Repeated bars?

Question

It has been a while since I have come across it, but i now feel the need to use the musical symbol to indicate that the following bars are identical to the ones before it. Would I be correct in thinking that the symbol on the stave should look something like this:
//
Also, does this only mean one bar or can it apply to a phrase? What symbol can be used to apply to a phrase?

Thanks Douglas. Does that apply only to a bar or more? I want it to be two bars repeated a few times.

No, I must have explained poorly... I don't meant for it to be repeated using double bar lines and repeats, I'll show you what i mean:

1---2---3---4---5---6---7---8---
|----|----|----|----|----|----|----|----|


Now this is what the music looks like across the page. Imagine some notes in bars 1-4. Without using repeat signs, and without having to write the whole thing out again, I want bars 5-8 to be implied to be exactly the same. It MUST follow that layout across the page, not:
||:----|----|----|----:||

Answer 1

To repeat a number of bars, say play the last 8 bars again, you don't have to use repeat marks. You put two empty bars and across the barline between them place the % symbol, but with solid dots instead of the little "o"s, and with the diagonal slash doubled. Then above the symbol you write "8" or however many bars you want played again.
This way you can keep track of bar numbers, and keep other parallel parts in co-ordination.

Answer 2

If you want to show a repeat for a single bar, you can do what looks like a percent sign (%). You can do that as many times as you need to. I believe you can also do just one bar like that and write a number above to indicate how many times to repeat it. I'm not 100% sure on that one.

If you want to repeat a phrase, you need a double bar with dots behind it ( ||: ) at the beginning of the phrase and a dots in front of a double bar ( :|| ) at the end of the phrase.

Good luck!

Answer 3

It looks like %, only the circles are filled in.

It applies to one bar, but the ||: .... :|| sign applies to a whole phrase.

Answer 4

i dont' got to bars...