaning above sol and falling away, the harmonic lift (C♯) only at the cadence:

KEY: d minor    METER: 3/4    CLEF: treble
| D4/q E4/q F4/q | A4/h A4/q | Bb4/q A4/q G4/q | F4/h. | D5/q A4/q F4/q | G4/h E4/q | A4/q C#5/h | D5/h. |

PF3 — F major, 6/8. The compound lilt from session 2's round, now as a solo line:

KEY: F major    METER: 6/8    CLEF: treble
| F4/q. A4/q. | C5/q A4/e F4/q. | Bb4/q G4/e E4/q. | F4/h. | A4/e A4/e A4/e C5/e Bb4/e A4/e | G4/e G4/e G4/e Bb4/e A4/e G4/e | F4/q A4/e G4/q E4/e | F4/h. |

PF4 — E minor, 4/4, with a pickup. The widest of the four: an octave arch, then the melodic-minor climb (la–ti rising, te–le falling back):

KEY: e minor    METER: 4/4    CLEF: treble
| E4/q | G4/q B4/q E5/h | D5/q B4/q C5/h | A4/q B4/q C5/q A4/q | B4/h. G4/q | E4/q F#4/q G4/q A4/q | B4/q C#5/q D#5/q E5/q | D5/q C5/q B4/q G4/q | E4/h. |

Part 5 — Before session 1 (the prep step)

Run Tutorial 13 first — it drills the motion-type ⟷ interval-pair conversions the studio votes on, and the "why parallels collapse" logic in words, so in session 1 your ear only has to confirm what your head can already say.

Part 6 — What counts, and how

Participation is the grade: sing your line, vote in the hunt, lose the frame and re-enter it. 20 points, graded in session across the two meetings.

Criterion weights: perception 50 · realization 35 · labeling 15

A student who sings the right pitches with the wrong syllables loses only the labeling points. A student who sings the right syllables on the wrong pitches fails the item.

Criterion	Full	Partial	None
Perception — motion calls, hunt votes, and violated-pull spotting show real two-voice listening (10)	9–10	5–8	0–4
Realization — round lines and frame lines held, re-entered after capture, in any octave that fits, sung or played (7)	7	4–6	0–3
Labeling — motion names, syllable names, and the pulls named rightly when describing what you heard (3)	3	2	0–1

Part 7 — Missed a session? The make-up path

Full credit by the end of the week: (1) record the round-partner track from this week's submission page — it IS the round experience, self-generated; (2) record Frame A twice, once per line, against a slow played or generated version of the other line (any app, any instrument); (3) three sentences diagnosing your holds with the error classes. Submit clips + sentences under this studio's make-up assignment in Canvas. If you missed session 2, the prepared final set is in this page — print or copy it this week.

Why this makes you a better musician

Every harmony vocal you'll ever sing is this week's skill: a line that stays a line while the melody pulls at it. Now you know — by ear, from inside — when your part has independence and when it has collapsed into the tune it was supposed to color, and you know the two pulls that make a resolution feel inevitable.

Canvas placement block

canvas_object    = Assignment
title            = "Unit 13 Drill Studio — Two Voices, Heard from Inside"
assignment_group = "Drill studios"
points_possible  = 20
grading_type     = points
submission_types = [on_paper]        # graded in session; make-up: online_upload (clips + sentences)
due              = in session, both meetings; make-up by the end of the week
published        = true

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