Dal segno

In music notation, dal segno (, , ), often abbreviated as D.S., is used as a navigation marker. Defined as "from the sign" in Italian, D.S. appears in sheet music and instructs a musician to repeat a passage starting from the sign shown at right, sometimes called the segno in English.

Variants

The two main common variants are:

• D.S. al coda instructs the musician to go back to the sign, and when Al coda or To coda is reached jump to the coda symbol.
• D.S. al fine instructs the musician to go back to the sign, and end the piece at the measure marked fine.

The Sibelius 5 Reference manual had the following description:

Al segno indicates that the player should go to the sign: Da capo al segno (D.C. al Segno), "From the beginning to the sign (𝄋)."

In operas of the 18th century, a dal segno aria was a common alternative to a da capo aria, which began with an opening ritornello, and which was then omitted in the repeat (the sign being placed after the ritornello).

Encoding

The segno sign is encoded in the Musical Symbols block of Unicode as .

See also

• Coda
• Da capo
• Fermata
• Repeat sign

References

Bibliography

External links