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As shown in the second bar of the third complete system (fourth system on the page), I guess it tells me to play like this on first/second time or something.

What is the name of notation? I searched Del Segno but it doesn’t seems right.

Score excerpt

Elements in Space
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Trollman Cheung
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  • 3
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    To help future people searching for this same question, please include the title of the piece. – Aaron May 12 '21 at 13:57
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    Notice there's double the beats in that measure, a strong hint :-) that you play either the first group *or* the group inside the parentheses. – Carl Witthoft May 12 '21 at 14:52
  • D.S. means "dal segno" (note the spelling), but knowing that won't be particularly helpful here. This notation is idiosyncratic, nonstandard, unusual, etc. – phoog May 14 '21 at 13:53

1 Answers1

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It means that the very first time that measure is played, it's played with the non-parenthesized notation. On any subsequent visits to that measure, it's played according to the parenthesized notation.

There's no special name for this instruction, but it serves a similar purpose to writing separate "endings":

X: 1
T: First and second "endings"
M: 4/4
K: Db clef=bass middle=D
L: 1/8
G,G- G3/2A,/2- A, A2 F |1 F,F- F3/2B,/2- B,3E ||2,3,4  F,F- F3/2B,/2- B,4 ||
Aaron
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    Personally, I would prefer the typesetter to have written two Bass Clef lines for those measures (one above the other), with the "D.S.x" marking in front of the extra staff. – Carl Witthoft May 12 '21 at 14:54
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    What do the D S and x stand for? – AakashM May 13 '21 at 08:49
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    @AakashM "D.S." stands for "Dal Segno" (a type of repeat indicator); the "x" stands for the number of times the "D.S" indication (elsewhere in the music) has been encountered. So the "D.S.x" means "play these notes each time you are following a D.S. repeat indication." – Aaron May 13 '21 at 10:31
  • I would have read it the other way around, the "X" means don't play (as in "cross out") on the D.S. – Duston May 13 '21 at 13:45
  • @Duston So you'd play the parenthetical part first time, and the non-parenthetical part on the D.S.? – Aaron May 13 '21 at 14:02
  • @Aaron No, what I meant was to omit the part in parens on the D.S., but looking again, I see that's wrong. After counting the beats, I agree you play the non-paren part the first time and the paren part on the D.S. – Duston May 13 '21 at 16:48
  • Have you ever seen this sort of notation before? I have not. I would be less surprised to see a third staff of two measures' duration showing the alternate left hand part. – phoog May 14 '21 at 13:54