Viewing the WesterParse Corpus

To test for compliance with Westergaard’s rules, I have assembled a small corpus of examples, including many from Westergaard’s book (these are identified by page number in the filename). There are over 70 single lines and over 50 examples of two-part counterpoint, some with errors and most without.

Using the Web-Based Corpus Viewer

Visit https://ada.artsci.wustl.edu/wp_web_project/corpus/

Using the Stand-Alone Corpus Viewer

Requires Tkinter, PIL (pillow), and MuseScore.

Navigate to the examples folder and then run the corpus viewer from the terminal.

$ python viewer.py

This will open a GUI.

Select a corpus to view: either lines or counterpoint.

Select a file in the list. The music will automatically display in the bottom panel.

If the file is a single line, you may select what line type to evaluate. Choose ‘any’ to get all of the possible parses.

If the file is counterpoint, you may choose either to evaluate the counterpoint or to display the the linear syntax (i.e., the parses of the lines). If you choose to display the syntax, be patient, as it takes several seconds for MuseScore to generate the image files that will be displayed onscreen. The viewer can display up to four parses. In most cases, the number of preferred parses does not exceed this number. The viewer displays a message indicating the total number of preferred parses.

Brief reports on parsing and voice leading are displayed above the music.