D.S.S. appeared before D.S. Should the D.S.S. be ignored in the first repeat?

Question

I'm making lead sheet with the following form:

Intro-A-B-C/ Instrumental-A-B-C/ A-B-Outro

The picture below is my interpretation, assuming D.S.S al Coda ignored in the first repeat. Would the solution be possible?

Answer 1

Although technically correct, it is all but guaranteed to cause confusion.

Instead, you could use a very long first ending that incorporates the instrumental section. So the form would be:

Intro
||: A (segno) |
| B (to coda) |
| C | C-first ending | Instrumental :||
    | C-second ending (D.S. al coda) |

| Coda (= Outro) ||

Answer 2

While the rationalized suggestion from Aaron's answer is logically valid, it is also important to make efforts in making the structure as easily readable as possible to the musicians.

Standard symbols are suited for relatively simple structures; trying to extend them for more complex cases often results in an important loss of time and concentration for the musicians in order to recognize those symbols and therefore understand the actual structure: they will be more worried about "reading+understanding+applying" what they read, distracting them from what they should actually do: play.

Musicians reading such complex structures based on "extended" symbols will eventually memorize the structure on their own, meaning that all efforts you put in trying to write a pseudo-standard notation will be completely wasted.

There is absolutely no ban in writing a clear text explanation for a musical structure: one of the main purposes of notation is clarity, which implies that musicians must be able to understand what's written as soon and easily as possible, so that they can focus on the music; using complex adaptations of relatively standard notation will complicate things to you and, most importantly, to the performers.

You have 6 distinct sections, which are the basic blocks of the piece:

• Intro
• A
• B
• C
• Instrumental
• Outro

Leave those sections written in full, with each one having its clear labels, and add a note to the top or bottom of the score, explaining the structure. Just ensure that that notes are written in a more hierarchical representation, as even using different lines might be enough for clarity.
For instance:

- Intro
- A + B + C
- Instrumental
- A + B + C
- A + B + Outro

The benefit of doing the above is that it's also very easy to extend, in case performers want to slightly alter the structure, because they know the basic elements on which the piece is based.

For instance, if they want to add solos for each instrument on the "Instrumental" section, but only once for each "A+B+C+Instrumental" group (thus making A+B+[C] a sort of chorus), then it's quite simple for you or them to slightly change the note:

- Intro
┌ - A + B + C    ┐
└ - Instrumental ┘ × (guitar + sax + trumpet)
- A + B + C
- A + B + Outro

Answer 3

With the given solution I’d be really confused on how you intend this to be. Do you intend to have Intro - A - B - C - D (Instrumental) - A - B - A - B - Outro? Or do you want Intro - A - B - C - D (Instrumental) - A - B - A - B - C - D - Outro? Jump marks like this originate in a particular baroque and later song structure, which consisted of a main part, an interlude and then repeats the main part. Commonly you find this in the Trio-Form and the da-capo arie. But once things get more complex is becomes quite complicated to follow such instructions. Especially in Pop music there is quite a lot of abuse of such jump marks, leading to really confusing scores (I’ve seen a score using a jump mark for a single alternate measure in a repeat).

Often it is adviceable to produce longer scores and write out the parts rather than relying on intransparent jump instructions.

If you have a piece that is made up of very clearly defined blocks that are combined in different ways it might make sense to do something like this:

(though note that this will become unfeasible when you have more music than fits one stand).

But if I understand your score correctly you essentially have Parts A-D plus an Introduction and a Coda, and essentially want to have

    Intro - |: A - B - C - D :| - Outro

just skipping certain parts during some repeat counts. This you could do using volta brackets:

or potentially an instruction like this:

Answer 4

Since A is always followed by B, there's no reason to consider them separately in the roadmap. Instead of

Intro-A-B-C/ Instrumental-A-B-C/ A-B-Coda

... you might as well have (changing A-B to X and C to Y):

Intro-X-Y/ Instrumental-X-Y/ X-Coda

Now this could be mapped as a rondo -- A-B-C-B-D:

Intro+X | Y | Instrumental+X | Y | X+Coda

Relating this back to the image in the question, the first section is 26 bars, Intro-A-B; the first refrain is 14 bars, C; the middle section is 26 bars, Instrumental-A-B; the second refrain is the same as the first, and the last section is 27 bars, A-B-Coda. I obviously have no idea whether this form makes sense given the musical material, but certainly 26+14+26+14+27 is a more symmetrical way of presenting it than 40+40+27 (then again, not all musical forms are symmetrical).

This reminds me a bit of Schlummert ein, a Bach aria that has two middle sections, so A-B-A-C-A. Bach wrote out the second A section in its entirety and used da capo only for the third A section. This would be an option here, though it would mean writing A-B-C twice, 31 redundant bars.

Another option would be to take this as the verse/refrain form of the 19th and early 20th centuries, where "verse" is A-B and "refrain" is C, with different introductions for the first and second verse. This doesn't make the roadmap simpler, but it might help with the approach suggested by musicamante.

I'd consider using the word "Verse" instead of a traditional segno, but either way you don't need to put two different signs at that one point; you can have to Verse or D. S. in two places pointing to the same indication at the beginning of A.

Intro - Verse - Refrain - Instrumental - Verse - Refrain - Verse - Coda

As I write this, I am leaning towards the idea of just having a repeat from the end of the Instrumental to the beginning of A with D.S. al Coda at the end of C and the coda marked at the beginning of C (using ‡ here instead of the traditional coda sign). This gives :

       %         ‡     D.S. al ‡                 ‡
Intro ||: A  | B | C           | Instrumental :||  Coda |]

But that is still going to cause confusion in rehearsal because you have to ignore the D.S. the first time around. To avoid that, you can include A and B in the coda:

                ‡                     ‡
Intro ||: A | B | C | Instrumental :|| A | B | Coda |]

It means you're copying an extra 17 bars -- 76 instead of 59 -- but the improvement in clarity is well worth it.