Music is sound.

Musical notation is a way to describe and record musical sound. It is, necessarily, less than perfect, and therefore involves all kinds of complicated subtleties in cases where an effort is being made to "write" musical sound with the utmost precision. Hence the current controversy.

This is NOT a case of "the chicken or the egg," where there is any possible doubt about "which came first." Music came first, and is absolutely primary; musical notation is secondary.

Not to denigrate music theory or musical literacy, which are as important in their own roles as reading-and-writing literacy. But reading and writing are not more important than the thoughts and ideas that they express, and certainly no more critical than spoken language.

Teaching and learning the craft of playing a musical instrument (including the voice) is not the same as a study of theory. As a student becomes more adept and advanced, different aspects of theory will occasionally come up and need to be explored. But the first and most basic effort should always be a concern with how to make a sound, the right sound, with the highest possible degree of musicality.