| Term | Description |
|---|---|
| Dance music | Dance music is music composed specifically to facilitate or accompany dancing. |
| Degree | In music theory, a scale degree is the name of a particular note of a scale in relation to the tonic (the note of the scale that is considered the most important). |
| Dialogue accompaniment | Dialogue accompaniment is a form of call and response in which the lead and accompaniment alternate, the accompaniment playing during the rests of the lead and providing a drone or silence during the main melody or vocal. |
| Diatonic and chromatic | Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are most often used to characterise scales, and are also applied to intervals, chords, notes, musical styles, and kinds of harmony. They are very often used as a pair, especially when applied to contrasting features of the common practice music of the period 1600–1900. |
| Diatonic scale | In music theory, a diatonic scale is a seven-note musical scale comprising five whole-tone and two half-tone steps, in which the half-steps are maximally separated. Thus between each of the two half-steps lie either two or three whole-steps, with the pattern repeating at the octave. |
| Diatonic set theory | Diatonic set theory is a subdivision or application of musical set theory which applies the techniques and insights of discrete mathematics to properties of the diatonic collection such as maximal evenness, Myhill's property, well formedness, the deep scale property, cardinality equals variety, and structure implies multiplicity. |
| Diddle | In percussion, a diddle is a pattern consisting of two consecutive notes played by the same hand (either RR or LL). |
| Diminished seventh | In music theory, a diminished seventh is an interval encompassing nine semitones, or a particular chord containing this interval. |
| Diminished seventh chord | A diminished seventh chord is a seventh chord comprising a diminished triad plus the interval of a diminished seventh above the root. |
| Diminution | Diminution, from Italian diminuimento, is a musical term used to mean different things in the context of melodies and intervals or chords. A melody or series of notes is diminished if the lengths of the notes are shortened. An interval is diminished if a minor or perfect interval is narrowed by a chromatic semitone; a diminished chord is constructed of stacked minor third intervals. |
| Dirge | A dirge is a somber song expressing mourning or grief, such as would be appropriate for performance at a funeral. |
| Dissonance | In music, dissonance is the quality of sounds which seems "unstable", and has an aural "need" to "resolve" to a "stable" consonance. |
| Divertimento | Divertimento is a music genre, with most of its examples stemming from the 18th century. The mood of the divertimento is most often lighthearted (as a result of being played at social functions) and it is generally composed for a small ensemble. |
| Dominant | In music, the dominant is the fifth degree of the scale. For example, in the C major scale (white keys on a piano, starting with C), the dominant is the note G; and the dominant chord uses the notes G, B, and D. |
| Dotted note | In Western musical notation, a dotted note is a note with a small dot written after it. The dot adds a half as much again to the basic note's duration. If the basic note lasts 2 beats, the corresponding dotted note lasts 3 beats. |
| Double bar | A double bar can consist of two single barlines drawn close together, separating two sections within a piece, or a barline followed by a thicker barline, indicating the end of a piece or movement. |
| Double fugue | A double fugue has two subjects that are often developed simultaneously, similarly it follows that a triple fugue has three subjects. |
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