Close Encounters theme spells out "your spring" in Solresol

[Gray Richardson]

Today is composer John Williams' 81st birthday. That made me recall the movie Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind and the musical language used to communicate with the aliens. I knew it was based on Solresol, the language of musical tones and colors invented by François Sudre, circa 1827. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solresol) But I wondered if the music "uttered" in the movie actually said anything intelligible in Solresol, and if so, had anyone translated it?

A cursory search of the internet turned up nothing. I finally managed to find this post on the Conlang Mailing List archive from way back in 1999 which said:

I still haven't worked out exactly what the close encounters theme means
(I think it's RMDSL, but I'm not positive), but here is a plausible translation:
MR R=AFM S=AFRS ML
que your language here/is here
"let your language be here"

The only thing is, he got the notes wrong. The actual notes from the iconic 5 tone theme were: re mi do do sol.

So I tried to translate it myself. There aren't any breaks in rhythm, so you can't tell where the word boundaries are. However, searching the Solresol dictionary, I found only one combination that works: RM DDS, which translates as "your spring." (or ton automne per Sudre's original Solresol-French dictionary.) Not exactly the auspicious greeting I was expecting!

So I suppose that, while the language was inspired by Solresol, the movie music doesn't really convey anything meaningful in that tongue. I guess they were going for musicality over authenticity, which is probably what they should be doing if they are trying to engage an audience. Even so, I was a little disappointed after all this time to find out that whole conversation with the aliens was all very pleasant sounding gibberish. But you have to hand it to John Williams for writing such a memorable theme that sticks with us after all these years.

[Ambrisio]

Well, here's an inspiration for a Proto-Ginösic way to greet aliens, and newcomers in general: "ngouldrõ guuk" (your spring) (the word 'spring' denotes life and joy for Ginösic people).

[Ulrike Meinhof]

"your spring." (or ton automne per Sudre's original Solresol-French dictionary.)

So... 'your autumn'?

[Gray Richardson]

Okay, I'll bite. In Celestial, "your spring" (the season) would be sofino ui.
Actually, technically, that's "spring of you," (triliteral root SFN in noun form, abstract gender, nominative case with 2d person genitive pronoun) which is how I would say it.
But, alternatively, you could say sofino uio, with the pronoun in attributive adjective form and matching nominative case ending, which would be the more literal translation of "your spring."

[Gray Richardson]

"your spring." (or ton automne per Sudre's original Solresol-French dictionary.)

So... 'your autumn'?

By golly, you're right! Something about that was bugging me but I didn't clear the mental hurdle.
The English dictionary has DDS as "Spring." http://www.datapacrat.com/True/LANG/SOL ... CTIONA.HTM
But Gajewski's French dictionary has "dds" as automne. http://www.datapacrat.com/True/LANG/SOL ... LRESOL.HTM
He has printemps as ddso.

I think this third dictionary solves the mystery: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc ... n_US#gid=0

In Sudre's original dictionary he spelled out the words with vowels. And he used the syllable "si" instead of "ti."
Spring (printemps) is didisol, while autumn (automne) is didisi, which is confusing because the abbreviation dds is ambiguous. It should probably be pronounced diditi and abbreviated DDT for clarity's sake.
One site is using the abbreviaion T for si/ti, and S for sol, but Gajewski's French dictionary abbreviates "si" as s and "sol" as so.

But, in the end, "your spring" is the correct English translation for remi dodosol, which was the musical phrase in Close Encounters.