The musical notes are ascii characters. There was a posting on the old message board on the exact characters. I never bothered to use it, as I prefer simple and sweet.
As far as hot buttoning switching weapons/instrument goes, there's only the utility between the chair and the keyboard. :)Swapping isn't macroable. But with a better UI over the default, switching becomes less tidious.
As far as the UI question, check the UI forum. There are so many out there that it isn't funny. However, one thing to bear in mind when using a custom UI: Sometimes SOE changes files, altering the default UI. This has the tendency of breaking the custom UI being used, forcing you to go back to the default until the creator (or someone else) posts a fix to it.
Polara Magami
63 Melodic Disciple