I know nothing.
How would I teach myself? By listening or reading the best, composers, songwriters, arrangers?
Below are some elements.
Possibly the best approach is to study the best at any time. Bach and of course Bach Bass Rules. [Bach, Niedt].
For example Mozart on the female vocal parts of Confutatis is writting his masterpiece using a very important rule contained in the Bach, Niedt manual:
The seventh with respect to bass is prepared and then the third wrt bass added.
So for example sopranos may be sustaining a B, bass becomes C and altos play the third ie E while sopranos keep singing the 7th B. Then similarly E becomes the prepared 7th of the chord F A E. So the other women sing the A ie the 3rd with respect to the new bass F. This goes on and a harmonic chain is created.
In order to understand the Bach, Niedt manual we have to know the key or musical scale with which we currently compose so that we know the allowed notes to be used which normally should be seven. For example E minor has all white notes except F sharp.
It helps tremendously to know that allowed chord notes are derived from the simple rule: The set of Harmony notes to choose above bass is 1 3 5 7 9 11 13. We do not have to use all notes, we choose what we like or what sounds best. Like a good chef does not use all ingredients at the same time. Just few ones.
For example on above example Confutatis - Mozart.
At a moment in time we may have violin playing bass D, a group of singers singing prepared C (the 7th) and the other singers singing F (the 3rd), and that is all. (Prepared C comes from having women singing C and E simultaneously and then keeping C and the rest women moving from singing E to singing F). Mozart at this particular masterpiece of human intellect uses just 3 parts or voices. The 3rd part is the violin which has the role of bass.
The simplest hint is to use notes that belong to the key otherwise it may sound nonsense. But we may use different sharps or flats when we might like to modulate to a different key.
Another effective hint is keeping some parts constant, or pedal as just mentioned on Confutatis.
Another example is the last few bars of Chiquitita-ABBA where an A (La) is continuously sung while other parts change. On this example there is bass step down change.
Another obvious hint is to give to the voices the notes of the chord. So we must know the chord, (harmony, or bass number code). For example if key is A minor (all notes white) and bass code is F9. The chord is F A G and each voice may sing one of these notes.
Even just 2 voices can sound great. The second voice may sing the chord as melody. For example B minor sung as Si FA FA Re as on Idlewild - Travis at 2:35 subtly heard on left channel if listening softly with headphones.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LjeCN1DObYc
Even 2 independent melodies each sounding nice can make a nice combination full of hopefully nice surprises.
There is also the simple parallel 3rds or the inversion parallel 6ths. For example Silent Night, the melody is G A G E, the second voice can E F E C. If at some point it sound wrong the chord at that post must be consulted and using a note belonging to this chord.
And of cource the most obvious of all but overlooked rule: That we must use notes belonging to the key or musical scale. Any such note will do. For example the masterpiece I am not in Love - 10cc. Each note had been multiple recorded and assigned to a desk fader.[Cunningham]
See also:
https://euroelectron.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-2-vocal-parts-of-sounds-of-silence.html
Bach Bass Rules - Bach, Niedt - PDF
Harmony - Piston
Good Vibrations - Cunningham
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