Burney describes Neapolitan conservatory students "pounding out" accompaniment exercises that were full of "jargon and dissonance" in his history of music and Robert Gjerdingen suggests that these exercises were partimenti. Assuming that Gjerdingen is correct, does Burney's statement imply that students did not get the partimento down perfectly at the first go, but rather would have to work at it a bit? If this is the case, would teachers have occasionally had students write out realizations to better understand what they were playing?
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2What is the Burney book/article? – Michael Curtis Apr 17 '19 at 22:33
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This is the article where I found the reference, but it appears to be an excerpt from Burney's General History of Music. faculty-web.at.northwestern.edu/music/gjerdingen/Papers/… – Cayden Johnson Apr 18 '19 at 1:38
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Related question. – guidot Apr 18 '19 at 7:20
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it's just pattern exercises, templates that you can then modify for the sake of improv. so you need to practice and memorize them. youtube.com/watch?v=nubC3dktQ24 – user34288 Apr 18 '19 at 13:11
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But the question is if written realization was a part of the teaching. It's already clear performance practice was the basic method. – Michael Curtis Apr 18 '19 at 13:26
The book "The Art of Partimento" by Sanguinetti contains a history of partimento, and an exposition of the practice, by way of the author's study of the subject, and through direct translations of the original Italian (Venetian) manuscripts on the teaching of partimento. It may have the answers you seek. It is, in my opinion, the best musical text one can find.
