>The next level of explanation is to say: “Yes, I recognize that D-sharp and E-flat sound the same, but they function differently, and the spelling communicates this functional difference.” This explanation always bothered me, because if the “function” is limited to the page and isn’t audible, then is it even a real thing?
A feature of notated music (which is what most of us mean when we say "[western] classical music") is that there can be things notated and not heard. Similarly, there are also different notations which correspond to the same sound. Notation is ambiguous, and this can be a source of both frustration (for the students) and invention (for the composers). Charles Rosen opens his book The Romantic Generation with a fascinating discussion about music which is seen and not heard which deals with this philosophical issue.
Of course this practice goes back much further. Composers have been playing with notation for a long time and it reached a peak of sophistication in the 15th century, as Emily Zazulia demonstrated in her PhD thesis and book[1]. This quality is obviously absent in musical cultures which do not rely on notation. I imagine to the outsider it appears as if the notation itself has taken on a life of its own to the detriment of the sounding music. Of course there is a certain elitism involved as well since explaining subtleties in notation is also a sure way of ostentatiously demonstrating one's erudition, which may explain why these kind of discussions are perennially popular here ;).
I would argue the difference is heard in music that broadly follows tonal harmony. Sure, the note it self sounds the same, but the difference is context. That context is there regardless of whether it is heard or seen.
Edit: just to add some detail: you can definitely hear if something sounds Lydian. If it sounds Lydian, you know that's a sharp 4, not a flat 5. Put it in C e.g., then it's an F# and not a Gb, and you can hear that.
The author frequently uses the term “same note” when the more accurate term in this context would be “same pitch.” Your comment and the next one up both clarify why having differently-named notes that use the same pitch matters.
My favorite illustrstion of this is “Call Me A Hole”, a mashup where the vocal track of NIN’s “Head Like A Hole” is played atop the music track of Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe.” A vocal performance that was originally seething with rage is transformed into a disco pop anthem, and the main reason it works is because “Call Me Maybe” was written in the relative major key to “Head Like A Hole.” The same vocal pitches—the whole melodic structure—functions entirely differently, with hilariously effective results.
The mashup is an in-the-large example of the musical context you mention. D-sharp and E-flat is the same principle, just at a much more fine-grained scope.
Yes, exactly. A note is rarely found by itself, and looking at the context surrounding the note usually clears up the function of a note pretty quickly. Now that I think about it, the notation actually reduces ambiguity in this case since it specifies the function of notes which have the same sound.
A feature of notated music (which is what most of us mean when we say "[western] classical music") is that there can be things notated and not heard. Similarly, there are also different notations which correspond to the same sound. Notation is ambiguous, and this can be a source of both frustration (for the students) and invention (for the composers). Charles Rosen opens his book The Romantic Generation with a fascinating discussion about music which is seen and not heard which deals with this philosophical issue.
Of course this practice goes back much further. Composers have been playing with notation for a long time and it reached a peak of sophistication in the 15th century, as Emily Zazulia demonstrated in her PhD thesis and book[1]. This quality is obviously absent in musical cultures which do not rely on notation. I imagine to the outsider it appears as if the notation itself has taken on a life of its own to the detriment of the sounding music. Of course there is a certain elitism involved as well since explaining subtleties in notation is also a sure way of ostentatiously demonstrating one's erudition, which may explain why these kind of discussions are perennially popular here ;).
[1] https://global.oup.com/academic/product/where-sight-meets-so...