🎼 DV Music Language — Full Dictionary & Working Specification

Text • Rhythm • Harmony • Voice • Percussion • Expression • Multilingual Writing • Visual Notation

Working Draft / Pre-License Edition

By Ronen Kolton Yehuda (MKR: Messiah King RKY)

Developed with the assistance of AI

Important Note — An Evolving Language

DV Music Language is still being developed, tested and expanded.

This document presents the current language together with several working recommendations and proposed extensions. Before a final licensing system and formal specification are established, symbols, shortcuts, terminology and implementation details may still change. New capabilities may be added, existing syntax may be simplified, and multilingual conventions may be refined together with musicians, educators, software developers, institutions and native speakers.

The intention of this document is therefore not to freeze DV Music Language prematurely, but to give it a clear, comprehensive working dictionary from which further standardization can grow.

1. What Is DV Music Language?

DV Music Language — part of DV Language / David’s Violin Language — is a textual and visual system for describing music in a form that can be read by people, computers, software and AI.

At its simplest, a musical event can be written as:

Do4Q

This contains three pieces of information:

Do = pitch

4 = octave
Q = duration

A musical line can therefore become readable text:

| Do4Q ; Re4Q ; Mi4Q ; Fa4Q |

The same basic language can describe melody, harmony, rhythm, rests, percussion, singing, scale degrees, frequencies, chords, slides, bends, bowing, multiple instrumental parts and more.

The present DV Composer implements many of these elements directly, including boxes, duration mathematics, notes, accidentals, fractional durations, rests, repeats, slides, bends, chords, degrees, frequencies, piano hands, tuplets, percussion, multilingual solfège and notes that carry across boxes.

DV Music Language is not intended to eliminate traditional staff notation. It offers another musical representation: one especially suited to text, education, digital environments, accessibility, software, AI and interactive musical instruments.

2. The DV Musical Box

Time in DV Music Language is organized into boxes.

A box commonly corresponds to a musical measure:

| ... |

For example, in 4/4:

| Do4Q ; Re4Q ; Mi4Q ; Fa4Q |

Each quarter note occupies one beat, producing four beats in the box.

The recommended event separator is:

;

A comma may also be used where supported:

,

The final ending can be written:

||

So:

| Do4Q ; Re4Q ; Mi4Q ; Fa4Q ||

means a complete musical box followed by the end of the musical section or piece.

The regular Composer presently calculates boxes mathematically. With its current resolution, a quarter equals 24 ticks, and the box capacity is calculated from the number of beats.

3. NEW WORKING RECOMMENDATION — Music Before the First Box

DV Music Language should also permit music before the first vertical box line.

This is useful for an anacrusis, pickup, lead-in or introductory musical gesture.

For example:

Sol4E ; La4E | Do5Q ; Si4Q ; La4H |

Here:

Sol4E ; La4E

is played first.

The first formal box begins only when the first | is reached.

In this interpretation, playback begins with the first written event, while the regular box count begins at the first box boundary.

This gives composers two legitimate approaches.

Direct box opening:

| Do4Q ; Re4Q ; Mi4Q ; Fa4Q |

Pickup before Box 1:

Sol4E ; La4E | Do5Q ; Si4Q ; La4H |

A composer who prefers everything to remain inside boxes can instead represent an opening delay using rests:

| 0H ; Sol4Q ; La4Q |

These approaches are musically different and should both be possible.

The pre-box form is a proposed DV extension and should eventually be supported explicitly by DV software.

4. Pitch

DV permits several ways of identifying pitch.

Solfège

Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Si

Example:

Do4Q

International letter notation

C D E F G A B

Example:

C4Q

Scale degrees

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

The current Composer supports degree-based writing together with root, scale and octave information. Extended and altered degrees can also be represented.

Examples:

1Q ; 2Q ; 3Q ; 4Q

1#Q

2bQ

1.1Q

where the additional octave modifier can place the degree above or below its base register.

Frequency

DV can also address pitch directly as frequency:

440HzQ

523.25HzQ

This makes the same language useful for conventional musicians, acoustics, synthesis, software and machine-controlled instruments.

5. Octaves

Octaves use numerical identification.

Examples:

Do3

Do4Do5

Therefore:

Do4Q

means Do, octave 4, quarter duration.

The octave remains an independent part of the musical token so that pitch class and register are both immediately visible.

6. Accidentals

Sharps and flats may be included directly.

Examples:

Do#4Q

Do4#Q

Dob4Q

Do4bQ

The symbols ♯ and ♭ may also be used where supported.

7. Duration Dictionary

The compact duration vocabulary presently includes:

Duration	DV	Fraction
Double whole	`D`	`(2/1)`
Whole	`W`	`(1/1)`
Half	`H`	`(1/2)`
Quarter	`Q`	`(1/4)`
Eighth	`E`	`(1/8)`
Sixteenth	`S`	`(1/16)`
Thirty-second	`T`	`(1/32)`

Therefore:

Do4Q

and

Do4(1/4)

express the same basic duration.

Likewise:

Do4D

and

Do4(2/1)

represent a double whole duration — twice the duration of a whole note.

Fractional writing is not limited to subdivisions smaller than a whole. It can express durations shorter than, equal to, or longer than one whole unit.

For example:

(1/8) = one eighth

(1/4) = one quarter

(1/2) = one half

(1/1) = one whole

(2/1) = two wholes / double whole

(3/1) = three whole-note durations

(4/1) = four whole-note durations

Thus:

Do4(4/1)

means that Do4 continues for the duration of four whole notes.

The numerator and denominator therefore provide a flexible mathematical way of defining musical duration. This allows DV Music Language to represent conventional note values as well as longer or more unusual durations without requiring a separate letter shortcut for every possible value.

8. Dotted Durations

DV Music Language may represent a dotted duration in two equivalent ways:

. = dotted duration

* = dotted duration

For example:

Do4Q.

or:

Do4Q*

Both mean dotted quarter.

Likewise:

Do4H.

or:

Do4H*

Both mean dotted half.

The dot or star extends the original duration by one half of its value.

For example:

Q. = Q* = (3/8)

because:

1/4 + 1/8 = 3/8

The same principle applies to fractional notation:

Do4(1/4).

or:

Do4(1/4)*

Double-dotted durations

Two marks can represent a double-dotted duration:

Do4Q..

or:

Do4Q**

The second dot adds one quarter of the original duration.

Therefore:

Q.. = Q** = (7/16)

because:

1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 = 7/16

This allows both the familiar musical dot and the existing DV * shorthand to remain valid.

9. Flexible Fractional Durations and Multipliers

Fraction notation gives DV Music Language an open-ended duration system.

A duration can be written directly as a mathematical relationship:

Do4(3/8)

Do4(5/16)

Do4(2/1)

Do4(4/1)

This means the language is not restricted to a fixed list of traditional duration names.

For example:

Do4(3/1)

means three whole-note durations.

Do4(4/1)

means four whole-note durations.

Do4(3/4)

means three quarters of a whole-note duration.

Do4(5/8)

means five eighths.

DV may also retain the X multiplier as a convenient shorthand.

For example:

QX4

means four quarter-duration units, equivalent to one whole.

WX2

means two whole-duration units, equivalent to:

D

or:

(2/1)

Likewise:

WX4

is equivalent to:

(4/1)

This gives the composer several equivalent ways to express duration: a traditional DV shortcut, an exact fraction, or a multiplication of a base duration.

10. Triplets and General Tuplets

DV should support both a short form and an explicit mathematical form.

Short form

The current regular Composer allows the tuplet number directly after the duration.

For a triplet:

Do4Q3

Re4Q3

Mi4Q3

The 3 tells the interpreter that the base duration is subdivided into three equal parts. The same mechanism can be generalized:

Q5

for a five-part subdivision,

Q7

for seven,

and so forth.

The regular Composer already applies the same suffix principle to notes, rests and percussion.

Explicit indexed form

For education, analysis and more complicated tuplets, DV also has the older [i/n] concept.

A three-note group can therefore be represented explicitly as:

Do4Q[1/3] ; Re4Q[2/3] ; Mi4Q[3/3]

The numbers show both the position inside the group and the number of equal divisions.

A quintuplet may similarly be written:

Do4Q[1/5] ; Re4Q[2/5] ; Mi4Q[3/5] ; Fa4Q[4/5] ; Sol4Q[5/5]

This is particularly useful when looking at the structure visually or teaching irregular subdivisions. Earlier DV Composer documentation already used the indexed [i/n] principle for tuplets.

So DV can provide both:

Fast shorthand: Q3

and

Explicit mathematical notation: [1/3] [2/3] [3/3]

11. Rests and Silence

Silence occupies musical time just as sound does.

DV supports forms such as:

0Q

RestQ

RQ

MuteQ

MQ

and corresponding fractional forms such as:

0(1/4)

A complete silent box may be represented simply by a full-box mute or rest where supported.

Example:

| 0 |

A rest is therefore not “nothing.” It is a timed event.

12. Chords and Simultaneous Events

The + symbol represents simultaneity.

Example:

Do4+Mi4+Sol4Q

This means that Do, Mi and Sol start together.

The + system also applies to percussion:

KE+HhE

where two percussion events occur simultaneously.

DV also supports conventional Western chord naming in compatible software:

CQ

CmQ

C7Q

Cmaj7Q

and other chord qualities as implementation develops.

Notes Written Together — Horizontally or Vertically

DV Music Language may also allow notes to be grouped together without a sequential separator, meaning that they begin at the same time.

Normally:

;

or, where supported:

,

moves the music to the next event.

For example:

Do4Q ; Mi4Q ; Sol4Q

means that the notes are played one after another.

Horizontal simultaneity

If the notes are written together without a separator:

Do4QMi4QSol4Q

they may be interpreted as beginning simultaneously.

The explicit + form can express the same idea:

Do4Q+Mi4Q+Sol4Q

So both forms may represent notes that start together.

Vertical simultaneity

The same musical event may also be written vertically, with the notes stacked one above another:

Do4Q

Mi4QSol4Q

When these notes occupy the same vertical event position rather than being separated as successive events, they are understood as starting together.

This is especially natural for chords, harmony, orchestral parts and the DV visual layer, where simultaneity can be understood spatially as vertical alignment.

Therefore, DV can represent the same simultaneous event in several ways:

Explicit horizontal form

Do4Q+Mi4Q+Sol4Q

Horizontal form

Do4QMi4QSol4Q

Or

Do4Q Mi4Q Sol4Q

Vertical form

Do4Q

Mi4QSol4Q

All three may express the same basic musical relationship: the notes begin together.

The general principle is:

A separator advances to the next event; notes grouped together horizontally or aligned vertically can belong to the same event.

The explicit + remains useful when maximum clarity is needed, while compact adjacency and vertical stacking provide alternative ways to write and visualize the same musical structure.

This is a working syntax recommendation and should be standardized carefully so that the distinction between sequential and simultaneous events remains clear for both human readers and software.

13. Independent Durations and Pedal/Overlay Writing

Simultaneous notes do not necessarily have to end together.

For example:

Mi3W + Mi4Q ; Fa4Q ; Sol4Q ; Mi4Q

The low Mi begins together with the first upper note and continues for the whole duration while the upper voice keeps moving.

This makes DV capable of expressing sustained pedals, multiple voices and contrapuntal textures within the same textual system. The regular Composer now supports this type of independent-duration overlay.

14. Slides

The recommended DV slide form is:

-S-

Example:

Do4E-S-Mi4E

This indicates continuous motion from the first pitch toward the second.

The current regular Composer recognizes this structure for both notes and degrees.

For example:

1Q-S-3Q

The principle is important: DV does not describe only which pitches exist, but can describe movement between pitches.

15. Bends

The recommended compact bend form is:

-B-

Example:

Do5Q-B-Si4Q

The current regular Composer distinguishes slide and bend behavior: the slide travels through the transition, while the bend is interpreted as a different expressive pitch movement.

Earlier DV development also explored directional bend forms:

-BU- = bend up

-BD- = bend down

These can remain available as possible extended forms where explicit direction is useful, while -B- remains the simpler general structure.

16. NEW — Phrase Beginning and Phrase Ending

Musical language needs a simple way to show not only measures, but phrases.

A working recommendation is to reserve:

/ = beginning of phrase

\ = end of phrase

Visually, / rises and can suggest an opening or beginning.

\ falls and can suggest closure.

Example:

/ Do4Q ; Re4Q ; Mi4Q ; Sol4H \

This creates a visual envelope around the phrase without interfering with the notes themselves.

A longer example:

/ Do4Q ; Re4Q ; Mi4Q | Fa4Q ; Sol4H \

The phrase can therefore cross a box boundary.

This proposal also solves another problem: / and \ do not need to serve as alternate slide symbols. Slides already have the clearer -S- form, while bends have -B-.

Earlier experimental DV violin documentation mentioned slash/backslash as optional alternative bow marks. Under this new working recommendation, it is cleaner to reserve / and \ for phrase boundaries and retain > and < for bow direction.

This phrase notation is a new proposed extension, not yet a finalized standard.

17. Bow Direction and String Performance

DV has existing keyboard-friendly bow symbols:

> = down-bow

< = up-bow

- = continue/same bow

^ = accent

Example:

V| >Sol4Q ; <La4Q ; >Si4Q |

Fingering may also accompany the event:

2>Fa4E

1<Mi4E

The existing Orchestra documentation preserves these marks in the text even when the present playback engine does not yet reproduce every physical bowing distinction.

This illustrates an important DV principle: performance instructions can coexist directly with the musical event instead of requiring an entirely separate notation layer.

18. Right Hand, Left Hand and Performer Layers

DV can identify who performs a line.

Examples include:

R| ... | = right hand

L| ... | = left hand

P| ... | = piano

V| ... | = violin

G| ... | = guitar

B| ... | = bass

D| ... | = drums/percussion

S| ... | = singer/voice

The general dictionary already uses this performer-prefix principle.

A piano composition might therefore be:

R| Do5Q ; Re5Q ; Mi5H |

L| Do3H ; Sol2H |

Both layers share the timeline.

19. Voice, Singing and Lyrics

Voice is a first-class musical layer in DV Music Language.

Lyrics may be connected directly with pitch and duration.

General form:

Pitch "Lyric" Duration

For example:

Do4 "Hel-" E

Re4 "lo" E

A phrase might be:

S| Do4 "Hel-" E ; Re4 "lo" E ; Mi4 "my" Q ; Fa4 "friend" Q |

A hyphen can divide syllables.

"_"

can indicate continuation or melisma without introducing a new syllable.

DV also permits timed speech without a defined pitch:

S| "Stop!"Q ; 0Q ; "Now."Q ; 0Q |

This vocal syntax is already described in the existing DV Language materials.

Because the lyric itself is ordinary Unicode text, singing can naturally use English, Hebrew, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Hindi, Thai or other scripts.

20. Drums and Percussion

Percussion follows the same temporal grammar as pitched music.

Current DV shorthand includes examples such as:

K = kick

S = snare

T1 / T2 / T3 = toms

Hh or earlier Hc forms = closed hi-hat

Ho = open hi-hat

Cr / Cc = crash

Tr = triangle

Rm = rim/rimshot depending on the specific mapping

Cl = clap

A simple pattern can be written:

| KQ ; SQ ; KQ ; SQ |

Layered percussion can use +:

| KE+HhE ; HhE ; SE+HhE ; HhE |

The fundamental principle is identical to melodic DV:

instrument identity + duration + position in time.

Tuplets apply to drums as well:

KQ3

and rests behave identically.

This is important because rhythm should not be treated as a secondary part of DV Music Language. Percussion is one of its central musical vocabularies.

21. Multilingual DV Music Language

Multilingual writing should go considerably further than simply translating the names of Do, Re and Mi.

The current Composer already demonstrates equivalent note writing in multiple scripts, including Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Russian, Hindi, Thai and others.

Examples include:

Chinese:

哆来咪发唆拉西

Japanese:

ドレミファソラシ

Korean:

도 레 미 파 솔 라 시

Hindi:

सा रे ग म प ध नि

Thai:

โด เร มี ฟา ซอล ลา ซี

But the long-term multilingual DV system should permit much more.

The entire musical vocabulary can be localized.

That includes:

pitch names, durations, rests, percussion, instrument names, commands, expressive terminology, phrase markings, interfaces and shortcuts.

The internal musical meaning remains identical.

22. Localized Duration Shortcuts

English W H Q E S T should remain valid because it is compact and already widely implemented.

But it should not be the only possible shortcut system.

A DV language profile should be capable of mapping local words, characters or numerals to the same canonical duration.

For example, conceptually:

Chinese

哆4(四分) → Do4Q

Japanese

ド4(四分) → Do4Q

Korean

도4(4분음) → Do4Q

Hindi

सा4(१/४) → Do4Q

Thai

โด4(๑/๔) → Do4Q

These examples illustrate the architecture rather than declaring the final abbreviations for each language.

The final native shortcuts should be tested with native speakers and music educators.

The important principle is:

DV syntax belongs to musical meaning, not to the English alphabet.

A user should eventually be able to work substantially within their own script while the software converts everything internally into the same DV musical events.

23. Multilingual Percussion

The same principle should extend to percussion.

Today:

KQ

can mean kick quarter.

A multilingual DV implementation could also accept native-script aliases.

Illustrative examples:

Chinese:

底鼓(四分)

Japanese:

キック(四分)

Korean:

킥(4분음)

Hindi:

किक(१/४)

Thai:

คิก(๑/๔)

All could resolve internally to the same event:

KickQ

The same would apply to snare, hi-hat, toms, cymbals, claps and other percussion.

Native-script abbreviations could later become even shorter once each language profile is formally designed.

24. Multilingual Numbers and Numerical Localization

DV Music Language should support multilingual numerical writing, not only multilingual note names and words.

A musician should be able to use the numeral system that naturally belongs to their language or script, while the software internally understands the same numerical musical value.

For example, the universal tuplet form:

[1/3] [2/3] [3/3]

could also be written using other numeral systems.

Western / International digits

[1/3] [2/3] [3/3]

Hindi / Devanagari digits

[१/३] [२/३] [३/३]

Here:

१ = 1

२ = 2३ = 3

So:

Do4Q[१/३] ; Re4Q[२/३] ; Mi4Q[३/३]

would have exactly the same musical meaning as:

Do4Q[1/3] ; Re4Q[2/3] ; Mi4Q[3/3]

Thai digits

[๑/๓] [๒/๓] [๓/๓]

Here:

๑ = 1

๒ = 2๓ = 3

Example:

โด4Q[๑/๓] ; เร4Q[๒/๓] ; มี4Q[๓/๓]

Bengali digits

Another numeral system used in India and Bangladesh could also be recognized:

[১/৩] [২/৩] [৩/৩]

Here:

১ = 1

২ = 2৩ = 3

Arabic-Indic digits

A future Arabic DV language profile could similarly accept:

[١/٣] [٢/٣] [٣/٣]

Extended example — quintuplet

Western:

[1/5] [2/5] [3/5] [4/5] [5/5]

Devanagari:

[१/५] [२/५] [३/५] [४/५] [५/५]

Thai:

[๑/๕] [๒/๕] [๓/๕] [๔/๕] [๕/๕]

Bengali:

[১/৫] [২/৫] [৩/৫] [৪/৫] [৫/৫]

The same multilingual-number principle could apply throughout DV Music Language, including:

tuplets — [१/३]

octaves — सा४Q

scale degrees — १ २ ३ ४ ५ ६ ७

fractions and durations — (१/४)

time signatures — ४/४

box numbers and measure numbers

tempo values

and other numerical musical information.

The important principle is:

The numerical script may change, but the musical value remains the same.

DV software can normalize each supported numeral system internally, allowing musicians to write music naturally in their own language and script without being forced to switch back to Western digits.

25. The DV Visual Layer

DV Music Language is primarily textual, but it also has a complementary visual notation layer.

The guiding concept is:

Pitch becomes color.

Time becomes space.
Harmony becomes stacking.

The visual system does not replace DV text. It is another representation of the same underlying musical information.

26. Pitch as Color

The current working DV palette is:

Do / C → Red

Re / D → Orange

Mi / E → Yellow

Fa / F → Green

Sol / G → Cyan / Teal

La / A → Blue

Si / B → Purple / Violet

The exact shades remain a working design rather than a final manufacturing standard. The stable principle is that the same pitch identity keeps the same color family.

Accidentals can occupy blended colors between neighboring natural pitches.

Accidentals as Mixed Colors

In the DV visual layer, sharps and flats are represented by mixed or intermediate colors between adjacent natural-note colors.

For example, a pitch between Do and Re would use a blended color between the color of Do and the color of Re.

This means that chromatic notes are shown visually as transitions within the color spectrum, rather than as isolated unrelated colors.

27. Octave as Brightness

In the DV visual system:

Hue = pitch.

Brightness = octave.

Therefore a low Do and a high Do remain members of the same red family, but the higher Do becomes visually brighter while the lower Do becomes darker.

This preserves pitch identity while making register visible.

28. Duration as Length

A DV visual note is not merely a colored square.

Its horizontal size expresses duration.

A whole note occupies more space than a half note.

A half occupies more than a quarter.

An eighth is shorter again.

Thus:

color tells us what pitch it is;

length tells us how long it lasts.

The musical box becomes a spatial puzzle that must be filled correctly.

29. Harmony as Vertical Stacking

Notes that begin together can be stacked vertically.

Therefore:

Do4+Mi4+Sol4Q

becomes a vertical stack of the colors belonging to Do, Mi and Sol.

The chord can be seen as geometry as well as read as text.

Multiple voices can similarly occupy separate lanes while remaining aligned to the same DV time boxes.

30. Visual Rests

Silence must occupy visual space too.

A rest may therefore appear as a neutral, transparent or otherwise distinguished block of the correct length.

A quarter rest still occupies a quarter of the timeline.

This allows rhythm to remain visually exact even when no sound occurs.

31. Visual Percussion

Percussion can have its own visual block vocabulary.

The current visual concept proposes shape families such as different forms for kick, snare, hi-hat, toms, claps and cymbals.

Duration remains block length.

Simultaneous percussion remains stacking.

Percussion may use neutral shapes or a separate family-color system so that pitch colors remain reserved for pitched notes.

This gives DV a unified visual timeline for melody, harmony, bass and percussion.

32. Text Inside the Visual Layer

Color should never be the sole carrier of musical information.

A block may contain its textual identity:

Do4Q

or its degree representation.

Patterns, textures, borders and text can provide additional redundancy for color-blind users, printing environments and educational situations.

The visual layer can therefore remain fully connected with the textual language rather than becoming a separate notation system.

33. Multilingual Visual Blocks

The visual layer can itself be multilingual.

The same red quarter-length block could be labeled:

Do4Q

哆4...

ド4...

도4...

सा4...

or another supported language form.

Its color, duration, position and musical meaning remain unchanged.

This is particularly powerful because the visual grammar can remain universal while the text displayed inside it follows the musician’s language.

34. Spillover and Notes Across Boxes

Musical duration does not always stop simply because a new box begins.

DV therefore supports notes that continue across the box boundary.

The current Composer can calculate a note whose duration exceeds the remaining capacity in one box and carry the unused duration into the following box.

This allows DV boxes to behave as real musical time containers rather than forcing every note to end artificially at a boundary.

35. Repeats

Repeat sections can use:

|:

and

:|

Example:

|: Do4Q ; Mi4Q ; Sol4Q ; Mi4Q :|

The present demo interprets a simple repeat section as playing twice. More advanced endings and repeat logic can be developed further.

36. Metadata and Musical Context

Information can be written above the notation.

For example:

[BPM:120]

[Time:4/4]

[Key:C]

[Scale:Major]

This is especially important for degree notation because the meaning of 1, 2, 3, etc. depends on scale and tonal context.

Future metadata can continue to grow without changing the fundamental event syntax.

37. One Musical Idea, Many Representations

The same event can exist in several forms.

A quarter-note C could appear as:

Do4Q

C4Q

a degree such as:

1Q

a frequency:

261.63HzQ

a localized DV token,

or a red DV visual block of quarter length.

These are not necessarily separate languages.

They are different representations of the same musical event.

This is one of the most important architectural ideas of DV Music Language.

38. Human and Machine Readability

Because DV Music Language is structured text, software can parse:

pitch,

octave,

duration,

simultaneity,

instrument,

voice,

lyrics,

articulation,

phrase structure,

rhythmic subdivision,

box position,

scale degree,

frequency

and other metadata.

At the same time, the notation is intended to remain understandable to a human reader without requiring a specialized graphical score editor.

This dual nature makes DV suitable for composition software, educational applications, AI systems, robotics, digital instruments, interactive visualizations and conversion between text, sound and visual notation.

39. Current Core vs. Developing Extensions

It is useful to distinguish between what is already established in the working ecosystem and what is being proposed for further standardization.

Established / substantially implemented working vocabulary

Boxes and separators

Pitch + octave + duration

Solfège and letter notation

Accidentals

W/H/Q/E/S/T durations

Fractional durations

Dotted durations

Rests and mutes

Chords and simultaneous events

Degree notation

Frequency notation

Right/left-hand writing

Slides

Bends

Triplets and tuplets

Pedal/independent overlays

Percussion

Repeats

Multilingual note names

Spillover across boxes

Vocal/lyric notation in the wider DV specification

Bowing and fingering metadata

DV visual/color notation

Proposed or still-developing standardization

/ phrase opening and \ phrase closing

Music/pickups before the first formal box

Full native-language duration aliases

Full native-language percussion aliases

Native-script shortcut dictionaries

Expanded articulation vocabulary

Directional and more complex bend vocabulary

More formal phrase syntax

Additional visual-material rules

Expanded multilingual parsing

Further accessibility standards

Formal licensing and institutional standardization

40. A Combined Example

A future DV score could combine many layers:

[BPM:96] [Time:4/4] [Key:C] [Scale:Major]

Pickup:

Sol4E ; La4E

Melody:

R| / Do5Q ; Re5Q ; Mi5Q ; Sol5Q | Fa5H ; Mi5Q ; Re5Q \ ||

Bass:

L| Do3W | Sol2W ||

Voice:

S| Do4 "Hel-" E ; Re4 "lo" E ; Mi4 "world" H ; 0H ||

Percussion:

D| KE+HhE ; HhE ; SE+HhE ; HhE ; KE+HhE ; HhE ; SE+HhE ; HhE ||

A slide could appear as:

Do5E-S-Mi5E

A bend as:

Sol5Q-B-La5Q

A triplet as:

Do5Q3 ; Re5Q3 ; Mi5Q3

or explicitly:

Do5Q[1/3] ; Re5Q[2/3] ; Mi5Q[3/3]

All of these can ultimately be interpreted as events on one synchronized musical timeline.

41. Toward a Complete DV Music Language

DV Music Language is evolving toward something broader than a substitute set of note symbols.

It is a musical information language.

It can express:

what is played,

when it is played,
how long it lasts,
what sounds together,
who performs it,
how pitch moves,
how a phrase begins and ends,
what words are sung,
what percussion is struck,
what scale function a sound has,
what frequency it represents,

and how that information can be seen visually.

It can also present those ideas in different human languages while preserving the same musical meaning underneath.

That is central to the DV vision:

One musical structure, many ways to read it.

Text can become sound.

Sound can become visual structure.

A visual block can become text.

A melody can be expressed as notes, degrees, frequencies or localized scripts.

A human can read it.

A computer can parse it.

An AI can reason about it.

A performer can play it.

And a learner can see music not as an inaccessible page of symbols, but as structured musical language.

Status of This Dictionary

This document is a working DV Music Language dictionary and specification, not the final licensed standard.

It collects the language as it exists today while proposing a clearer path toward its future standardization.

Some symbols may change. Some may be replaced. New ones will certainly be added.

That is part of developing a living language.

DV Music Language / David’s Violin Language

Created and developed by Ronen Kolton Yehuda (MKR: Messiah King RKY).

Explore the DV Language Ecosystem

Articles About DV Language

The DV Language: A Textual System for Music, Movement, Theater, and Time-Based Arts

https://ronenkoltonyehuda.substack.com/p/the-dv-language-a-textual-system

DV Music Composition and Production Tools

DVMLCOP — DV Music Language Composer Orchestra Pro — Demo V1

https://dvmusiclanguagecomposerorchestrapro.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Music Composer Studio — Demo V1

https://dvmusiccomposerstudio.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DVLC — DV Language Composer — Demo V1

https://dv-language-composer-demo-v1.pages.dev/

DVLCO — DV Language Composer Orchestra — Demo V1

https://dv-language-composer-orchestra-demo.pages.dev/

DV Music Language Composer Pro — Demo V1

https://dvmusiclanguagecomposerprodemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Music Language Runner — Demo V1

https://dvmusiclanguagerunnerdemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Music Language Runner 3D — Demo V1

https://dvmusiclanguagerunnerdemov13d.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Music Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvmusiclanguageplayerdemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV SnapScore Player — Demo V1

https://dvsnapscoreplayer.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Time and Performance

DV Cuckoo Clock Player — Demo V1

https://dvcuckooclockplayer.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev

DV Theater and Dance

DV Theater Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvtheaterlanguageplayerdemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Classical Dance Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvclassicaldanceplayerdemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Martial Arts Language Players

DV Karate Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvkaratelanguagecomposer-demov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Samurai Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvsamurailanguageplayer-demov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Chinese Martial Arts Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvchinesemartialartslanguageplayerdemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Tai Chi Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvtaichilanguageplayer-demov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Korean Martial Arts Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvkoreanmartialartslanguageplayerdemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Muay Thai Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvmuaythailanguageplayerdemov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Indian Martial Arts Language Player — Demo V1

https://dvindianmartialartslanguageplayer-demov1.ronenkoltonyehuda.workers.dev/

DV Language and software concept by Ronen Kolton Yehuda (MKR: Messiah King RKY).

Check out my blogs on Medium, Substack & Blogger:

Medium: https://medium.com/@ronenkoltonyehuda

Substack: https://substack.com/@ronenkoltonyehuda

Blogger: https://ronenkoltonyehuda.blogspot.com/

MKR: Messiah King RKY (Ronen Kolton Yehuda) 