Mr. Wu Dao-Gong, professor of violin and traditional Chinese violin, composer, who graduated from the Anhui Academy of Arts and subsequently performed there as a concert artist, has lived since 1983 in Rome, where he has pursued further advanced and specialized study with the eminent violinist Maestro Arrigo Pelliccia of the National Academy of «Santa Cecilia», and carried out extensive research into the ideographic aspect of music notation. The innovative model is the result of a felicitous encounter between those elements of tradition and rationality, typical of Western musical culture, and several themes that originate in Chinese culture and that act as a catalyst, while respecting the basic framework of universally diffused music notation.

    The definitive text of the Treatise on the Hexagram is an enlarged and updated version of the first edition published in 1990, and is the result of re-examination and research over a period of twelve years. It is a practicable system independent of any tendency and particular school, can either fulfil the evolutional demands of contemporary and avant-garde music, or satisfy the need for the divulgation, promotion, and development of classical and traditional music. It is an elaboration whose goal is universal contact and the shared advancement of musical culture in humanity’s third millennium.
    The proposal of Hexagram notation is based upon ample research, it inherits and preserves the theoretical and artistic achievements of Pentagram notation and its customary application. It makes use of a methodology that modifies the formal and mathematical logic, but does not change the way of reading and writing the notes. Having thus found a “keystone” — a logical formula and a unified rule that is simple, versatile, and multifunctional — it does not involve beginning again from zero, but rather a conceptual conquest and a process of transformation. Once musicians have understood the basic concepts of the Hexagram system, they can all master it immediately and be ready to soar again in flight from the ground of Pentagram theory.
    The emergence of Hexagram notation, which corresponds to the most advanced technical-musical demands of today, sums up the best achievements of musical ideography in history and resolves the difficulties encountered up until now. It normalizes and rationalizes musical ideography, with the utmost simplicity and functionality. The Tonic Do/La solfeggio notation on the hexagram, not only can highlight the tonality and strengthen musical perceptiveness, but can also allow unrestricted modulation of key at pleasure; these methods are not only in effective accordance with professional application, but also providing both an efficient applicative modality for the popularization of singing activities, and a divulgative method of musical education in primary and secondary schools. In fact, the appearance of Hexagram notation is neither the result of a momentary fashion nor the sign of an ephemeral trend, but rather a painless birth and peaceful revolution. Its emergence will open up new horizons on the high seas of free musical navigation.